Do you go to Grandma & Grandpa's on Christmas Day?

[CatholicMom]

Am I being unreasonable that I don't want to pack up the kids on Christmas Day? Just wondered what everyone else does.

 

Dh has 5 siblings who all convene at their parents' house on Christmas day. One of them has 2 kids, the other don't. We are the one who has the oldest kids and the most kids (we have 5). I want to go to Grandma's house on Christmas Eve so we don't have worry about packing up, get gifts read to bring, dressing up the kids, and getting to Grandma's house on Christmas day. I would rather relax at home, drink hot cocoa and let the kids play with their toys. After putting presents under the tree and doing last-minute prep I am also usually exhausted on Christmas day, so getting the kids ready to go and cleaning up is pretty much maxing out my energy at that point. But Grandma wants her adult single kids to open their presents with everyone else (meaning our family, too) on Christmas "morning" (by 1 or 2pm, but the earlier the better).

 

I say it's unusual to have families with little kids go to Grandma's house in the early afternoon or morning ON Christmas day. Growing up, Christmas revolved around your immediate family and we would take our sweet time doing our thing and THEN Grandma & Grandpa would come to us and see what we got for presents. We did the Christmas dinner & presents at my mom's mom's house on Christmas Eve and we would go over to my other grandparents' right across the road and show them what we got and we might have sometimes had a dinner in the afternoon (supper time), not early afternoon or morning.

 

I just hate feeling rushed on Christmas morning and worrying about people "waiting" for us at dh's parents' house. His single siblings are all 28 - 40 yrs old, mind you. :confused1: Is it a big deal for them to open presents on Christmas Eve with everyone, or else to wait until the evening of Christmas Day? I guess they want to do everyone's presents at the same time... Kids & grandkids together, so they don't want to open presents unless we're there.

 

I don't like feeling like Christmas revolves around getting over there - and not about celebrating at our house with our kids, but wondered how everyone else handles it?

 

P.S. Another factor is that we are Catholic and Christmas Day is a holy day of obligation so we must go to mass on Christmas day. Not sure if it's OK to go on Christmas eve or not. I'll have to check, but point being... add getting all the kids to mass on Christmas day, and that's even more packing the kids up and rushing around on Christmas day.

[LifeLovePassion]

DH and I have reserved Christmas day for our immediate family. He has 1 sister(32) and I have 2 brothers (35 and 30) all are single. The pull is strong for us to make an appearance on the day, but it got to be too much. Even with dd1's first Christmas it was nuts for us and not enjoyable at.all. We now schedule a different day, and if we host, we invite everyone for one big gathering. It is much more relaxed for us.

[LifeLovePassion]

double post

[Skadi]

I'd like to see your DH's siblings come over and get your kids ready...then see if it's worth it to them to have you come over! ;)

 

Your DH should take all responsibility for making it immediate family only. It's not you, it's him. He realllly wants a quiet Christmas at home with just the kids. Ayup.

 

I personally wouldn't do Christmas Eve. I'd do the day after Christmas. I definitely honk it's unreasonable to turn Christmas into a family reunion when you're the only one with a big family.

[Dory]

My dh's family always did Christmas eve at one grandparents and Boxing day at the other. Christmas Day they staid home although from the sounds of it extended family often would come to their place during the afternoon and visit.

[KAM]

We did go, for years. And we loved seeing everyone, but it got to be too much. Same reasons as you. We want the day to feel relaxed, we want to spend it in our own home, with our own tree and not go driving around (my Dad is a 40 minute drive away). We stayed home last year and they came to see us. I made it very clear that we would happily see them on a different day if they didn't want to drive, but that's what they wanted and it worked out fine. I have been getting a bit of guilt this year, but I am choosing to ignore it. I want my kids' memories to be about Christmas at our house-not being stuck in the car in holiday traffic, getting home late, and being grumpy when they go to bed!

[HecticMama]

Since we live in NC, and one set of grandparents live in WI (2 days of driving to get there), and the other in AL (1 1/2 days of driving), we go one year to one, one year to the other, and one year at home. Everyone has been pretty satisfied with that. But now that they are getting older, and one grandparent has died on each side, the remaining grandparent has been asking us to come more often. I have to laugh at you guys who think 40 minutes is a drive (no offense meant)! DDs 9 and 11 patiently sit in the car for the trip. We listen to books on CD, and watch/listen to movies and sleep. DH and I do is for each other as a christmas present.

