What are your Christmas traditions?

[xmyboys]

So I have two ds. 3&4 yo.
First year that they both get it.
We are not religious but I was raised Catholic.
Want to start some traditions to start doing over the years. Just us 4 for Christmas as rest of family lives overseas.
I am so excited for the holiday season already!!

For us Christmas starts the first weekend when the village lights go on (and there is a little celebration for that). The day before I take the children to the village Christmas shop to choose a new decoration - they choose one new one a year. On the sat, the tree is purchased and we go to the light ceremony and then have drinks with friends.

Decorating the room is a family affair with hot choc (and baileys for the grown ups), Christmas music. I do the tree and the children decorate the room.
One present per person is placed under the tree and you can touch, sniff it etc. each day you make one guess as to what the present is - if you guess correctly, you get to open the present, if not you put it back until the next day. Presents are of course disguised and guesses have to be specific. Cd wouldn't be good enough - it would have to be 'the new now album'. In 35 years of doing this, I have never correctly guessed. But it all adds to the excitement and my girls live it.

Also, in the run up to Christmas, the girls will make a Christmas decoration or present for family - something like a little calendar. Yellow moon have nice Christmas activities which are not too tacky.

Then we have our day Christmas shopping. Usually go to Milton Keynes as they have got a crèche, but now that's gone I'm not sure. I always go for either the day or the weekend and take the girls, and my mum and we see FC, the Xmas decorations and so on... This has become a mini tradition in its own right as the girls are given money and this is when they buy their presents. At 7 and 4, they really like this tradition as wehave some good girlie time

Christmas Eve, we always have people over in the evening and a mini party to start Christmas off. This includes a small tree present (which includes pjs for the children) and children put out the oats for the reindeer, leave out Santa's key and so on....

On Christmas morning when the girls wake, they bring their sacks into our room and open their presents from FC.

Then shower, get dressed and we all have a special breakfast. Usually pancakes and bucks fizz / OJ.

Then when tidy we open presents from us (under the tree). After this the girls have time to play with their toys in the morning whilst we tidy up all the mess.

Then we go to my parents for lunch. We open presents from my parents after lunch, and again the children have time to play with their toys etc.

Then we have a buffet tea and we open presents from other family members. After we all play a game together. This usually includes chocolate roulette - which the girls love! Tv is banned on Christmas day, as is spending the day on your own. It's a family day and we all celebrate together.

Also, in the presents is a joke present which has clues in. You are not allowed to open that present until you know what it is. Sometimes it has taken me all day to work it out!

The next day we come home and there will be a few presents left under the tree from other people and we open those.

Boxing day is the day we spend alone as a family (just the four of us). We have a movie in the afternoon, and play a game together in the evening with the children.

Then each evening, we'll invite a different set of friends over / go to family - each night is a mini party. The children dress up / swap presents and we all play games / socialise. If its a family that we don't do big presents with, then there will be little 'tree presents' under the tree for the children. This is usually bargains I've picked up over the course of the year - for example a bag of marbles for 50p etc. nothing big, but just a little something.

New year - see friends and party.

Christmas finally ends in our house on new year's day when we take the children to the Panto with family and then have a curry afterwards.

The next day the tree comes down.

Christmas is epic in our house and my children are excited already!

Wow Moblem, I want to come to your house!

Christmas is epic here. Not surprising, the girls are excited already.

Mob I am so impressed that you can keep up with all of that.
I might ban tv on the day!
I am buying a lovely family board game so might start that tradition as well.

Near the beginning of December I take my DSs to Poundland to choose a new decoration for the tree/sitting room. Also late November/early December we go to the switching on of the lights and my DSs school usually sing. There are lots of traditions through the school like the Christmas shows and carol service.
Once the school has broken up we go to the pantomime.
Christmas Eve: We spend the day tracking Santa on the Norad site!
Christmas properly starts for us with the Crib Service at church. After that the shops have all shut so no time for last minute panic buying!
We decorate the table for a nice dinner and the DSs are allowed their first chocolate from the tree. After dinner the DSs are allowed their Christmas Eve present - always new pyjamas, sometimes other items as well like slippers or dressing gowns. We always read The Night Before Christmas
Christmas Day: DSs open stockings in the morning. After breakfast we usually go to my parents although sometimes they come to ours. We have a huge lunch, present opening goes on all day. DH makes a chocolate platter. We dont watch a huge amount of TV but are always glued to the Dr Who Christmas special!

Mob, me too, can i come to yours?

Our longest running tradition is the bearded fairy! The fairy (angel?!) we had on the tree as kids had a furry hand muff thing and we referred to it as her beard. To this day my Dad will text us all to announce whe 'the bearded fairy has landed!)

We have traditions like lunch at my Dad's on Christmas Eve, tracking santa on Norad, stupid table presents to play with ( a tiny set of hand bells probably most legendary), sprinkling 'magic oats' in the garden so Santa knows where to land the sleigh .....

