to heave all over my boots if I read one more thread about "special family traditions"

[Mintyy]

and how that interfering old hag of a mum/mil/aunty is not asking permission to buy presents or, even worse, hoping to spend some time with their relatives over the Christmas period?

Stop being so bloody PRECIOUS! and get a grip. You are part of the older generation's "special family traditions" - do you not understand??

but that's MN. no one posts a thread to say 'hey, we just fuck about in our (possibly new) pyjamas, open presents, tidy up, our old auntie pops in and then we either cook here or go and eat at someone else's house'. despite the fact that's the majority experience, in all likelihood.

doesn't matter whether it's christmas, or schools, or parent and child parking, it will always be the controversial stuff that makes it onto here.

Right- just had to go over to the dark side to find out what a Christmas Eve hamper is. Apparently, it's just where you give your kids a whole bunch of additional presents specifically for them to use on Christmas Eve- pyjamas, DVD etc.

This is one tradition I will not be adopting.

sorry, that last to postbellum. agree treats, i thought the pile-on with the advent calendar thread was a bit cringey to say the least. they're probably insecure.

YANBU although you may regret heaving over your boots once you have to clean it up.

Well, yes and no. DH and I have divorced/separated parents, so four separate grandparent households before we even get into the wider family. If each of them wanted to buy each of the DCs a chocolate Advent calendar and a special dated ornament and a "Christmas outfit" and a bike every year it would be maaaaaaadness. And so I'd expect anything like that to be run past us first. Also, no way are they all getting to see us over Christmas every year, because that's just impractical.

I think we all have our irrational points. I'm very laid back about chocolate/clothing/gifts/most of this stuff but for some bizarre reason getting my DCs their Christmas stockings was important to me. No one else ever tried to muscle in on that, but if they had I would have been pissed off. And I don't think that would have made me micro-managing or controlling. I think it's fine to have a couple of details that are important to you, even if not for a particularly rational reason, but if those start to multiply and take over the whole holiday then you may have issues.

I sometimes go to weddings and think the whole thing has been so stage managed, with the bride anxiously ensuring that everything goes to plan and that all the usual wedding traditions are honoured, that the whole event loses all spontenaity and specialness or any unique little things that make the wedding different.
I think some people see Christmas like that as well. 'Oh, we have to go up the mountains and cut our own holly because that's a traditional thing traditionally type people do at Christmas' 'Oh, I must give myself a nervous breakdown trying to find an old fashioned Christmas stocking instead of buying the nice Santa embellished ones in the Poundshop that the kids would love'.

If you have to try to create traditions, then they're not really traditions. I love the post on here about the 'gravy row'. That is a real Christmas tradtion.

Right- just had to go over to the dark side to find out what a Christmas Eve hamper is. Apparently, it's just where you give your kids a whole bunch of additional presents specifically for them to use on Christmas Eve- pyjamas, DVD etc.

So it's another inducement to spend a load of money and spoil your offspring rotten?

What bollocks.

It's not just on MN though, it is everywhere. "What are you doing for Christmas?" must be one of the most asked questions at this time of year.

Sadly, people rarely say "oh, just go with the flow", but instead you end up a boast festival or a major whinge about family members you've never even heard of before or a massive stress vent about not having money for gifts or the amount of stuff they have to organise.

I think it shows a degree of collective madness!

Right is it just me who dreams of a day when my DCs have their own families and I'm old, wrinkly and frying on a beach somewhere at Christmas with DH.

I have 3 DCs, I love Christmas, I always try to make it special but there will come a time I'm sure when I can't be arsed with it all and it becomes much more low key.

but that's because you don't ask your real friends what they're doing for christmas, because if they're your real friends they will have been chosen because you broadly have the same attitudes to things. so with strangers it's just chit-chat, and no-one's listening anyway.

this, MN, is chit-chat. these people are strangers. no-one is listening anyway. Mintyy's not listening to hazeyjane pointing out that some family 'traditions' are dark and need covering over with adopted brightness in the hopes that they become the new way. she's not listening to those of us who have pil/parents who are no less arsey on Christmas Day than at any other time of the year. this is all just quacking into the wind...

What I don't understand about those threads is the tradition is in their head and not ever been communicated to the poor sod who ruined it. When did advent calendars become so controversial and who on earth thought of baby's first Christmas decoration - and why would anyone instinctively know these are parent only territory?

Family tradition:
If you're the one with kids, you get to stay home.

If your kids are grown up, it's up to you, if you want to see grandkids - you travel.

My tradition: Happily drive to collect people on Christmas Morning, before 11am. Afterwards, the car is garaged until Boxing Day. So stay/taxi/walk home.

dd1's (6) homework last week was to write about your families special traditions at xmas - i thought she might say we watch Muppet xmas carol in our pjs on xmas eve,and eat breakfast in bed and use the xmas coffee pot which only gets used once a year.....but she said, 'we go to the pub'. I wouldn't mind but the last time I spent xmas in the pub i was in my 20s!

lol, hazey.