[amyrobynne]

When I was growing up, we'd go to my Dad's cousin's house Christmas Eve, then go to the 10pm church service. Then Christmas morning we'd open stockings, go to my Dad's mom's house for brunch, then go to my Mom's parents' house for Christmas dinner. I'm not sure how we kept from going crazy. It was just my sister and I and we don't have cousins, so things were pretty focused on the two of us.

 

Now, my husband's family (15-20 people) come to our house for Christmas Eve -- potluck supper -- between various families' 4pm church and 10pm church services. Only my husband goes to Mass on Christmas Eve because he sings in choir. Christmas morning my husband, kids, and I go to Christmas Mass. Then things are relatively calm at home until we go to my parents' house mid-afternoon for supper with my mom's family. My dad's sister has us come to her house a few days later. We determined back when we had one kid that one family event was our limit per day. Everyone lives within half an hour so we're never driving for hours and hours. This year, my mom's going through chemo, my sister's pregnant, and my aunt is leaving town shortly after Christmas so things are more up in the air and we might end up hosting most of the Christmas events. We'll see how everyone's feeling.

 

P.S. Another factor is that we are Catholic and Christmas Day is a holy day of obligation so we must go to mass on Christmas day. Not sure if it's OK to go on Christmas eve or not. I'll have to check, but point being... add getting all the kids to mass on Christmas day, and that's even more packing the kids up and rushing around on Christmas day.

It's my understanding that any Vigil Mass counts towards a Holy Day of Obligation (I converted to Catholicism 9 years ago), so a Christmas Eve Mass starting around 4pm or later is fine.

[IceFairy]

I am divorced and we actually live with my parents (i was pretty ill for awhile and still have many many issues, so it works). My kids father does not see them and I keep his adoptive parents away, so we do spend Christmas with my parents a few close friends who stop by.

[*Jen*]

Since we are 12 hours away from family we rotate who's house we are at for Christmas morning. I would love to get to stay home at our own home for Christmas but seeing our siblings is important to us so we make the trek home every year for Christmas. We spend way too much time in the car and I'm not sure how we haven't gone crazy yet. Our families live a little more than an hour apart. Our typical Christmas looks like this. Christmas Eve - Dinner at DH's Grandma's house. Christmas Eve Mass then drive the 30 mins to one of our parents houses. Spend the night and Christmas morning with them. Have lunch and then pack up and leave to drive an hour to other family's house. Spend Christmas evening/night with that family. Then this year my brother has to work on Christmas day and it's my parent's year to host us on Christmas morning so we will be driving the hour back to my parent's house the day after Christmas to celebrate with my brother and his family.

 

It takes a lot of work, but it's been this way for 10 years and I don't see it changing at least until DH's Grandma passes away. We spend every Christmas like it's her last (she's 93) so we don't want to miss a Christmas with her.

[MtnMama]

We spend Christmas Day at home. If other family members want to see us, they are welcome to come over.

[SevenDaisies]

My husband and I battled this one out for several years after having kids. His parents are very needy in comparison to mine. They expect a lot on holidays and I mean, any holiday including Independence Day. Before dh and I had kids, his parents would go to dh's brothers to watch their son open his Santa gifts. Once we had kids they were expecting to do the same thing at our house. I explained that I wanted Christmas morning to be about our immediate family, and that I had no interest in making my kids wait for my in laws to go from brother in law's house to our house before my kids could open their gifts on Christmas morning. It took several years before we arrived at a compromise. Now they give us Christmas morning, and we go to their house around 2 or 3 that afternoon. It's still too early for me - I would prefer to go another night or at least closer to dinner time, but this was the best compromise we could manage. I wish we had more time at home to just relax and enjoy ourselves. I understand your desire, but it wasn't happening for me.

[mom31257]

We have gone to my in-laws' house around Christmas day (give or take a day or two) every year of our marriage. Dh was always in education and had a long time off during the holidays. His family is 11 hours away, and dh's brother lives there. The rest of the family up there never has as much time off as us, so we've always gone up there. I asked dh for just one Christmas at home before dd goes to college and he agreed. Of course, our only niece got pregnant and had a baby this year, so I feel like I can't ask for us to miss the baby's first Christmas. Our kids are really excited about the baby, too. Next year he'll be able to do more and be more fun, so we won't want to miss that either.

 

My family is on the way to my in-laws and about 4 hours away. We do see both families, but I still want to just be here and if anyone wanted to see us they would be welcome to come. I'm really tired of going because we end up having to do Christmas early with our own kids. I think we should at least stop going when dd starts college. Dh is laid off and in school learning web development. He may end up with a job that won't give him much time off during the holiday anyway. That may take care of it for us, or I can always hope!

