12 Days of Christmas Ring and Run



It's that time of year again, time to plan the annual Christmas Ring and Run.  We've done this for the last two years in a row, and it's lots of fun to ding dong ditch and run like the wind!  Here's the list that our family uses, there's lots of variations out there on the wide world of web.

ON THE FIRST DAY OF CHRISTMAS, your true love gave to you…a partridge in a pear tree. Sorry, but we can’t find the partridge, so we are giving you some pears from the tree the partridge flew away from. (attach to a can of pears)
ON THE SECOND DAY OF CHRISTMAS, your true love gave to you…two turtle doves…but don’t’ have any…will candy turtles with a bar of Dove soap do? (attach note to a box or plate of caramel turtles w/ a boxed bar of Dove soap.)
ON THE THIRD DAY OF CHRISTMAS, your true love gave to you…three French hens…well, we don’t have any French hens, so we’re giving you some chicken noodle soup, compliments of the three French hens. (attach to can of chicken noodle soup).
ON THE FOURTH DAY OF CHRISTMAS, your true love gave to you…four calling birds…we can’t find those calling birds though! Here are 4 messages they left for you before they flew off! (attach to 4 messages describing what a wonderful person they are)
ON THE FIFTH DAY OF CHRISTMAS, your true love gave to you…five golden rings, but sorry, we’re too poor for golden rings, but will some golden pineapple rings do? (attach to can of pineapple rings)
ON THE SIXTH DAY OF CHRISTMAS, your true love gave to you…six geese a laying, but we know you don’t really want the mess of six geese all over your house, do you? How about some eggs that they left behind! (attach to a half dozen eggs)
ON THE SEVENTH DAY OF CHRISTMAS, your true love gave to you…seven swans a swimming! OK, we looked for the swans, but couldn’t find them, but we did find some bubble bath they used while they were swimming! (attach to bottle of bubble bath)
ON THE EIGHTH DAY OF CHRISTMAS, your true love gave to you…eight maids a-milking. Here is some milk we got from the eight maids — we think they must have been milking some brown cows! (attach to a container of chocolate milk)
ON THE NINTH DAY OF CHRISTMAS, your true love gave to you…nine ladies dancing…Here are some canes used by the nine ladies who were out dancing all night! (attach to a nine candy canes)
ON THE TENTH DAY OF CHRISTMAS: your true love gave to you…ten lords-a-leapin’ – here is some “Ben Gay”, which is highly recommended by the ten Lords we saw out jumping around. (attach to a package of Ben Gay rubbing lotion)
ON THE ELEVENTH DAY OF CHRISTMAS, your true love gave to you…eleven pipers piping, so here is a pipe of your own, have fun with it, but don’t “blow” the whole day! (attach to a bubble pipe and bubble solution)
ON THE TWELFTH DAY OF CHRISTMAS, your true love gave to you…twelve drummers drumming, but we figured twelve drummers drumming would take up way too much room, so we drummed up some cookies for you…hope they keep this from being just another hum-”drum” day for you! (attach to a plate of cookies)

We have adapted this list a bit.  For example, on the first day, I always start scouting for a little inexpensive bird ornament and buy some nice real pears instead of canned ones.  On day two I send along chocolate Dove candy and chocolate Turtles.  For the five golden rings, we like to use the big candy Ring Pops.  For day ten, really, who wants to get Ben Gay?  I can't remember what I substituted last year, but I know I didn't send along any Ben Gay or Rub-A535.  Anyway, this is lots of fun, it's a challenge to not get caught twelve days in a row.  Remember to start on December 13th!