AIBU to think this sounds like a rubbish Christmas Day?

[Tengreenbottles2]

We have a 4 year old and a baby. This year we are spending Christmas with the in-laws (they live in a different EU country). DH’s bro and sis will be there, with their kids (both aged 6). The massive fly in the ointment this year is, my SIL couldn’t come on the 24th due to work, so she she’s travelling up on the 25th with her partner and child, arriving at MIL’s around 4pm. It has therefore been decided that we won’t open presents until DSIL and co arrive, at around 4pm. We’ll then have our proper full Christmas Dinner on the 26th.

Am I being a consumeristic spoilt drama queen who is raising my children to be consumeristic spoilt drama queens, or does that sound like a really shit plan when you’ve got little kids?

It had apparently been proposed that we could potentially lie to the children and tell them it’s Christmas Eve on the 25th, and act as though it’s Christmas Day on the 26th, but that idea was rejected for some reason (I wasn’t involved in the conversations so I’m not sure why - it sounds like the ideal solution to me).

Another idea I have thought of would be to let the children open a couple of presents when they wake up and then open the rest when SIL and co arrive.

I can just hear the tantrums now, when our DC wake up on the 25th to be told “yes, Father Christmas has been, but don’t you dare touch those presents!”. I am struggling to think of a way of selling it to her. (There’s also the fact that I think it sounds a bit rubbish for the adults too… Just doing nothing all day until 4pm, and the kids won’t even be distracted with their new toys…)

AIBU to insist and say the proposed plan doesn’t work for us and we want to either do Christmas on the 26th, or let the children open a few presents on Christmas morning? Or am I being materialistic and selfish and we should just go with the flow?

If the children don’t know the exact date, that means postponing the whole thing until the 26th shouldn’t be a problem, no
But that means your SIL's DC either have to wait even longer till the 26th or you have to rely on them to keep up this pretence about it being the 25th on the 26th. It would be far easier for everyone if you stop obsessing about "the magic" and just open presents a bit later in the day like many people do.

No way would I be making an excited 3 year old wait all day to open their prezzies, to suit other people.
Tell them you will do it your way

Why is it mean to allow children the spontaneity of opening their presents on Christmas morning with their parents & Grandparents (if around) without being dictated to by those who can't be there. I often worked on Christmas day pre-children & arrived at my parents gathering later. I would never expect relatives children to wait until I was there so everyone could be together to open presents even if I had ny own children at the time. I never interpreted it for a single second as sod you we will do as we please.

i didn't suggest she was planning to - but that is how the family may see it.

But the idea that it sounds "rubbish" is daft. Her child is really small enough for this to work, and i like pp suggestion about santa coming late for reasons.

I'd definitely go the stocking route. Make it a new tradition.
I still do stockings for my adult kids (and now their partners). As my kids were born in the late '80s, their 'stockings' were leg warmers sewn up at one end...and I still use them! All kinds of random cheap stuff went in them, from variety packs of cereal (they weren't allowed sweetened cereal as kids, so a little box of Frosties caused great excitement!) to bubbles, crayons and notebooks and little toys, chocolate orange, real fruit....you name it. Obviously now the contents are a bit mid grown up.

The fact that stockings are new to your children will make them and the day more special and counterbalance the annoying stuff.

Why is it mean to allow children the spontaneity of opening their presents on Christmas morning with their parents & Grandparents (if around) without being dictated to by those who can't be there.

it's a bit mean to the SIL and her kids who are spending a long time on a train to visit their family on the one massive family occasion that most people have, no? waiting for a bit won't hurt anyone. And the SIL and DCs may be highly apreciative of people acknowledging that they can be allowed to have fun with the family too.

we had to do this once while visiting family. They allowed their DCs to open all presents on 25th (really early then bitched and moaned all day about how tired they were) and when we arrived the next day and our kids got presents - their lovely children threw tantrums because they didn't get anything. (am going to asusme OPs DC isn't as badly brought up as my cousins)

I honestly don’t believe your SIL’s child is going to spend all morning waiting for his/her Mum to come home, then going on a journey, before opening any presents. I pity her partner if he’s the one left to police this! I bet they’ll arrive and it’ll turn out that SIL’s child has already opened several presents, and has kept a few back to open with the cousins. Meanwhile the kids at PIL’s house will be climbing the walls with boredom and desperation to attack the pile of presents. There’s no way I’d go along with this.
Could your DH speak to his sister and suggest a staggered opening? All kids get a few presents in the morning separately, then save the rest to open together?

