SURVIVING CHRISTMAS - MUMSNET WANTS YOUR TOP TIPS

[AbbyMumsnet]

Yes we know, we know, it's only October. But before you know it it will be THAT day again, so we're compiling a Mumsnet list of top tips on how to survive all aspects of Christmas. From defusing difficult in-laws to keeping up with your kids' expectations to coping with countless car journeys to far-flung relatives, post your survival tips here. TIA.

I would advise going to midnight mass and having plenty of mulled wine afterwards. Have a fanstatics lie-in and stay in bed all day with a huge tin of Celebrations and a bottle of wine. put the telly on if it makes you feel better or read a damn good book. Come out the day after boxing day and resume life as normal.

I would love to do this but apparently I have to give my children presents and visit relatives

Bah humbug

do as much shopping on line as poss, much less stress. An excellent web to look at is madaboutbargains.co.uk

I disagree with everyone about the drinking. Stay stone cold sober, then you can watch in horror as you realise how dysfuctional your family really are. Plus, when everyone else is shouting and crying over the brandy round about 7 pm, you can watch in a pitying fashion or even sensibly and safely bugger off somewhere decent in your car.

Marks & Spencers, Mark & Spencers, Marks & Spencers

Draw up a detailed timetable of what needs to go into the oven when and stick to it.

Bucks fizz with breakfast starts the day off nicely.

However tempting it seems to kill MIL by 11am and stash the dismembered corpse in the loft, try to remember that this is NOT in the true spirit of christmas and ask her to peel some brussel sprouts & make herself useful for a chnage .

work !

It's probably all been said but:

Shop online
aim for it all done by end Nov, wrapped by mid Dec
don't go anywhere you don't want to go/see anyone you don't want to see. We have Christmas at home just us 4 every year, it's bliss since I gave up trying to have fun with my mum, sisters and disliked stepfather
buy more batteries than you think you'll need
take a couple of days off, pref with childcare, before it starts

don't do Christmas dinner at lunchtime if you have little ones! Mine aren't ready for a big meal middle of the day so we eat at 5 ish like normal. It also means that I don't have to spend all day in the kitchen missing out on all the fun. Works for us.
Top tip re MIL - don't let her get TOO drunk too early on. My MIL from hell turned up pissed last year, kept on drinking before, during and after dinner, then revealed all about her sex life with FIL from the early days till now!! not required!! TMI n all that!!! She was shrieking about it lying back on the couch, legs in the air and opened wide!!! DH was dying a death on the floor - horrified and visibly shaken. This was after she'd attempted to play articulate with such spot on answers like 'ethiopa' and 'Spain' are the capital of Italy - we agve up playing as everyone refused to be on her team. This year she is BANNED!!

In a word, drink. Honestly. Don't let the mild fug of semi cushion like drunkeness ever lift.

Works every time for me and not just Crimbo.

If you have little one's at the crawling/pulling themselves up stage,and older ones who want a christmas tree, put the christmas tree in a playpen

Abandon hope. You will only see it crushed like a fragile mammal under the horrific lorry of reality.

Agree with the pre-assembly of all toys - open boxes. Barbie boxes require lots of time to open.

Also stop drinking before you reach the point of wondering blurrily whether Christmas might have been wonderfully all right if you'd managed to hang onto your ex, and try drunkenly to phone him in his own seasonal catastrophe.

(I have never actually done this, by the way, but I imagine it's horribly easy. And in any case it's not true. Christmas would be Christmas in any circumstances.

Probably.)

Don't bend over backwards trying to accomodate everyone else in the world. Decide what you want to do and then work everyone else around that.

Do as much of your shopping ahead of December as time and money allows and also online as the time saved is amazing.

Don't leave wrapping the kids presents until xmas eve unless you're particularly masochistic!!!!

Have the house stocked up with nibbles and drinks as you never know who may pop by!!

Don't waste loads of money on personalised cards from clintons - get your kids to make cards for grandparents with handprints and glitter etc.

Keep a screwdriver and loads of batteries handy on xmas day!

"Abandon hope. You will only see it crushed like a fragile mammal under the horrific lorry of reality. "

Oh MI, made me LOL, that.

Embrace minimalism. Specifically:

1. Decide what you're going to buy the DCs. Halve it. There are always more presents than you anticipated from relatives and friends and no amount of presents is 'enough' when they get to the end of them.

1. Enforce an 'if you can't eat it, drink it, read it or bank it, you don't get it' policy with all gift recipients over the age of 10.

1. Unless you absolutely love Christmas lunch - ditch it. Cook a light lunch that the children might actually eat and enjoy and serve before blood-sugar levels plummet and it's completely dark outside. Put the kids to bed early then have a fabulous adult meal in the evening where everyone can get roaring drunk without the impediment of the surviving through the waste-land of the late afternoon. This year we're having a super-duper, matured for a couple of days Boeuf Bourguignon, heaps of mashed potato and salad.

