Here at the Beijinger, all the signs are that the holiday season is in full swing. Which is to say that there are a few more empty seats in the office than usual and there's a Christmas tree by the reception desk. Ah well, let's make the most of it - pour yourself a nice warm cup of mulled wine (or crack open a festive Yanjing), break out the mince pies and get into the spirit of things with our roundup of this weekend's Christmas parties! (Plus a hint of what to look forward to for New Year)

Before we hit the weekend's action, The Brick is doing a charity Christmas raffle tonight (Wednesday) - tickets are on sale until 9pm, so hurry down there if you're in the area. Prizes include food and drinks vouchers for Villa Castanea, Stumble Inn, Union, Luga's, Saddle Cantina, Fubar, 12SQM, Booze2u and, of course, The Brick itself. There are also beauty treatments and a 30GB flash drive to be won. The raffle will be drawn during The Brick's weekly quiz night. All proceeds go to the very worthy cause of Ping An Medical Foster Home, the charity The Brick helped us to support with our recent Charity Super Quiz. If you're in Shuangjing, you've no excuse, so hit up The Brick - if you can drink two of their Terminator cocktails and still stand up, you'll probably also win the quiz, so double reason to get down there.

Right, on to the holiday weekend, and we'll keep this simple, starting with Friday's events:

December 23
87 FEI 87: Eskweeemo Edition
Verktyget and Black Mansions bring skweee, Lapland crunk and more. RMB 20 (includes one free beer). 11pm. School (6402 8881)

Haze Club Night
Zhi Qi, Yang Bing and Kaize set you up for the weekend. Free. 10pm. Haze (5900 6128)

The Syndicate presents Goldie
Drum & bass founding father returns to lock horns with The Syndicate. RMB 100, RMB 70 (advance). 10pm. Yugong Yishan (6404 2711)

Woman of Techno: QQ
QQ proves girls can DJ too. Free. 10pm. Lantern (135 0134 8785)

Wu Opening Party
If you couldn't guess, Wu is a new club in Wudaokou, located in the basement of the U-Center. They throw their doors open this Friday for a night of free Tsingtao, cocktails and tequila. Free. 8pm. Wu (189 1020 6978)

Next, up it's Saturday, or Christmas Eve as some of us call it, or December 24 as everyone else calls it:

December 24
Acupuncture “Tech-the-Halls” Xmas Party
Acupuncture put some techno needle into Christmas. RMB 100. 10pm. Lantern (135 0134 8785)

Christmas at Aria
Valeria Proano and her jazz trio kick off the celebrations, with festive canapes, and fine drinks.
Free. 9pm-2am. Aria, China World Hotel (6505 2266 ext 6644)

Eddie’s Weekend
Christmas Eve bleeps and beats with X.Lee and Johnny Z. Free. 10pm. Mo Lounge (6413 1019)

Haze Xmas Bash
Yang Bing, Pancake Lee, Kaize and Zhi Qi get the Santa hats on. Special “Santa” drinks all night for RMB 25. RMB 60. 10pm. Haze (5900 6128)

Hotpot
DJ Wordy gets his Santa hat on, bearing musical gifts. RMB 50 (after 11pm). 10pm. Punk (6410 5222)

Suzie Wong’s Christmas Party
Sexy Santa outfits at the ready – and that’s just the guys. Reservations at 138 1112 3770. RMB 200. 9pm. Suzie Wong’s (6500 3377)

Zeta Christmas Eve Party
If Santa was going to turn up at any Beijing Christmas party, it’d probably be this one. RMB 199 (includes three hours of free-flow spirits, wine, beer and finger food). Zeta Bar (5865 5050)

For Christmas Day, not so much happening with the clubs, but Great Leap have announced they'll be doing a Holiday Ugly Sweater Party on December 25 from 3-10pm. They encourage everyone to come equipped with "something to share" (presumably something edible as opposed to personal tales of woe), but it's free to get in, there'll be live bluegrass and a tent outside with heaters to keep everyone warm. Our Style Editor has already done the research and worked out where to buy some suitably tasteless knitwear, so check out her post here if you're in need of a reindeer sweater.

Looking ahead to New Year's Eve, we'll have a full roundup of what's going on coming very soon, but December 31 highlights will include British DJ and producer Darren Emerson headlining a bill of local talents at FDC's Nova New Year's Party - full details here - Acupuncture and Yen throwing their by now well-established and sure-to-be-mobbed Genesis and Countdown parties respectively, as well as Migas hopefully debuting their new bar as part of their New Year celebrations, and more intimate clubber-friendly parties at Haze and Mo Lounge. At the higher end, there'll be champagne and fancy frocks at Aria, Zeta and Xiu, and live music for the Lido crowd at Eudora Station. That's just a taster, so keep it here for full details on all of the above and more!

PHOTOS: The Guardian, wowdewow and courtesy of the organizers