Where are they coming from that means they can't get there till 4pm?

I wonder if they are starting their day with a nice breakfast as opening their presents at home?

This exactly.

100%. My children get a sack delivered at the end of the bed from Father Christmas. They open them straight away, and it usually takes all day. Christmas is for children really.

From OP’s post at 6:05 today:

SIL is coming up from the south of the country (MIL is in the north), and they’re coming by train, so then will have to be picked up from the train station about 45 minutes’ drive away, so that’s why they’re getting there so late. I think they’re leaving theirs about 7 or 8 in the morning. Tbh if it was me I would’ve stayed at home with the kids, but I admire her commitment…

Are you aware of the “see all” function under OP’s posts?

It takes them all day to open the Santa presents? Blimey, how many are there?

Actually has nobody thought about this from the SIL 's viewpoint? Why is the OP's family more important than that of the SIL?
Yes - it will be a different Christmas this year, but it will be different for the SIL 's family too.
Perhaps just explain the Santa has a really difficult time getting round to everyone in time so, with your family's agreement because not everybody is going to be there on Christmas morning, you will be getting your presents a bit late this year. That only works if the presents aren't all under the tree though.
We don't open our presents until mid afternoon anyway, but we do have stockings to open first thing. Maybe give the children a small present from you to open in the morning and to keep them occupied if all the presents usually come from Santa. I don't know what else you do on Christmas Day but as children our morning were always taken up with going to church anyway - and as adults we used to make it a game of 'spot the Christmas jumper/hat/scarf/gloves/tie' when at church.
It is good for children (and everybody else) to understand that sometimes you can't have everything just when you want it, and anticipation can actually make things more fun!

In our family we have always had 'stocking' presents from Father Christmas first thing in the morning and then family presents later on in the day. I don't think 4pm is unreasonable at all. We often don't open main presents until that time and yes we do have children. The stocking presents take the edge off in the morning and then we do something outside of the house like a walk, late lunch and then presents afterwards.

It's really common for presents to wait til after lunch at least. That was the norm in my house growing up. There was no drama and we coped fine.

It'd be a bit rude to let your kids open all the main presents if the family as a whole have decided to wait til 4pm (for a very good reason - to include the SIL and her child). But you could certainly put together a stocking of treats and small presents for them in the morning. Fairly obvious solution.

Some adults don't seem to notice that other people do Christmas and Santa differently to them.
The UK doesn't even all have the same name for him some people insist he's Father Christmas, others he's Santa, or Santy.

The issue is its not NOW the little kids have been counting it down for weeks. It just sounds like a PITA to be asked all day, when's cousin going to be here? Like a broken record.

Adults can wait unfair to ask kids to wait longer.

I’m with you on this. I would either arrive on the 25th (but that could be too much hassle), give some new toys early (perhaps a large Christmas Eve box?) or just do it anyway and possibly say it was an accident as we had left some presents in our room unattended.

If you choose the last option, a 6 year old should be able to keep quiet to the in-laws (you could say these were just toys brought from home or, if rumbled, use the accident lie).

I wouldn’t be waiting until 4pm for my kids to open their presents, that’s for sure.

The chances of them arriving for 4pm are slim- it’s much more likely to be at least 5pm once you factor in potential delays in terms of setting off in the morning, transport etc.

So if they arrive and are in the house for 5pm, by the time everything is brought in and everyone’s said hello, it’ll be what, half 5 at the earliest before everyone sits down to open gifts?