On Christmas Day we visit DH's elderly Great Aunt for Eastern European snacks and beer! Then we have the big family gift opening ( everyone picks someone in a huge secret santa) where someone plays the elf to give out gifts and we all throw our gift wrap into the middle of the room for the children to bury themselves in at the end before it all gets collected up.

We do go back to our own smaller family groups for dinner later on and I'm excited to start our own traditions like hanging up stockings, leaving things out for santa etc when we have old enough DCs. This year will be exciting as we will have a new addition to tag along with us as pur first DC is due to arrive in a few weeks time!

The Oxford Christmas lights - but from a bus as I don't like crowds. Have written up how we do it here, in case anyone wants to add it to their tradition list:
imaginatemum.wordpress.com/2011/10/25/oxford-christmas-lights-from-above-the-crowd/

Also, letters to the Royal Mail Santa. Details here:
imaginatemum.wordpress.com/2011/10/24/the-postcode-for-the-north-pole-is-san-ta1/

Sorry to be lazy and just copy links not paste in details - DH nagging me to get off PC and actually talk to him. My kids love the NORAD Santa, and we do new PJs and a new Christmas book each Xmas Eve (we have a stack that come out each December).

We have toasted pannetonne for Christmas morning breakfast, and also love Christingle on Christmas Eve.

Think that's all I am going to get away with typing, DH wants a DVD and a glass of wine!!

We have used the Royal Mail Santa thing - it does work well, but people should maybe know that the letters are not personalised. So if your child is on the cusp of figuring out about Santa, it might not be the best thing.

Mine really enjoyed the Canadian "personalised" Santa video, so we do that each year:
holidays.sympatico.ca/MagicSanta/vacation

We like going to a Christingle service on Christmas Eve, so much so that when we were on holiday last year the kids made us seek one out to attend as they were missing their UK one.

Mine also like having an advent candle.

The NSPCC Santa letters are personalised and I've ordered them for children in our family before. They ask for specific information to mention in the letter and the children have been genuinely excited that Santa knows about them!

My DDs are asked to write their Christmas list at the start of Nov (not so early I'm not thinking of Christmas, not so late that I can't search and find the things they'd like at a bargain price).
We go to the Christingle service a week or so before Christmas in our local Church as well as the Crib Service on Christmas eve.
We also go and see Father Christmas at the excellent garden centre. They have a cookie and a drink with a story and come away feeling all Christmassy. They also choose one new Christmas tree decoration for their small tree (in their room).

At bed time, FCs treats are put out on a plate (homemade mince pies and sherry) and they sprinkle Reindeer food bought from the school fair on the path and leave out the 'magic key' that my MIL bought for them a couple of years ago. They have new PJs.

In the morning, they are allowed to open their stockings as they like (everything is wrapped so as to take longer) but usually they like to wake each other up and bring their stockings in to open them on our bed.

Noone is allowed down until DH or I have nipped down to switch on the Christmas tree lights (pinched from my childhood traditions).

We then usually spend the day at Mum and Dad's (OH's Mum goes away for Christmas every year) and my sisters and I take it in turn to host a buffet in the evening.

Christmas really starts for us on Christmas eve when we go over to my parents for an early evening meal (DM is Czech where they really celebrate on Xmas eve so this is a nice tradition for her). While we're eating, Father Christmas (DF) sneaks round to the back of the house to leave presents under the tree for my DC's (6 and 3) to discover after tea. We then come home about 9ish, deposit over-tired children in bed and DH and I put the presents under the tree for the morning. Oh, and we also do the mince pie, sherry etc for FC plus reindeer food (porridge and glitter).

Xmas morning, the DC's bring their stockings which are hung on their bedroom doors into our bed to open. We then go downstairs to see what's under the tree. Like 2kids, I have to go down first, switch on the tree lights and 'check that Father Christmas has been' - again, this is one from my childhood!

We have a leisurely morning (last year we went to friends along the road for brunch) and then my parents arrive early afternoon. We then do the big Xmas dinner late afternoon - lovely as it's getting dark and you can light candles etc. After dinner, once the clearing up is done, I then escape for a little walk around the village, sometimes on my own with the dog, sometimes with DF. Last year, there was snow on the ground and I love the fresh air and complete silence and walking past the other houses imagining their celebrations inside.

It won't surprise you to know that I absolutely love Xmas - am feeling quite wistful typing this now!

Oh, and another fairly new tradition of my own is that a couple of weeks before Christmas, a friend and I have a 'wrapping evening'. Her DH is away in the week and mine has no interest in wrapping pressies so I take my presents along to her house together with all the wrapping stuff, some sherry and little nibbles/mince pies. We then spend the evening wrapping, chatting and having a little show-and-tell as we go along about what we've bought for people! It is lovely and a really sociable way to get presents wrapped. Sadly, said friend will be off overseas at the start of December this year so will have to wrap on my own!