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??

DontmindifIdo, sorry it wasn't a clear post. The kids love it, loads of pressies, chocs and indulgence. I find it a bit over the top, not very relaxing and its not Christmas with my family but with DH's plus SIL's PILs if that makes sense and other odd rellies. We do it every other year so its not too bad. DH doesn't dislike it, its just not as easy as when we are in our own house.

We do it because the ILs are great, they help us out a lot in the year and our children love them. It seems churlish in that respect not to let ILs have fun with them at Christmas as well. I think we need to 'bend' it a little and make sure that we get the kids and ourselves out of the house and just have a bit of time as a family.

I got a wee bit confused about the Elf on the Shelf I saw mentioned in DOD recently - WTF is that? I was going to google it and then I had more sense. I don't need am Elf on Shelf tradition however it manifests itself (at least not yet).

YANBU if people try to use the "it's tradition" to force other people to do miserable things/travel 100's of miles/perform in a certain way/eat at X o'clock all in the name of 'tradition' when actually what they want to do is control other people and force them to do things they don't want to do.

It's Christmas day people - lighten up.

DP's family is hugely relaxed at Xmas - it is where we go (my family are ex-UK). I used to get quite stressed - we didn't all sit down together, they rarely ate pudding, the food wasn't that great etc etc, but I've learnt to love it. It's relaxed, it's fun and it's a really nice day (and I don't have to cook). HOORAY!

We only have one very strict Xmas tradition in the dragon household. Footballs on telly in the afternoon. We will be at home watching it. We don't care who comes over but we don't go any where.

After 13 years of this I tend to end up with a houseful

I don't do an hamper but they have to get new pyjamas for Christmas Eve. It's the law

Our family tradition is....
get up
open pressies
eat
more pressies
eat more
snooze
eat
bed

No-one gets dressed (unless there are new outdoor toys to play with), no-one cooks, no-one is invited, no-one goes visiting.

I don't care who buys who what, I don't care how much chocolate or advent calanders they have, I don't care if someone (anyone) wants to spend more money than me on my children and I certainly dont have christmas eve hampers (unless you count the lovely shop we do to make sure the fridge is full of nice things to eat)

but we absolutely have new pj's on christmas eve

treats I'm so sorry to he's that you lost your son

If this really is generated by (my) advent calendar thread then that's a bit weird really. I like my mil. I adore my parents. I'm more than happy to continue most of their traditions. I'd also like our own to evolve.

Precious? Nope, I don't think so.

Gah, stupid phone - "to hear that"

We only have one tradition too. That is we spend Christmas Day in our own home and no one else is welcome! Everyone else in our families has a partner, and/or children so they aren't alone. People are welcome at any other time, just not Christmas Day!

I would prefer if they didn't come on Boxing Day too, 'cause I'm a lazy cow and like to stay in my jammies eatiing chocolates!

I don't think people are often complaining at sometimes doing the "special Christmas celebrations" so much as the expectation that they will do them... sometimes every year.

Also for every family with grandchildren there are potentially up to 4 sets of "older generations". Often the complains come when one of the older generations thinks their traditions take priority over the others.

Also are you saying that the next generation doesn't have a chance to set up their own traditions? Because if you always do other people's traditions you don't set up your own.

My family always went to dgrans at Christmas. The first year after she died was very difficult because all the traditions were set up round her, we had none of our own except being at her place. I was 22 when she died and married by the next Christmas, so my family never had Christmas traditions when we were children.

I was last year at Christmas about being host for my IL. Not actually for hosting them. I don't mind hosting.
But because the way it happened was bil announcing that everyone was coming to us for Christmas lunch... after he'd told all the others that they were coming. Made it very difficult to say "no" because arrangements had already been made. We haven't been to my parents for 6 years.

Ariel yup. Bloody nightmare, isn't it? The worst part for me is that DH only learnt to drive a couple of years ago and is still very nervous, so I have to do the lion's share of the driving. How I will do that with a tiny baby that I'm trying to establish breastfeeding with, I'm not sure.

