Women are the cause of Christmas being stressful....

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Women are to blame for making Christmas a stressful and expensive holiday.

It's women* who are doing all the planning, booking of trips to father Christmas, managing and booking expensive UK Lapland trips/visits to activity farm, booking light trails, making sure the elf delivers a North Pole Breakfast, sorting Christmas Eve boxes trips to the panto/nutcracker, sorting parties, making sure kids Nativity costumes done, doing the stupid elf in the shelf, writing letters etc

All rushing, trying to make everything perfect and everything a "memory"... And then complain it's all too much, toj stressful, too expensive

Nobody is holding a gun to their head.

We all know the kids would be perfectly happy with a few presents on the morning and able to eat chocolate for breakfast.

Nobody will stop loving you because you couldn't be fucking bothered to make bread sauce from scratch using homemade organic breadcrumbs.
If you didn't bother making a starter, who cares?

Nobody would care if the stupid Elf never arrived.

Live by this mantra "Those who matter, don't mind. those who mind, don't matter"

It's stressful because YOU make it stressful.
Just embrace your Inner Man** and stop making the effort.

*Not all women, my husband dies yada yada yada
** Not all men...blah blah blah

I think you are right, OP. When I was a kid, it was my mother who did absolutely everything for Christmas (and a lovely job she made of it too!). My father did nothing except go shopping for a present for her on Christmas Eve! My DH isn't interested in Christmas really, so I do a few things to make the house look festive but we don't even have special food - maybe a nice steak on Christmas Day.

I think a lot of people are toning down Christmas this year, not just because everything is so expensive, but I think they have grown tired of the excesses of the season and want to go back to a more relaxing but still enjoyable time with family and friends.

People tend to overlook the other days of Christmas and put everything into the one day. We have a small Christmas day, a separate day for extended family with a buffet, rather than a sit down meal, a day out or two with other friends or family to get everyone together on neutral terrority and not burden anyone.

People are also free to do their large-scale Christmas dinner elsewhere, like a restaurant or pub and those travelling can stay in a hotel. Hosting and putting people up is still a choice, I'm afraid, and if you do this without enjoying it, you are martyring yourself.

I host Christmas day for 10 but everyone serves theirselves. I love Christmas but I have never dressed my house apart from a tree, never done experiences and now DC’s are secondary age they send me a wish list on Amazon and all I have to do is click buy! This year I’m buying FC27 for DS straight through Playstation so one less present to wrap - ha! Writing that makes me sound really lazy!

Thank goodness my dds were children before the age of Christmas Eve boxes, Elf on the Shelf, etc., and although we never went OTT by current standards, I did enjoy the tree (always real) the decorations (many going back forever), the stockings, and putting out a tot of something and a mince pie for 🎅🏻, and carrots for the reindeer.
I enjoyed, and still do, Carols from Kings on 🎄Eve, with mulled wine and a mince pie or two.

We’ve always had a trad turkey dinner, but I’ve always kept it fairly simple, no masses of sides except trad veg and Ps in Bs, and only ever roast potatoes - just a slightly tarted up Sunday roast.

My main gripe about Christmas now, is the pernicious habit from across the pond, of leaving out ‘milk and cookies’ for Santa/FC! Sacrilege! Who on earth wants cold milk on a cold midwinter night anyway?

High time this travesty was banned by Act of Parliament!

Is it because women get talked into the whole 'competitive Christmas' stuff? Little Alice is being taken to a fancy 'meet Santa' experience, and you get told all about it, so feel obliged to make sure that your children have the same, or better, just so Little Alice doesn't lord it over them?

Did those of us who grew up before Elf on a Shelf, Christmas Eve boxes, Christmas Experiences, Light shows, braised cabbage you had to start in October and all that stuff really have a worse memory of Christmas? I know I don't and we never did anything at all, other than have a stocking, a few presents and a bigger than usual dinner. Christmas was still a magical time, even in the 60's.

They have the right idea, imo. Many children don't need half of what they get at Christmas. The men are not running around like headless chickens for everything!

I will have a baby about a month old at Christmas so am embracing this ethos to the max. The only things that matter are a few gifts for my 3 yo, husband is picking up her bike today, and nice food. Christmas dinner may well be a lasagne but tradition can go jump.

That's assuming you find xmas stressful, which I don't.

I start early. I like buying presents for my ds and my friends. I like making cakes for my siblings. I like planning and cooking all the xmas food, much of it is already in the freezer. I like decorating the house. I like seeing my family.

We share the load, watch christmas films, play silly games, go for long walks, snooze in front of the fire and eat too much. This year my only planned outing is to our nearest cathedral to hear the cathedral choir sing carols.