1. Plan an activity to fill the said wasteland of Christmas afternoon. Anything will do, provided it's not DH's chosen activity of completing the 2006 tax return.

1. Go swimming on Christmas Eve - the pool will be empty.

1. Don't send Christmas cards. Tell yourself that exchanging Christmas cards is merely a symptom of bourgeois social insecurity.

1. Don't be seduced by any of that Christmas stuff in catalogues, fairs or shops. They won't make "your Christmas perfect", they will make your home look like Woolies in November.

1. Lower your expectations, lower them again and then slice off another substantial chunk. That way you will retain your Zen-like inner calm when, at some point on the day, it goes tits up. As it inevitably will.

have really, really miserable in-laws (like mine) who don't go on motorways in winter in case it snows, so you end up all on your own in the house

bear in mind that if you drink too much you will be unable to use the Cappuccino House Christmas Desperation Activity, which is to drive round the neighbourhood in the dark looking at everyone else's Christmas lights

this to be used when everyone is too bored to speak

quick tip - the chavvier areas have the best lights

issymum am going to do exactly what you say except the boef bit

Quote of the week...

MI - "Abandon hope. You will only see it crushed like a fragile mammal under the horrific lorry of reality. "

OR

Issymum - "Plan an activity to fill the said wasteland of Christmas afternoon. Anything will do, provided it's not DH's chosen activity of completing the 2006 tax return. "

How to decide...

rahter than ambling through the day with little ones, plan the day (not regimentally but just enough so they have little things to do at different points in the day).
Fit in a couple of organised games they'll enjoy, plan a couple of walks (one in the morning and one in the afternoon), have a table pressie for each person to open during xmas lunch etc. By having little things spaced out throughout the day, they'll be less likely to keep whinging when you're trying to sit down and have a drink.

Well I think I would just go with Issymums no8 suggestion!

'8. Lower your expectations, lower them again and then slice off another substantial chunk. That way you will retain your Zen-like inner calm when, at some point on the day, it goes tits up. As it inevitably will. '

I think we all expect far too much from it as a day, and work ourselves into the ground trying to be all things to all men (or small people)!

I'd select two things that for you encapsulate Christmas - do these two things well and then do everything else you feel you need to do with a very light touch - so it may be that you have a fantastically decorated table, get the best china out, but eat baked beans on toast! If it works for you and your family - go for it!

The other thing I would like to add is that for those with new babies and young children starting to do family christmas at their place for the first time - don't spend hours arguing with your DH/DP over hte form your past christmases took and trying too replicate the way your only family did it. Instead sit down and come up with some new traditions that will suit both of you - these are the traditions that your children will remember in years to come -so don't be hampered by the past!

Finally - remember at Christmas time - compromise is everything! Stick with the objective of the day- whatever that might be for you and your family - and don't lose sight of it in the ensuing chaos

1. My most successful present giving time was when I was working really hard in the run up to Christmas, so late one night in December bought everyone in my family something from "Good Gifts" - charity gifts but much better than the Oxfam goat thing. You can get some really appropriate things - both sets of my grandparents used to have adjoining allotments, so I bought an allotment in the 3rd world for my parents; my SIL is v fussy re her hair, and I bought her a shampoo and set for 2 old ladies; we had had a really lovely "bucket and spade" holiday that summer and I bought DH a week's beach holiday for an under-privileged child in UK; DB plays football in a really rubbish local team and I sponsored half-time refreshments in a league for wayward youthe, etc etc. Then on 23 December I went to John Lewis and bought everyone a (very) small present as well so they had something to open - worked on the basis that if it couldn't be bought in John Lewis in 2 hours and carried out of the shop there and then it wasn't going to get bought. Result was a roaring success - not a dry eye in the house with the Good Gifts presents. (Note - this does not apply to small children).

1. My children have never said "Thanks Mum, but we have enough plastic tat now". Grandparents always over-buy. We are very "restricted" on the number of presents we buy the DCs and bask in the reflected glory of right old tat from relatives. Children can never remember who gave them what anyway!

1. I think it is important to remember that no one is having a better time than you. Perfect Christmases only appear in Waitrose magazine features, with the suggestion of "Bucks fizz and smoked salmon for breakfast". The rest of us all have children who eat selection boxes for breakfast, run round in ghastly sparkly fairy dresses and have at least one major meltdown. No one's in-laws hang around like model oldies with twinkly wellbrushed grey hair, smart muted clothes, words of useful advice and a single glass of sherry.

1. We make the children go through the toy boxes in early December to put aside some toys for the charity shop - and explain to them exactly why we are doing it.