The thing is, PIL's and my DP's are lovely people and would completely understand that this Christmas, and probably going forward, we would like to be at our house and maybe have them over instead just because it's more practical for everyone concerned. My MIL has confessed to getting incredibly stressed because of Christmas as they really struggle to fit everyone in their house during the day, let along overnight guests. And her oven has recently given up the ghost too.

DH is the one who refuses to spend Christmas away from his childhood home. I suspect MIL is going to have to be the one to tell him she doesn't want to 'do' Christmas anymore. It would sound horrible coming from me

Traditions suck.

Why do there have to be traditions? Why do we feel the need to set up our own traditions? Why can't it just happen the way it happens?

Thanks for your post toomanydaisies. As I said in my first post in this thread, the responses to your post really made me think and I'm glad that I took the time to think about my own situation in a different way.

I'm sorry that you got caught in the middle of a bunfight though - I still think YWNBU

I just had to come back to shout ragefully about Christmas sodding hampers. Just WHY?? No. I have spread enough of my hatred of these baskets of crap on here, but who the hell can be arsed to then go and make up extra stories about elves bringing them beforehand? It's frankly ridiculous.

YANBU not one tiny little bit. Having family traditions is fine but some people seem to be very militant about them especially DMIL's and DDIL's . It is all a bit my way or the highway. The same thing seems to happen with PFB's.

It is all too precious for me.

PostBellum, my two posts were not as contradictory as they sound if you consider that I'm talking about the parents buying say three presents per child, but other people will get them presents as well. Likewise my mother had one reusable advent calendar to show us, one to give us, but other people sent us some as well. So presents always had calendars outnumbered! The couple of threads I'm thinking of (which could, on reflection, have been the same poster) detailed about enough presents for everybody in the extended family to give to this kid for the next five years, Christmas and birthdays... and she was still worrying that it wasn't enough. Sometimes being mean isn't such a bad thing.

DeWe, if you killed your BIL and buried him under the patio (with a sprig of holly in his heart, like Scrooge), not only would it prevent him from issuing all and sundry with invitations on your behalf (!) in future, but it would be one fewer to cater for at dinner. You know it makes sense.

Christmas hampers? Really? Bizarre idea.

I thought it was just a hamper full of food and booze. Now that I would be up for as a main present.

I had never heard of Christmas hampers before. It seems to be overegging the pudding a bit.

Isn't overegging the pudding the real meaning of christmas?!

DH and I don't need to micromanage anything - nobody else in my family has ever given a flying fuck about Xmas. I have nothing but shitty memories to go on, and DH is the same, so I do get ideas from MN, it's harmless fun to try things out and see if they stick. That is not the same as insisting on doing things your own way all the time, or not letting MILs others 'in' to share the joy with grandkids etc... that is very controlling and unfair.

Most kids learn from their parents, who learned from their parents etc, how to 'do' Xmas - but some people don't get to, so the Christmas board is a lovely teacher :o

I would gladly relinquish some so called 'control' in exchange for some happy childhood memories, or for someone in my family to actually give a damn about it and maybe stop ignoring their grandkids for one day a year. Not gonna happen though, so MN it is :)

I'd have thought overbrandying would be more likely, hazey :o

Annie tempting... tempting.... dh wouldn't let me give him a Scrooge hat for Christmas last year.

I love marmite, and rescue remedy

Janeatthebarre W is it wrong that after reading your message I thought that Santa hiding the panto tickets is a great idea and to try it one year?

I know that was completely not your intention, but sometimes we need a bit of help.

I know what you mean about accidental traditions though. We had to have salmon for Christmas Eve dinner every year because Mum did it a couple of years in a row. Half the family don't even like salmon.

I'm not sure my family have any traditions. Does that make us odd? The only one I can think of is that I don't make a starter for Christmas lunch because we are just about to stuff ourselves silly anyway. But if we go to dmil's or dstepmum's then we do have a starter.

Other traditions include not being quite ready, doing a lot of the shopping at the last minute, drinking Baileys, eating cheese footballs (never happens at any other time of the year), dh and I getting a bit ratty with each other over Christmas Eve present wrapping frenzy, my dmum drinking a shedload of sherry.

Am not sure these are the traditions that magical childhood Christmases (barf) are made of.

oh i see... this is really just a classic 'competitive slackness' thread in disguise...