Edit: I was so excited to post, forgot to mention, my SS did an awesome job wrapping each gift individually.

Merry Christmas and thank you SS! Love the gifts

The Rush picks will go great with my machine, a nice little tool kit for those harder to reach spots, an awesome Nightmare on Elm Street shirt(wife is trying to claim), and some good popcorn for our family to enjoy, simply awesome.

Thank you to all who participated this year, Merry Christmas to you all, enjoy the day!

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It was hard but I waited until this morning to open my gifts. A couple nice quality arcade related t-shirts, socks and a set of custom pinballs for Iron Maiden. Can't wait to give them a try. Thank you SS and Les Manley!

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I got a new pinball machine! Nice touch adding the batteries! Thank you secret Santa! I love it. The sign is so cool. Merry Christmas pinside family! Thanks les Manley for this great program

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Dear Secret Santa, Thank you for all of the gifts it was truly magical opening everything this morning. I was joking I wanted a red head for Christmas and one showed up on the Gorgar shirt! I think the shirt speaks too but only like 7 words Used books are the best books too! I love your personally crafted Pac-Man figures I am going to hang them in the window over my front door. Plus all of the Star Wars pancake pans and the Grogu are over the top! May the force be with you this new year and may you live long and prosper. Thanks again!

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When Santa knows, he knows! Thank you for the amazing gifts! Happy holidays everyone!

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Thanks secret Santa- stern Led Zeppelin shooter rod and a fun sticker!

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Love this sticker ❤️

Merry Christmas to everyone around the world!

I felt like another kid in the house this morning when opening presents. There's something great about being surprised on Christmas morning!

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My SS did his homework on my machines and interests and knocked it out of the park with this one. I'm in to motorcycles, retro pop culture and nostalgic items, and own an Evel Knievel so... I couldn't believe it when I opened a classic Evel Knievel Stunt Cycle!!

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I had really enjoyed how Pixar paid hommage to that toy in Toy Story 4 (as the Canadian Duke Caboom)...

Already enjoyed playing with it this morning with my 9 year and 2 year old girls!

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And to top it off, a set of all 3 Novus and nice microfiber cloths. Now I have no excuse to get my machines back up to their original high gloss shine!

Thank you to my SS for bringing so much Christmas Magic to my first Pinside Secret Santa experience.

Wishing everyone and your families a happy and healthy holiday season! And lots of success in 2023, may we all get to set our initials as grand champion on at least one of our friends' pinball machines!!

Thanks a million to John (@LesManley) for making all this happen!

AWESOME. I need that EK too. Very cool

Best sticker ever!

Thank you Secret Santa I’ll be wearing this shirt while upgrading Tron with my new shooter plate. Merry Christmas to all who are enjoying the best once a year thread on Pinside!

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My second package unpacked!

Brian Allen Alien print!

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Thanks to my SS! Drac and Frank figures, some Kirk guitar pics, and a kick ass print of Lugosi’s Dracula. Luckily I had an extra 12 x 18 frame hanging around so it’s already in there and ready to hang!

AND an original Halloween print autographed by Nick Castle (which will look great right next to my homebrew pin).

Merry Christmas to everyone.

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Haven't opened gifts just yet, but Marshmallow wanted us to wish you all a Merry Christmas, a Happy Holiday of all types, and to keep on flippin.

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I LOVE IT!!

Atomic Arcade with the little bell sounds, priceless!!

Thanks Secret Santa for the Tshirts and the pinball art.

Love it…

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Fun update from Secret Santa 2021 ... back at the end of my SS post last year (https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/official-2021-pinside-secret-santa-participants-thread/page/5#post-6634373), I'd taken one of my gifts -- an awesome mini Twilight Zone pinball machine -- and stashed in in amongst my mom's Parade of Cows collection to see how long it would take her to notice it. Just arrived for Christmas dinner and got an earful for messing with her cows, because she JUST finally found it yesterday. It sat in there amongst the herd for an ENTIRE YEAR! Bwahahaha

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Thank you Secret Santa for all the gifts, can’t wait to install Godzilla! And thank you for making me the first to receive the crochet stuffed chinchilla!

