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Christmas

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Original poster

Dh's weird Christmas family traditions?

111 replies

deaconblue · 06/12/2006 22:26

What weird traditions do your husbands/partners' families have? I now have to buy extra presents for the tree to give to us on Christmas Eve thanks to Dh!

OP posts:
LemonTart · 07/12/2006 18:27

my pils tradional day involved letting the children open stockings in their own room and not wake parents so they can have a lie in..(I love to see their faces, all piled into one bed opening stockings together).
Christmas lunch is PRE COOKED (ALL of it) on Xmas eve in pils house. Soggy veg and dry turkey MICROWAVED up the next day!! (Not in my house,,,)
Afternoon with PIL involves all children being quiet so adults can watch every soap episode going followed by crap movie of their own choosing (WW2 pref.) Children not allowed to talk through it.. (I like mine to play with their pressies all together)
NO FRESH Air at all for PIL ideal Christmas - I need to get out for family walks, if not on Christmas day at least on Bosing Day afternoon.

good job they have emigrated really

LemonTart · 07/12/2006 18:28

oops! Is that Boozing Day or Boxing Day ?!!

Boobooroastingonanopenfire · 07/12/2006 18:28

My DH's family hate Christmas, and yet we dutifully drag ourselves over there every other year.

My family: champagne cocktails, beautiful tree, lovely presents, big dinner about 3pm, then turkey and stuffing sandwiches in the evening.

DH's family: never enough roast potatoes, floppy carrots, MIL stressed about the cooking but won't let anyone help (but bitches about it), 'experimental' cake (last year involving vodka: bleuch), crappy presents.

Also, embarassingly, they've decided they like me more than DH, which gets particularly uncomfortable at Christmas. Last year they got me about ten presents, and they got DH one book with really obscenely offensive limericks in it. (I'm no prude, but one of them was about a woman with a smelly c*nt. Nice).

They also give me presents on DH's birthday.

Oh God: only 2 weeks to go.

And I love Christmas...

NOELallie · 07/12/2006 18:38

lemontart - my sil does that.She cooks the turkey christmas eve and then serves it cold WITH HOT GRAVY!!! And tinned veg.....Now that is weird.

santasaltire · 07/12/2006 18:46

I must admit, i cook my turkey on Christmas eve, but certainly don't microwave it the next day, or serve it cold.
lemontart, my MIL, would, if she could get away with it, watch TV all day on Chrismtas day. This year we have decided Tv not going on until 5pm(ish). She's not happy, doesn't know what we will do all day! I told her we can play games with the DS, i know for a fact santa is bringing DS1 Cludeo!

Original poster
deaconblue · 07/12/2006 20:36

Oh my God microwaved Christmas dinner and vodka Christmas cake - makes my pil look like Christmas angels!! Dh wasn't allowed to touch his stocking until his Grandparents arrived at lunchtime. Can you imagine the suspense? We used to be welcomed into mum's bed for a snuggly opening of pressies at 5am!

OP posts:
SantasPersonalClown · 07/12/2006 20:48

I don't have ILs so makes life easier for me!!!
Our family tradition is
Everyone up and breakfast, then all presents are dished out first, THEN mad frenzy of ripping paper and trying to convince ds to open more not just play with the first thing he gets to.
Am planning this year to let ds open some at home, then some at GPs then the last of his in the evening. I may save one or two for the 27th as its my birthday and he gets a little confused as to why only I get more presents. Bless!!!

colette · 07/12/2006 21:02

First time I went to dhs family Xmas mil opened every single ptresent she had received(like a tin of biscuits posted from someone she used to know 30 years ago), whilst giving me the history of their lives in great boring detail. She flattened each piece of wrapping paper out carefully taking the sellotape off and the rest of the family sat and watched . We took turns in a very restrained way of carefully opening lots of small presents, and they put their presents on the tree No tv and the most boring board games imaginable.
We didn't eat dinner until 7pm
I prefer the get stuck in and slob out mode of xmas ( saying thanks for presents along the way of course}

santasaltire · 07/12/2006 21:12

in 10 - 20 years time out DIL's will be on here saying
"Oh it's awful with Dh's family at chrismtas, they all just rip paper off, the house is chaos, they are all drunk etc"
And we will all be on our "fabgrannies.com website" telling tales on the same DIL's! .

maryhadaharpsichordyeahlord · 07/12/2006 21:16

no fkn alcohol and bloody lousy food
that's why I have never spent christmas there and never will

paulaplumpbottom · 07/12/2006 21:18

A dry Christmas does sound pretty horrible.

heavenlyghosty · 07/12/2006 21:19

Wierd family traditions of DH's family ...
Hmmm, let's see - how about giving presents to eachother when they all hate eachother .... how about getting all knickers in a twist about spending Christmas day together when they don't talk to eachother AT ALL for the rest of the year ...
Oh and MIL's classic "Spend Christmas day with me but don't expect me to get food for all of you, I have a ham and some salad, don't expect me to get food/cook for the children ...."
A few years ago we spent a fortune coming from the UK to NZ for Xmas and ended up buying all our food ....

maryhadaharpsichordyeahlord · 07/12/2006 21:24

oh I manage to get a bottle of beer
if I ask for it
then everyone Looks at me, in a significant manner
oh there she goes, the big ole boozer

paulaplumpbottom · 07/12/2006 21:26

Do you usually ask?

santasaltire · 07/12/2006 21:27

We haven't actually had christmas anywhere other than our own house. However MIL, and my mum still expect us to do their traditions when they come to stay

Boobooroastingonanopenfire · 07/12/2006 21:33

Maryhadaharpsichord: I think my MIL started experimenting with weird booze in cakes because she thinks I'm an alcoholic, and wants to please me.

This started when I insisted on taking champagne to theirs on Christmas Day, because otherwise we end up with one bottle of Liebfraumilch between 7 of us.

maryhadaharpsichordyeahlord · 07/12/2006 21:54

at the boozy cakes.
lol at the bottle of Lieb between 7
ditto, only Blue Nun

Stockingsofdinosaurs · 07/12/2006 22:03

Like the idea of football in the park but I would probably not be able to help myself staying home and stressing about dinner hence going for Hatwoman's Xmas eve turkey next year.

PeachesMcLean · 07/12/2006 22:11

DH's family fairly normal. The worst tradition was with my family - my mum would insist that we weren't allowed to open our presents until after lunch. And because mother wasn't going to get up early to cook (don't blame her actually) we didn't eat until 5pm or 6pm. So it could be 7pm before we opened presents. Deeply frustrating as a child and took all the fun out of the day.
If you know of anyone trying anything similar in this day and age, I'll personally go round and give them a serious talking to!

Snowstorm · 07/12/2006 22:15

My first couple of Christmas's at P-I-L, I was surprised and startled to find that M-I-L found roast potatoes a bit of an effort and so we got served crisps instead of them with our Christmas dinner

JollyOldSaintNikkielas · 07/12/2006 22:50

Think crisps wins

themoon66 · 07/12/2006 23:02

Crisps

BahHunkBug · 07/12/2006 23:07

Crisps?!

You can buy roasties if she found them that hard!

She manage a turkey OK, or did she just open a tin of spam?

themulledSNOWMANneredjanitor · 07/12/2006 23:18

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

hatwoman · 07/12/2006 23:20

pmsl at the crisps. did she manage any veg or did you just have ketchup?

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