Then, on top of that, by the time every family member has opened their gifts you’re looking at it being after 6pm?

Even if you let your 4 year old go to bed later at 9pm or so, it’s only 3 hours they’ve had to actually spend playing with their presents. And that’s going on the assumption that there won’t be any sort of meal during that time, which of course there will be.

It sounds like a shit Christmas for a child. Perfectly fine for adults- they can stay up until the early hours of Boxing Day and drink/eat and chat away, but for a child who will have been hyped up all morning and likely be exhausted by bed time, it’s a shit day.

If it was me I would let my children open most of their gifts on Christmas morning and have a few left for when SIL arrives. Firstly, it means you and BILs kids get to experience Christmas as they should and are occupied and settled throughout the day (so if there are delays in SIL arriving, it really doesn’t matter). It also means SILs child will get to play with their toys quicker as they won’t have to sit and wait through the other kids opening their gifts turn about.

SILs child might be disappointed walking in to the other kids already having toys opened but that’s not anyone else’s fault but SIL, who has made the choice to set off on Christmas Day for a journey that takes several hours. Really in her shoes I would have just had Christmas at home and came up next year when I didn’t have to work Christmas Eve, or let my child open most of their gifts at home, bring a few with them and then open a few upon arriving at the in laws house.

It all does sound quite selfish, putting the wants of adults ahead of the children.

Your kids, your presents!
My 4 year old, in this situation, would be having his stocking in our bed when he wakes up, and then presents from us / Santa.

Presents from grandparents/ other relatives can wait til later, no problem.

But I wouldn’t be told I couldn’t give my presents to my child / ren.

Just do it!

My family always open tree pressies after lunch once everyone is together, but stockings are always first thing in the morning. I'd compromise on the tree presents and open them in the afternoon once everyone has arrived, but there's no way on this earth that I'd be forcing my DS to wait to open his stocking presents. Miserable for the kids and miserable for the adults who'll have to listen to incessant whinging all day.

Maybe ask them to clarify why they feel the stockings need to wait. I understand tree presents as then whoever gave the presents gets to see the person opening it, but stocking presents aren't usually bought by other family members.

I don’t intend to go all guns blazing… I’m hoping we can discuss something that works for all of us…

And yes, no hard feelings at all towards SIL for arriving late. Basically there are limited train places from hers to MIL’s, and they all sold out for the 23rd and 24th as soon as they became available so it was either don’t come, or come on Christmas Day. She obviously really wants to spend Christmas with her parents and siblings, and feels the effort and inconvenience is worth it, which I think is lovely. They are all lovely, it’s just they can all be very strong-willed while DH is very much a people pleaser. That coupled with cultural differences that we sometimes don’t even realise exist until a couple of years later means there is sometimes some tension between our respective expectations of what makes for a workable and enjoyable plan for everyone. For example, I still don’t really understand what they tell their children about Father Christmas, so I’ve asked DH to talk to them about that, because whatever we do this year could have a knock-on effect on future christmases at home too (if, for example, they aren’t bothering to pretend Santa is real, then that has the potential to ruin DD’s belief before her 4th birthday, which I would find very upsetting).

we always do stockings first thing and everything else after lunch is cleared away, so about 2pm. But we always make sure there is enough in their stocking to occupy them until then and also it's what we have always done so they are used to it.

Would they be really against your kids opening a few in your room in the morning?
Where I'm from you usually open presents after dinner on the 24th and it wasn't an issue waiting as a kid but of course that was because we were used to it and they obviously won't be happy when they aren't.

So SIL child wont have opened any presents when they arrive? If so, YABVU. Imagine being that kid and arriving, having been unable to open your own presents to find the other kids has opened some. It’s not just about your child.

If SIL child has opened some presents, then you open some. And then you wait until later in the day to do the bulk.

IMO Christmas is about family, and spending time together. I don’t think this is a hill to die on and at 4 your kid can learn a bit of patience. If they open 2-3 in the morning and leave the rest until later that’s fine. If they don’t open them an until later and do it with the whole family there - that’s also fine.