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Thank you so much SS! Someone did some serious homework by finding out I love my Bears even though they’re struggling again this year!! And the pinball blanket is already in use! Thanks again Les for organizing such an awesome program each and every year!

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No water for 3 days in a Siberian Express catching a pretty dern low lattitude unawares. This guy….not bothered in amazing new sweater. Thank you, secret Santa!

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SS made this monster/Metallica kid very happy! Black light was the theme including one in there. Amazing Dirty Donnie signed art collage with all kinds of creepy goodness on it! DD art book. Frankenstein’s monster and Mummy ReAction figures. A pop of the monster from my favorite scene. Thank you soooo much!

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WOW WOW WOW!! Merry Christmas everyone! Again first year doing this and boy oh boy did my wife and I have fun from day one. The SS gifts under the tree were the most talked about and anticipated this year! We share custody with my oldest kid and every other year have to wait to noon till we have Christmas. Every other year that never bothers me, but I was totally watching the clock more than anyone so I could open my SS gifts. Totally felt like a kid again. MY SECRET SANTA IS AMAZING!! With it being my first year I gave minimal minimal ideas! THEY KNOCKED IT OUT OF THE PARK!! Thank you thank you thank you! My whole family had a great time!!

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You don't see many Grado/Ittok LP12 combos out there! Nice rig!

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This shirt is so fricken COOL! It will for sure be worn out faster than any other shirt in my closet!!

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Cool little space invaders arcade game. We have a multigame in our collection and me and my boy play space invaders lots!! Time to challenge him on a mini version!! Cant wait!

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Fun little Christmas cheer with mint chocolate that my wife claimed as they are her favorite!

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A cool game room addition. I thought it would be a great idea to have my daughter open it up and spell “thank you secret santa” on it and display it in the picture… and she opens it and this was on it!!!

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How awesome is that!!!!!

And then the OTHER gift!!! Yes there was more!!

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we have Cactus Canyon on order, and is my wife and mine’s ‘family bucket list game’! Brain Allen artwork is just phenomenal!! This will be hung proudly!!

And then… another framed piece?!? What yes ANOTHER!!!

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Two….. TWO AMAZING Brain Allen art pieces!! What a shocking Christmas afternoon!! Thank you so much Secret Santa!!!!

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Thank you Secret Santa! My Santa has homes in both Houston and Seattle, so they sent me some goodies from each locale:
From Houston came a cute buc-ees ornament and some delicious buc-ees snacks. From Seattle came a Kraken bumper sticker and a Seahawks water bottle (not pictured, forgot to snap one and I'm at the family's house rn). Also included was a fun t-shirt and a new Pinshield that will got to use on our new 007 LE! Thank you Santa!

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I'm obsessed with Bucc-Ee's. I got this from my niece!

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Should anyone wish to stop by, I will be opening my Secret Santa gifts on stream.

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I wonder if that is a stern insider connected plate to adapt the scanner to the coin door?

Opened the gift with the kiddos. They were pretty excited and want to steal this for their room!

Thank you SS!

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Merry Christmas everyone !!!! And a Happy New Year !!!

Little late to the party but I made it, Merry Christmas everyone! So many great gifts, so many considerate and thoughtful santees out there and mine was no exception! A Mars God of war T-shirt, I've had the game 20 plus years and now finally I've got the swag! A custom drink holder for my Electra, I needed this more than you'll ever know. And a whole slew of bourbons and whiskeys, will definitely come in handy over the rest of this Minnesota winter. Also in the mix, a tilt tumbler for the cup holder no doubt, and a fun mix of stickers and can koozies.Oh yeah,least we not forget, bourbon balls and a spiced fruit cake, it doesn't get more christmasy than that. Hope everyone has a wonderful Christmas, now I'm going to shoot some pinball and drink some whiskey.

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Disco!

