To wish we could stop over complicating Christmas

[Beswitched]

Ever more elaborate decorations, Christmas boxes, expensive branded advent calendars, fancy alternatives to the standard Christmas Dinner, competitive posts on Facebook, manic manic shopping, trips to lapland, Secret Santa angst etc etc and the whole shebang starting in November.

Aibu to wonder what happened to a couple of presents from Santa, simple presents for family and friends, putting the beloved and tattered decorations up a few days before Christmas and enjoying a roast dinner together?
It all seems to have become so elaborate these days.

At least this year people seem to be going on about Christmas Eve Boxes. Slightly less ridiculous than calling them Hampers.

Hmm I'm not sure. My parents were so overly simple on Christmas it was utterly dull by the tome me and siblings were in our teens we couldn't be bothered with a day away from our friends and this isn't something I want to recreate.

I love doing a whole big Christmas decorate everything and buy all festive food that I can over December. I've done lapland and that was incredible.
Me and dh don't buy each other presents though because we don't need a present off each other if I want something I buy it and he's the same.

For dd though I try to get at least one big present. I would never go beyond my means though and on dd first Christmas dh lost his job a few weeks before so we had no decorations and dd got a Tupperware box to chew on (which she loved of course!) and we went to church.
When I have the money I do enjoy spending on Christmas though

I think the UK could learn something from the USA about Christmas.
It is much calmer and it starts later.

I think this is because thanksgiving comes at the end of November and has to be dealt with first.

So I suggest creating some kind of food and family festival in late November to take up time and attention.
It will pace the festivities spreading them out over the winter season and dilute the Xmas effect.

A lot of this nonsense started when people began adding chestnuts to their sprouts. I suspect Delia is to blame.
Spiralled completely out control with pancetta and Marsala wine c/o Nigella et al.

Dick about with sprouts and it’s an inevitable slippery slope to that elf and all this Christmas Eve bullshit.

It’s all chestnuts fault. Absolutely.

I agree with the OP. The most important thing of all is being able to spend time if at all possible with your loved ones.

It is not just Christmas which has been upscaled over the last few years- think hen weekends not hen nights, Valentine's 'weekend', for example.

The observation about the US and not starting until after Thanksgiving is something I noticed when I was there one November.

I loooove roasted chestnuts in December. No other month. Hate them in dishes though.
I also have a Christmas toilet paper

I never understand these threads as we are not forced to buy stuff we dont want to buy or make Christmas complicated or very hard work. I think a lot of the stress comes from leaving whatever you do to the last minute. Christmas is the same date every year so plenty if time to organise whatever you want. Obviously some things cant be done early but most of it can or not at all .

’Dick about with sprouts and it’s an inevitable slippery slope’

Can I get that on a festive doormat?

Agree completely. It's ridiculous and meaningless now. All the magic of Christmas has gone.

Laurie, chestnuts just doing their own thing (roasting on an open fire for example) are fine.
Peeled, boiled, naked sprouts also fine.

Combine the two and you’ve opened a hell hole diabolical vortex into Christmas jumper days and the horror that is the £10 limit office secret Santa.

Delia knew what she was up to.

You cannot Breathlessness but mark my words some fucker will create festive doormat day next year in support of, god I don’t know, those poor sods who have to break up fatbergs in the drains, and then you'll be able to buy a sprout themed mat AND WONT THAT BE A LOVELY TRADITION.

I have a musical Xmas doormat, it has dancing penguins and plays we wish you a merry Christmas.
I would love the Brussels Sprout equivalent once my current one is worn out!

I can't stand the urgency to take the tree and decorations down. That seems to have become competitive in recent years, probably because people have had them up so long. I swear someone will be posting 'All back to normal' on FB before HM has even done her speech soon. What is the rush for everything to start so early and then be over? For me, put decs up after cards come down from early Dec birthday, leave up until as close to 6th Jan as possible depending on when schools go back.

Agree, OP.

We keep it traditional in our house - decorations and tree up a few days before - celebrating for the whole twelve days until Epiphany. We see family and do gifts, go to church and take DS to see Father Christmas. Before DS was born DH and I would go to a Christmas concert at the Royal Albert Hall or to see the Nutcracker, but we don't decorate on Dec 1st, do Christmas Eve boxes or Elf on the pigging Shelf! Trying to keep the focus on giving - not mince pies flavoured with pine scented prosecco, or beauty "advent" calendars.

