2024 Secret Santa Workout Gift Exchange
The Secret Santa Workout Gift Exchange is back for 2024! Here's how it works:
The Rules:
- You must have an active Check-In Thread here in the Hive to participate. This is so your Santa can read up on the types of workouts you like to do, so they can design a suitable "gift" for you. * If you're new here: Welcome! You can still join in if you set up a new check-in thread now and post at least three updates prior to the Secret Santa assignments going out. (More is better.) Also: if there's not much content in your check-in thread yet, please post an intro/summary of where you're at in your fitness journey right now.
- If you'd like to join in, sign up by commenting on this thread. The deadline to join is Sunday, November 24, 2024.
- If you decide to join in, you will be assigned your giftee, either by me or by my assistant elf (if somebody volunteers to assist me with this task), via DAREBEE private message. Santa assignments will be delivered by Wednesday, November 27. Be sure to check your in-box!
- Once you receive your assignment, go and read your giftee's check-in thread. (If it's really long, just reading the most recent couple of pages is fine.) Then design a 15-30 minute workout that you think will be fun and challenging for your giftee to complete. The theme of the workout is: The Great Getaway Gala. (More on this below.) Write up the workout, and send it via DAREBEE private message, either to me or to my assistant elf (whichever elf gave you the assignment). The deadline for turning in your gift is Saturday, December 7. DO NOT BE LATE!
- I will post all of the workout gifts here in this thread (so you won't know who your gift came from). Your gift will be posted here no later than Sunday, December 22. (The Gift-Wrapping Elf and the Dragon Elf need time to get the gifts wrapped and delivered. Which is why you need to get your gifts submitted on time!)
- You must complete your workout gift and post in your check-in thread that you did it, no later than Sunday, January 5, 2025.
- Is it better to give, or to receive? To investigate this question, you must also complete the gift you gave and post about doing so in your check-in thread. To make it harder for your giftee to identify you, you may break up this workout across multiple days and/or be vague in describing the exercises you did. The deadline for completing this is also Sunday, January 5.
- Read up on your fellow Bees' holiday adventures in their check-in threads and try to guess who was your Santa!
The Rules:
- Try to wrap your gift in a story that explains why your giftee must complete the exercises you have assigned to them. (For some inspiration, check out the awesome gifts that were created for last year's workout gift exchange.) The theme for these stories is: It's been a year, right? The Bees have decided that for our holiday party this year we truly need to get away from it all. So we've planned a getaway to a wonderful, magical land, where the sun always shines, and colours are vibrant and bright. (Unless you prefer shade and muted colours, in which case there is a shade tree that follows you wherever you buzz, and you see only calming, subtle colours--this is a magical land, after all!) In this land the sweetest, most-nourishing nectar drips effortlessly out of giant flowers, flowing freely like rain (and magically tastes like whatever you want it to taste like). But the trouble with galas in far-distant magical lands is that one has to find a way to get to them before the fun can begin, and this can be tricky business. Will your giftee Bee encounter wild weather, rough terrain, road bandits, or mischievous critters en route? Will they forge a path they and their fellow Bees can follow on foot, or build some sort of contrivance to make the journey easier? Whatever the challenges the journey entails, your giftee Bee will conquer them through completing their workout gift.
- Don't be gruesome! We're here to challenge one another. But also to have fun. The workout you design is meant to be a gift. Do not assign anyone 100 burpees! (Unless they've written recently in their check-in thread about how much they LOVE burpees and really hope that Santa will gift them with a high volume of them.)
- All exercises assigned should be no-equipment exercises--unless you know from reading your giftee's recent check-in posts that they have regular access to the equipment you're asking them to use.
- If you assign an obscure exercise, you need to include a link to a demo of how to do it. Anything in the DAREBEE video exercise library is fair game (if it's within your giftee's wheelhouse). For yoga poses, please use pose names from the Pocket Yoga pose library (or provide a link to a demo if you're assigning a specific sequence, or a pose that's not in that library).
- Modifications are fine! If you are gifted with push-ups, but can only do kneeling push-ups at this point in your fitness journey, for example, it's fine to do the kneeling variety. Conversely: if you assign your giftee step-jacks as part of their workout, because you've read in their check-in thread that they're not doing high impact activities at the moment, but you want to do jumping jacks as part of your "gift you gave" workout, this is fine too. Try to complete both the gift you receive, and the gift you gave to the best of your ability, using exercise variations that are right for you. In the Hive, we honour where each individual bee is at in their own fitness journey at this moment in time.
- You are welcome to include fun activities in the gift you design (e.g.: singing, dancing, etc.) if they are appropriate for your giftee Bee.
- All of the gifts, like last year, will be gift-wrapped in the DAREBEE way. To assist you in designing a gift of a suitable length, and to assist the Gift-Wrapping Elf in wrapping your gift, we have some guidelines this year on the number of exercises that can be included. Please see below for details.
- If you have any questions--either about designing your gift, or about how to complete your gift once you've received it, please post them here. (Or you can PM me if posting your question publicly would give away too much about the gift you're designing.) I will try to answer all gift questions myself (so your Secret Santa does not need to out themself by answering themself). Santas: I, or my assistant elf, may contact you via PM if a question is asked about the gift you gave which I don't know how to answer.
- The December 7 deadline is a HARD DEADLINE. Please don't miss it! If you sign up to participate in this gift exchange, you are committing to designing a workout gift for one of your fellow Bees, and submitting it to me (or my assistant elf) between November 27 and December 7, 2024.
- Have fun!
Oh my goodness, thank you so much!!! I love it!! And I especially love that you gave the kitties powers. I suspected from fairly early on, as I have seen the videos with Damer using a bokken and nobody else used one when doing my workout. And the writing was very comfortable and reminded me so much of the RPGs. But I wasn't sure so I waited to guess. 
Thank you for the amazing adventure!
I only have six deductions loaded up right now, but I'll take it easy in case anyone is still hoping to find their Bee on their own.
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