[~Rachel~]

Well, a trip to England would be a bit far to go see the only grandparents! When my MIL was alive though, I put my foot down and said NO. Christmas Day was for us. She was welcome to come and eat with us, but we were going to spend the day at home where my son (I only had him at the time) could play with his presents.

My compromise was that on Thanksgiving, we went there. It worked for us :)

[duckens]

Loverboy's folks live 4 states away, so we don't visit during the holidays.

 

I don't get along with my parents; and I have decided that I am too old to be unhappy on Christmas.

 

We stay home.

[UrbanSue]

Growing up we always stayed at home on Christmas and the extended family came to us for dinner. So it was the best of both worlds. I was the first (and only for many years) of my three siblings to have kids and I was sort of shocked when my mom still expected us to travel "home" for Christmas. We got out of it for about five years by living way too far away to travel and just putting our foot down about spending a week there. Now we live a mere four hours away and we are expected.

 

Fortunately, since my two siblings are now also married and one even has a baby of his own, we are on an alternating year schedule so it's only every other year we go. And I'm not sure, honestly, how long it will last. My siblings aren't up for the arrangement, either, and there might be a revolt coming soon.

 

Now, don't get me wrong--I love my family! But we would really like to attend Mass on Christmas Day as a family, for example. Or Midnight Mass. Both are out if we need to hit the road first thing on Christmas so we go to a Vigil that isn't even our own parish. But we have dealt with the frustration by really assessing what about our traditions is important to us and making that happen. We decorate the house and trim the tree as a family on Christmas Eve (dh never works that day so it works for us). Then we have a simple early supper and head to a really beautiful Vigil at a parish about half an hour away. We return home and light the tree for the first time and enjoy eggnog and our some of the Christmas treats we've been hoarding. Christmas morning we get up early (of course,with little kids every morning is early!) and have always had cinnamon rolls (prepped the day before and my childhood tradition but we had to go gluten free this year so I'm not sure what we'll do about that!) and then we just do stockings and one gift each.

 

Then we hit the road and arrive by noon--traffic is fast, at least on Christmas morning. We enjoy the day and get back home usually a couple of days later. Then we have really come to embrace the full season of Christmas. Usually other grandparents have shipped gifts for the children. Sometimes church folks send over small gifts. We usually open a gift each day. So far it has worked every year for each kid to have something or for there to be one large family gift each of the Twelve Days of Christmas (we are gift minimalists--most of these come from other family). Then on Epiphany we have cinnamon rolls again, give the kids their "big gift" from us, go to Mass, have a picnic by the tree for supper. And then the tree comes down the next day.

 

On off years we host my whole family here for New Year's Day. The holidays have so much stress so I try to decide where to really put down my claims to having our own tradition and where to just roll with it.

[arghmatey]

Nope. We have our own traditions, and I expect our children will have their own when they are adults with their own family. If not, they are WELCOME, but not OBLIGATED, to join us.

 

We spend all holidays at home. Grandparents are invited if they are capable of behaving like adults.

 

We don't make exceptions, even for Christmas Cancer / Easter Emphysema / Halloween Heart Attack (diseases that tend to "pop up" and then miraculously disappear after the holiday passes when grandparents feel they aren't getting enough obedience).

 

If they don't appreciate the love and attention we shower on them the other 300 plus days of the year, then the holidays certainly aren't going to make us golden children.

[arghmatey]

Double post--sorry!

[shawthorne44]

We have travelled so far, but we won't in the future. I put my foot down last year and said that that was the last year at their house. I am an only child. It was a huge fuss. Dad even said that they weren't coming to our house next year. Mom's argument was that SHE had to travel on Christmas when I was a child so, I should have to travel on Christmas. I pointed out that we moved 1000 miles away from Grandparents when I was 8. What solidified it for me was that I have NO memories of a Christmas before we moved. I remember birthdays and lots of other stuff from much earlier. But Christmases were not special enough to remember before then. Probably because I was miserable and mom was stressed.

 

Of course, we will be moving during December. So they get one more Christmas at their house.

[Stratford]

We spend Christmas Eve with my family, but reserve Christmas Day for spending with our own immediate families. I will add that my in-laws live overseas, so if we are lucky enough to have them visit at Christmas, we'd probably spend most of the time with them, and my family would be fine with that.

[Professormom]

We just do Christmas Eve as our personal family day now. My parents were split up and then adding his family in, we ended up with chaos on Christmas. To avoid rocking the boat (I really have no preference on whether my kids open gifts in the "day" so this works for us), we just made the Eve day like Christmas.