We don't go to work parties, ghastly winter wonderlands, relatives we don't like or anywhere near the M25. No entitled in-laws to endure, thank god. Just local friends and the odd passing rellie looking for a cup of coffee and a slice of cake.

The only bit I don't enjoy is clearing away the mess afterwards but that only takes a couple of hours so it's worth it.

It is much easier once the dcs are at senior school, I admit.

Chargers are large over-sized plates which you put the main plate on, for some reason! Can't see the point of them myself, except it makes the table look more 'dressed'!!

One of the reasons I did not want kids was due to the unbelieveable work that seemed to go into the surroundings and performative 'perfection'.

I didn't realise it was my 'inner man' coming out.

I did make some lovely little ceramic houses last year that sit on top of a wooden box I made about 12 years ago, with twinkly lights that made the house feel really cosy. I think I might make a new batch, and on this windy rainy day I can think of nothing more lovely than sitting down to some clay so thanks OP, I'll go get some clay and put the woodburner on.

P.S. santa drives past our house so that does instead of a grotto. I will make an effect to find a glow walk possibly because DD loved it so much last year.

I have really happy memories of Christmas, but they are about simple things. I was brought up on the principle of one big present, a tree that goes up a few days before, a big meal, a walk and it’s over. When the kids are small there is a bit more nonsense. I did also like the phase of being young adults and having a long lunch with my parents telling family stories and am glad we have cycled into that phase and are now the parents.

In retrospect the Christmas calamities were the things that I fondly remember, in a how we all laughed. There is no need to take it so seriously or to spend stupid amounts of money.

Precisely the opposite is true in my case.

I'm very organised and have everything booked, planned and bought in advance so there is nothing for anyone to stress about.

And before anyone starts, I thoroughly enjoy doing it all.

I think it’s gotten a bit out of hand the last few years.

I always decorated the house, baked christmas cake, did the santa visits (same department store one every year), panto and bought loads of gifts. I enjoyed every second of it.

However December boxes, Christmas Eve boxes, Christmas bedding, Light shows, Santa ‘experiences’ etc all pile on the pressure and it’s too much.

Now my DC are older teens, we do much less but I will book a fancy cinema trip to see a christmas movie and visit a Christmas Market etc. But I’ll do it because I enjoy it. The only thing I don’t enjoy is the expectation that DC will still get lots of gifts.Once the youngest turns 18 we are on one decent gift each and a stocking

Why don't you offer some help with the huge amount of work which Christmas is, even without children you CF?

I honestly think toning down this kind of stuff also helps with the cost of living. Ditto for halloween which also seems to have gone a bit bonkers for some reason

The point it's it is only a huge amount of work if people make it that

Exactly.

Be More Man, Do Fuck All.

Brilliant, genius, enjoy that cold lonely bedsit.

I agree…it’s performative Christmas in some cases, or social media pressure…it’s so commercial, and so much tat everywhere. Tk max full of landfill already….

Well I suspect no one wants to spend Christmas with you then.

My epiphany could be menopause related was a few years ago, when a friend said they'd booked the santa express (local steam train) IN MAY for early December, and the "good" dates and times had already gone.

When you have to book something more than 6 months out, it has just become a chore.

Was glad my girls were born before elf on the shelf even existed (the book was 2005!), and xmas eve boxes were just putting on an Xmas film to get the little "sweethearts" to sleep.

We cherry pick the stuff we like. Garden centre xmas stuff visit in mid November. Decorate tree 1st weekend December. DH builds a mantlepiece garland (mantlepiece is a stretch - fire surround on electric heater). I cook a big roast on the day. Chocolate selection box breakfast. Home Alone will be watched at some point.

Probably due Gordon Ramsey or some "celebrity" doing it once in a TV program in 2014 so now some people will give their plates an extra plate layer for evermore.

It’s gone bonkers so retailers can sell you tat.

I agree about capitalism, Christmas in the 70s was a lot more relaxed, presents in a pillow case ( not overflowing the room, morning Christmas service on BBC, top of the pops, and a Christmas film, the 90s when mine were young weren't too drastic either, I did worry our kids would feel 'neglected' as we couldn't afford much, but on their list of parental transgressions Christmas doesn't feature 😀.

I put the pressure on families now in the same box as the pressure on mums to be perfect mums, births to be joyous, babies and small children cherished. Reality = long slog from first contraction to pushed out the door as young adults! Not a lot to enjoy!😉

I dont get the logic, people can have lots of people at Christmas and it not be hard work