DD is too old to have elf on the shelf. I have always done Christmas PJs for DD on Christmas Eve 'delivered' (by DH) while we are at church. They are not specifically christmassy, just winter themed e.g. penguins etc so can be worn as normal PJs after but at least I know she will have some semblance of decent attire on for Christmas morning pictures! And we don't have matching PJs although I have threatened DH with them but that is more to see the look on his face than for any SM photo opp!

I agree. I'd love to know where everyone who does moor/nature walks lives though, it's pelting down where I am and blowing a gale, the moors will be marshland before it gets to Christmas day!

The observation about the US and not starting until after Thanksgiving is something I noticed when I was there one November.

Yes - it's one of the things I like about the US.

Also I quite like going to work on Dec 26th. Get away from the family, leave them in peace to argue, play with new drumsets, etc.

We also don't do advent calendars really. You can buy the ones with chocolates here now, but I hadn't realised till I read a thread on here the other day that you can get pretty much any kind of advent calendar in the UK.

Also - possibly just where I live - but the supermarkets aren't particularly crazy around Christmas. I usually book a click and collect slot for Christmas Eve, but I don't book it till a couple of days before. We don't get the huge crowds, queues all the way up the aisles etc. Unless we're due for a snowstorm on Christmas Day, in which case it's rammed and there isn't any bread or milk to be found.

@Itstheprinciple

Tree has gone up today. Wasn’t going to bother.

Everything else (just lights) have been up since last Xmas. Redresses some of the balance.

I can't stand the urgency to take the tree and decorations down.

Why not? We've always got rid of the tree very soon after Christmas, there wasn't any point to keep it past the event. Even as a child I can't remember any tree left around for New Year's Eve.

There's no rule, but I prefer a clean fresh house to start the year, not with any of the decorations still hanging.

@housinghelp101 - My walk will be on Dartmoor, if it isn't an absolute mire by the 25th.

I don't see the harm in any of the tat. December is a long dark month, why not add a bit of excitement?

Also, it's the only time in the past year I've had a full 2 weeks off work (had to save the holidays to cover it, as no alternative childcare available). So I want to make the most of it.

Finally, with a 3 year age gap between my DC, the years where the eldest still believes and the youngest understands will be pretty limited. I like the idea of spreading the celebrations out so that if someone is ill on Xmas day, or has a massive tantrum then it only "ruins" one day, not the whole of Xmas.

I think there is something in the zeitgeist this year. A move towards slower more mindful Christmas celebrations.
Maybe it's the ever heightened awareness of climate change and the knowledge that we can't go on as we are forevermore but I see people making efforts this year to consume less and leave a lighter footprint.

My personal wish is that Christmas wouldn't start so early. By the time January comes so many people seem utterly sick of it and yet winter has barely begun. Surely this is the time when we need the comforts and distractions the most?
Orthodox Christians celebrate on the Epiphany and some leave their trees and decorations up until February. This seems like a great idea to me. Less of Christmas in Autumn and more of it in winter please!!

The solution is simple, don't do it, don't buy it, don't let yourself be dragged down. It only happens because people are gullible enough to slavishly follow every 'tradition', on which the paint's still wet it's so new. I know that tomorrow when we do the shopping there will be many people spending far more than they can afford, and for what?

We do it on the more traditional side of things I suppose

Tree goes up after my dds birthday (its in the first week of December so usually the second weekend). It’s a 20 minute job getting it out the garage, putting some red tinsel on and battery operated lights and all our ornaments are hand made (either sewn or painted)
The first weekend in December we go to the pottery painting place and paint a new decoration to add to the tree together. No other decorations are in the house.

We then usually do a Santa visit and a pantomime. We also have an activity advent for the 12 days leading up- watch a Christmas movie, drive round and count the lights, hot chocolate and winter walk etc

Christmas Eve is stuff out for Santa and going to my mums where my dd and her cousins exchange presents (me and my sisters always used to do this but it’s passed to our kids now). They get Christmas Eve pjs off my mum and back home for a movie and book.
Christmas Day is spent at home and we always make Christmas biscuits on the morning. Me and DH don’t do presents but my dd gets a few. She gets one present from Santa that she asks for and we write a letter. Boxing Day is usually with the in-laws for a turkey dinner.

We also write our memories down for the year around this time and add them into a decorated bauble to read the next year when we decorate the tree.