There's not much time to determine who's been naughty or nice when it comes to gift-giving in large families. By mid-October, Jenna and Matthew Adams of Mountain View had already drawn names for their Christmas gift exchange.

With five daughters ranging from 4 to 14 years old, Jenna's four siblings and Matt's six, plus grandparents ... the list just keeps growing.

Jenna recalls that as a child growing up in Centralia, Washington, her mom would take the five kids to the local mall where they'd "buy small things for each person. We loved buying, wrapping, opening," she said. With a total budget of about $20, they could pick up little things, such as lip gloss, nail polish and hair doodads (at least for the sisters).

"When we got older, like high school and college, we had outgrown lots of little junky things," she said, and so they began a gift rotation (oldest gives to the next oldest and so on and so on, with the youngest giving to the oldest).

Today, with most of her siblings married, they are continuing the rotation, only by family rather than individual. And they try to stick to a budget of about $25.

"The idea is more thinking about something you love and want to share, rather than spending a lot," Adams said.

One year, she gave the book "Merry Christmas, Everywhere" by Arlene Eribach, which looks at Christmas in different countries and includes instructions for craft projects. "I filled the box with stuff to make the projects and sent it right after Thanksgiving not expensive, things like a cake mix, a roll of streamers, grains to sprout," she said.

"It gets to be so much stuff. I don't need more stuff. I'd rather have one smaller useful thing that brings the family together than individual sweaters from Aunt Shirley that nobody likes," she said.

Other ideas include a movie along with a large popcorn bowl and smaller ones for family night at the movies. More personalized gifts have included advent calendars with family names or a box of favorite things, from hand lotion to chocolates.

And, of course, there's always that gift card to Amazon, she added.

When Jennifer and Ben Galbraith got married, they gave gifts to every person in the family, Jennifer recalled.

"A couple years into that, I was exhausted. We'd try to get together for Christmas, then we were hauling these gifts in our cars, on an airplane. It got to be too much," the Palo Alto mother of eight said. Soon she was in the "let's talk" and rethink this mode.

Both she and her husband come from large families, often with money short and lists long.

"Because I came from a big family my dad was a professor we learned to be really frugal. My dad was overjoyed for one of those sprayers for his fruit trees. ... I realized I wasn't a very good gift giver because I'd always given very practical gifts," she said. (Early in their marriage her husband gave her high-end bread pans, knowing she'd never spring for them herself; she got him a set of drinking glasses from Walmart. "I was just very very practical," she added.)

When the children were younger (they now range from 13 years down to 7 months), she'd load them into the van on a Saturday, take them to the Dollar Store, give each $1, set a timer and let them go their separate ways.

"That was actually fun. We got really funny gifts and laughed at the random things we unwrapped from the younger children," she said.

Later they tried drawing names, cutting down the number of gifts from 45 to 10.

Even drawing names can get complicated in large families. So far, they've tried exchanging gifts with first cousins, whole families and individual members of the extended families (such as an uncle matching with a nephew).

This year the Galbraiths are breaking the pattern; rather than exchanging gifts (on her side of the family), they're contributing to a travel fund to enable more members of the extended family to get together for Christmas. "Some people can't come to Christmas because of cost," she said, noting that one brother is getting a doctoral degree in Oklahoma, and another lives in Victoria, Canada, and is married with four children.

"One of the benefits of having a large family is you have a support system for life; siblings are with you forever. We have 45 distinct relationships. I want to cultivate that.

"When we drew names, it was a lot more manageable," she said. But the downside was it took seven years to rotate through to that sibling again, she added.

So within their family of 10, they don't draw names, but give to each one.

They accomplish this by taking two children at a time out to dinner and to a shopping center, where each child picks out and pays for gifts for all their siblings. The children accumulate their money via allowance plus tasks, such as babysitting, feeding the cat or walking the dog.

Sometimes the gifts don't involve hard cash: One year the oldest, Jacqueline, gave each of her siblings a "date" taking 2-year-old Victoria to Eleanor Pardee Park and pushing her on the swings for an hour, going on a walk and getting a bagel with 4-year-old Jon Jon; or paying for two brothers to go to a movie with her.

"They loved it. Getting attention from an older sibling is really cool," Galbraith said.

On Ben's side of the family, they're planning to do a cousin exchange, and then buy something for each adult couple.

With eight kids, they're very conscious of keeping things fair on Christmas morning.

"My husband is a stickler to make sure each kid gets the same number of packages to open," she said. So one day in early December she and her husband go to his office, plug the laptop into an overhead projector and fill in a spreadsheet, assuring that each child's gift gets the same "wow factor."

"I started adding up so, if you have 90 just immediate family, then one gift from each couple, plus parents, plus Santa: more than 100 gifts! It's mind-boggling, isn't it?

"I think we need to think more about going in together for gifts, or service-oriented, or dates -- it can get out of hand," she said.

Anna and Greg McKeown, who moved to Menlo Park in 2006, also prefer that each of their immediate family which includes four children from 6 to 12 years old give individual gifts. Both Anna and her husband come from large families but with different traditions.

On Anna's side they do a sibling-rotating exchange. Last year Anna's sister's family of eight had their portraits taken. Anna gathered those photos and had them put on a large canvas, creating a large family portrait.

"Getting it the right size was a challenge," she said. "They live in Arizona in a spacious house, but money can be tight. We have a $50 limit -- more like $50 to $100 -- and some ignore it. To others, it lets them off the hook."

Between their four children, their teachers, one sibling rotation and joining siblings to buy for their parents, the McKeowns still have a considerable list.

On Greg's side, it's simpler, mainly because his relatives live in England and Scotland. They buy presents for his parents, exchange with one sibling, but mainly send cards to the others.

"We used to do a DVD of photos put in a slide show with music. This became quite difficult," she said, noting that people put it off and sent in the photos late. After doing it for three or four years, she decided it was time to pass the torch. "No one picked it up," she added.

For their immediate family, they put the emphasis on smaller stocking-stuffer gifts plus a major family gift. A popular tradition is giving a decorated toothbrush. "We were amazed at how much they loved it. They'll spend half an hour on Christmas morning decorating them with stickers!" she said.

As the children get older, the family gift has evolved into a "memory," usually a trip. In 2013, they went to Costa Rica; last year they went to Spain.

"When we include what my parents and Greg's parents send, there are plenty of gifts. They don't feel deprived," she said.