 

I get up when I feel like it, and make a super yummy breakfast with eggs, sausage, pancakes and egg nog. We sit in our pjs until at least noon:-), open gifts, laugh a lot, etc. it is super relaxing. In the evening, we go to a late service with his parents (they go to our church as well as live on the same property). Then, Christmas Day is split between his family and mine and I don't feel resentful at all because we had such an awesome time the day before. It works for us... Good luck!

[StartingOver]

I did for years, we split the holidays. Christmas Eve at the inlaws, and Christmas day at my parents. My mother passed in 2007, and now everyone comes to my house when and if they wish. It is not required at all. I HATED GETTING THE KIDS UP AND READY !!! I would never ask my kids to do this. They are welcome here if they want to come, and I will not be packing up to go anywhere anymore. LOL I still have little ones, and still hate it.

 

Dinner is done at 1 pm, if anyone is hungry. ;-) I love being the Matriarch!

[Homemama2]

We spend Christmas Day at home. If other family members want to see us, they are welcome to come over.

 

 

This. We are willing to go to all the zillions of Christmas events before and after....but Christmas day is spent at home.

[HomeschoolMamaOfTwo]

Ever since my son was first born I have insisted that we are staying home for Christmas. We are not traveling around. All of our parents are divorced and I am not trying to split up one day between four households. My parents live 5 hours away, his are here in town. At first, they were welcome to come over whenever they liked, but it really got to be too much. So, my dad doesn't really care about the day at all, and he just visits at some point later, usually January or so. My mom comes the day after Christmas in the afternoon and she stays with us for a few days. DH's dad, for the last 4 year, has not come at all. And DH's mom didn't come last year, but prior to that she came over on Christmas day in the afternoon usually. This was because DH was usually working every day except Christmas day. This year, I am really insisting that they all pick a day other than Christmas to join us. Christmas Eve, even Christmas night (like after 4), or the day after Christmas in the morning before my mom gets here would be fine. I just really enjoy that ONE day of Christmas without the stress of having visitors. They all stress me out and if I know they are coming, I just can't enjoy the time before hand because I'm just sitting their nervous about their visit and what is going to happen during it (seems there is always drama). I was going to just pick another day for us to celebrate as a family and let them have Christmas day since the actual day doesn't matter to me, but of course, my son is now stuck on December 25th. I'm sure he wouldn't mind if we did it a day early though, on Christmas Eve, so we may do that and then his parents could visit on actual Christmas day since the day is important to them. I don't know. I just know I want one day with my family and watching my kids enjoy their gifts where I don't have to stress out about who is visiting us.

[NotSoObvious]

Absolutely not!

 

My dh's mom is very into Christmas and likes everyone together. When we lived close, we all gathered for Christmas Eve, then we'd go home late. A few out of town siblings would stay at her house with their kids and gifts, which always seemed ludicrous to me, although I understood the alternative was not coming at all.

Christmas Day, Grandma and Grandpa would drive to each of the local families to see the kids and their gifts. That was perfectly fine with me!

 

 

[boscopup]

The last several years, we've done immediate family presents in the morning, first thing. Then we'd go down to DH's grandparents' house (1 hour away) for lunch. Extended family gathered there. Granny's cooking hasn't been exactly safe in recent years, so we usually ate very little there, then headed over to my parents (45 minutes from our house, and probably 45 minutes from DH's grandparents' house) for dinner and more present opening. If my siblings are in town, that's when we all do the get together. If they're not in town (this year, they won't be, as one has a newish baby and the other is about to in the next couple weeks), it's just my family with my parents. My dad cooks a delicious prime rib - and it's safe to eat. :D

 

This year may be different. DH's family get together has moved to his cousin's house, and she's an ER nurse, so she often works on Christmas. Last year, they did it the week before, but DH and I were out of town for his company's Christmas party. He's at a different company now, so we'll be in town and should get to go this year. We'll probably still do dinner on Christmas day, but that would be evening, so I'm good with that - I don't have to cook! My kids are all old enough to get themselves ready, so that shouldn't be a big deal. And they'll have had plenty of time to play with their presents during the day (that's the biggest thing that irked me when we had to do two family gatherings in one day - I really want the kids to play with their presents for a while).

 

What really made me insane was when Christmas was on a Sunday and we had to do church/DH's family/my family all in one day. And somehow squeeze in opening presents at home before going to church (class starting at 9am). That was one of those times when I really would have preferred family gatherings to be the day before or day after.