Hi all
Merry Christmas!
It seams to be a common post of how all secretsantas have figured everybody out! I’ve got to say that mine has, from the ice cream (chicken legs and the specialties from New York) to the other gifts posted below. Not sure how he/she figured me out ( I’m not very public on any forums ) but they did! Now it’s time for the reveal. I waited till after midnight mass to open them but just got a chance to post. First the bag my kids placed in a box was a great surprise,two vintage tee shirts that I’ll wear with pride!
Next comes the rest, from the puzzle, candles( I always light one when we’re playing),chips( they say there the best), to the candies and the rest! Thank you Santa! Also by the way the poo-pouri has been a big joke with my best friend and his wife for a few years! (By the way my dung don’t sting lol) I also wore the Merry Flipping out Christmas shirt today! (Family loves it)
Thank you Santa for your extreme generosity and thought fullness!
Jim

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My SS really spoiled me and absolutely killed it with the gift choices! I opened up the last 3 today and was blown away with the other gifts! Thank you so much and I hope you and your family are having a fantastic Christmas !

So the first 2 gifts i opened when I received them was a Star Wars Pinball shirt and a set of cliffys for my LAH

Today's gifts were; a framed numbered and signed Brian Allen print from MGC and then a Pandoras Box6 with a new Jamma harness.. and a Pingulp!

Can't wait to get it installed and dive into the library of games on the Pandoras Box.. Thanks so much and Merry Christmas to all the great Santas out there!

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Wow, my Santa just keeps on coming! Opened this in the mail, what an awesome shirt!

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Big thanks to my SS. your generosity is amazing. A cool Atari "Neon" for the wall of the game room, a cool arcade hawaiian shirt A dig Dug mini arcade game, and a couple tubes of caulk for my kitchen project. thanks for all the great gifts.

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To my Secret Santa: I did open up the final two gifts and love them. Life was crazy here today but I will try to take pictures and post tomorrow. Thanks, and sorry for the delay!

Seeing all this goodwill is incredible.

Thanks again LesManley for making this possible. Enjoy the shit out of your CE.

TroyS be like:

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Opened up my gifts during last night's stream.

Again, thank you so much, Santa! You're awesome!

Frohe Weihnachten

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Well, I could say that my Secret Santa killed it, or knocked it out of the park, like almost everyone else has said so far, but that would be selling them short as they went far above and beyond their call of duty for me. This year, for my list of ideas I sent to @lesmanley, I included a number of items that by themselves, were fairly inexpensive as I wanted to help make things easier for any potential Secret Santa to get a great gift without having to break their bank as i know a number of us, myself included, are feeling some of the financial pinch this year.

Well, my Secret Santa had the nerve to just go ahead and get all of those items! What a jerk!

In all seriousness, I had a rough Christmas this year and opening the oversized box to find numerous presents inside was very surprising and the experience of opening gift after gift after gift and have them all be things that were on my list was very humbling and very moving. It really meant a lot to me that someone would be so thoughtful and so overly generous. You even got the color of the t-shirt perfect(I know they offer it in a few shades of grey and even black)!

Again, a huge thank you to my Secret Santa! You definitely helped turn around my Christmas and I will absolutely and cheerfully use each and every one of these gifts. You can count on that! Huge box!Incredible gifts!

Finally getting to post the gifts I opened yesterday. Very cool....Thanks, Santa!

Don't know where you found it, but Gotye mug was over-the-top awesome! (I collect college/university mugs, and unique mugs, so this one is just really super-fun to get. Thank you so much!

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Opened the remaining 3 gifts from my secret Santa yesterday. In keeping with the theme from Santa's home state... A tumbler with the Maryland state flag, pinball coffee cup...and these amazing things called Bergers from Defaurers bakery of Maryland. They are like a cookie but also like a little cake..half fudge, but not a overpowered rich fudge, after eating one...let's just say I ate a few more immediately! They are very tasty, and I've never had anything like them!. My Santa took the time to send all this local flair , and it goes to show you there are special little places all over the country with hidden gems, like that little bakery, and the Maryland crab cake place, and the old bay hot sauce and spice. Those are some things that I would have never knew existed had it not been for Santa. Thanks again Santa it was truly a wonderful experience tasting a little bit of your state!!

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I want to thank my Secret Santa for the awesome gifts. All of them are meaningful and very appreciated! I especially love the bendable driver that comes with the Qila. It's worth its weight in gold. Thank you again!!!!

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For those needing a good headlamp like the one my SS got me, check out a TikTok I made reviewing it.

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTRqGW7QJ/

Finally, Big shout out to LesManley for making this all possible. Can't wait for next year.

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