All I want for Christmas is to spend it at home, but it's my DF who's pulling his face. We ALWAYS have it at our house is what he says! I just want my kids to enjoy Christmas in our house where they can laze around and play with their new stuff. On boxing day we are driving several hundred miles to DH family. Fucking marvellous. Not micromanagement, but just want the kids to have a nice time instead of being dragged hither and thither. Plus we always buy the bloody turkey regardless!

I was winging to DH about having to travel to ILs, who make a big deal about the meal, dress up, three courses etc etc and there are people who aren't close family and I find it a mixture of being really dull, not very relaxed and not being able to watch Christmas TV. DH replied, well I suppose they don't really want to do that as well but everyone has to compromise. He put it into perspective for me. He is good at that.

We do it, rotating between families each year as the GPs love to see the children so happy opening presents, running round, cousins playing. eating chocolate etc.

So, what would happen if you said "no, we are staying at home" OscarPistsbit?

Christmas Eve presents as well now. If I want to give the DCs something practical I just wrap it up along with the other things. Which brings us to my most hated Christmas thread type, the Givers.

When the DCs were small I'd tend to get them one main, though never lavish, present (barring one short period of relative affluence we've never been exactly made of cash) and two or three minor things that were too big to fit in the average stocking. It's more fun opening three small things than one big one IMO, unless the big one is that special thing they've been dying for all year but never thought they'd get.

BUT

Seen a few threads that go "well I've bought DS (14 months) a WII and a laptop and a rocking horse and a wooden desk and chair and a set of professional oil paints with real camel hair brushes and some mini golf clubs and a cookery set and a My Little Pony playhouse and a Duplo castle and a flashing helicopter and and and [maundering on for another few lines], but I feel there's something missing. Do you think that's enough or what else should I have got him?" I always want to shake the poster, not just because I don't believe someone that annoying should have access to so much disposable income, but also because I don't think it's even good for small children to be buried under a mound of Stuff, most of which is not age appropriate anyway. And what do you do for an encore on birthdays and subsequent Christmases? Buy a bigger house to keep all the stuff in?

I remember DS2's second Christmas. He opened his stocking and got about 2 things out and played with them. I tried to show him there was more inside, but he just murmured "no" and shook his head. He knew they were there but wasn't ready to cope with more new things at that point. Bless.

BlueberryHill - don't understand, your PIL have chosen to do a particular family tradition, you don't enjoy it, your DH doesn't enjoy it, the DCs dont but you go along with it because it's what the PIL's do and they wo'nt enjoy what you'll enjoy at Christmas - can you not just not spend Christmas with them if you can't find a way to do it where everyone gets to have a nice time? (I agree with you though, getting dressed up, 3 course meal that's more like a dinner party with non-family members does sound like hell with small DCs, it's a very adult focussed Christmas)

And Oscar, you can just say "thanks for the invite, but we're going to stay at home this year, yo'ure welcome to come to us." and stick to it. You aren't a child anymore! This is the bit I don't get, why should the older generation's traditions be kept too when they don't work anymore? You don't have to do what your dad says anymore, you're not 15. Say no thanks.

oooh YANBU!! All this "My Cow of a MIL has bought the DC an advent calender!" it is sickening!

Actually, it does seem to be the threads on here split into two camps, the ones who want to be in charge of everything and the ones who seem to think they aren't allowed to be in charge of their own lives, dispite being adults now.

Most normal people fit in the middle, it is possible to say no to things that really don't suit you, without having to then micromanage what everyone gets your DCs/everything that happens in your family.

christmas is supposed to be fun. I don't understand why some people allow the older generation who want Christmas to suit them basically take all the fun out of the day for their family.

Re traditions, ours are still evolving because my family keeps changing size and shape. Can't get a good solid tradition going under constantly changing circumstances, and frankly, there's nothing wrong with that.

As for advent calendars, when we were small my mother had a beautiful Nativity calendar like a small book, with tasteful windows revealing the next instalment of the story, which we got out every year, but she would also get us a sparkly modern one to keep in our rooms; when I was a bit older she got me an advent candle instead, loved that. Additionally, numerous relatives on both sides would send us calendars, including with any luck one or two chocolate ones. The more the merrier. Can't see a problem.

LOL AnnieGYG - so lots of advent calendars are ok, but not lots of presents!

Am chuckling at the insanity of it all. One family's madness, is another family's tradition, is another family's nightmare.

PostBellum your posts up-thread make a hell of a lot of sense :)

OP - I can see how it must come across from the older generation's POV but you(?)/they have to accept that when someone meets a partner/gets married/has kids they form their own family and the needs and wishes of those in that new family (as well as in their extended family) have to be taken into account. For some of us Xmas and most of the rest of the year is a continual juggling act between what our parents/our ILs/our DHs and our kids want and often we don't appear to get much say in it at all!