Dh's weird Christmas family traditions?

[deaconblue]

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!

Please tell me she didn't pour gravy over the crisps? Ew

peachesMclean - we don't open pressies till after lunch . You could try giving me a talking to if you like but I don't think it would help. We like it that way.

However I do get up about 5am and lunch is always over by 1pm so not quite so cruel....

Now our children are older, we sort all our pressies into piles just before bed on Christmas Eve, and all get loads of pleasure looking at our pile, and guessing what's in there!

We then get up as early as possible, make some hot drinks, and pile in front of the fire to open our presents.

Maybe a bit control freakery - but I make a list of who sends what to whom, and we also open one at a time, so we can see each other's gifts. Makes the fun last longer too. We also have some bin bags on standby for the rubbish!

We're away this Christmas, but ds wants to leave all the pressies at home, so that we can have our 'Christmas morning' when we get back home!

pmsl, rofl and wheezing at this thread, it's been priceless.

I think Victoria Wood or Jennifer Saunders must gbe able to get ALL their material for mad english women from the MILS on this site

I shall never forget crisps instead of roast potatoes.

Very sad for peaches having to wait ALL day for pressies....that really is mean.

Luckily, I haven't had to suffer the PIL for the past two years since being single, thank GOD.

When the DTS were having their first Christmas at the age of 1, just getting into seeing presents at 7am and the PIL turned up, and the BIL and his wife and 2 kids, then the SIL and the other BIL, my whole house was full of them at 7am. We hadn't opened a single present or even had a cup of tea. They were all blind drunk from the night before - their tradition - get wildly drunk Christmas Eve, hair of the dog Christmas Day

The following year I insisted no visitors, so MIL PHONED US at 7.30am and we waited about half an hour for exh to come back into the room to see the DTS open their presents from FC.

I don't miss them at all.

This year, I have a new DP and we have to buy 'TREE' presents, wtf??????????????? I don't think so.

I'm in the mad frenzy of wrapping paper camp

Tree presents - yes that sounds like my mother. When we were little, all our presents from FC and assorted relatives were piled up on a chair each. Then after dinner, we got a "tree present"!.
However, DH and I put under the tree all the presents received from relatives, which are opende after breakfast. My mum however insits on giving us a tree present to open after lunch!

Mioaw's xmas day sounds like something off The Royal Family!

Things are fairly normal with both sets of parents but with my family we always get a pillow case filled with little prssies all individually wrapped (normally crap freebies mum gets with magazines) but fun all the same. She would always leave them in our room in the middle of the night and it amazed me that I never heard her......until last year - I was truly, truly gutted - I wsas pg at the time and didn't sleep well - dh also gets a pillowcase, we will never grow out of it and now PILS also leave us a pillowcase when we go to theirs because DH said it wasn't xmas without one now

Mum always did tree presents too but not until after supper. That's one tradition I've given up on - my kids get quite enough as it is

It was a full Christmas dinner (minus the roast potatoes) ... plus the crisps ... think they were ready salted .

At my parent's house, however, tradition is at Christmas pudding time for my father to light the brandy pooling the pudding and to circle the dinning room table (with all of us sat at it) once, can't remember whether it's clockwise or anti-clockwise, whilst trying to keep the pudding flame alight ...

See, that's so completely normal isn't it?

My MIL thinks Christmas presents should be opened on Christmas Eve (apparently the Royal Family do this.) Hmmm... delusions of grandeur. I flatly refuse to do this but will usually (for the sake of harmony) agree to open a tree present - no my family never had those either - at midnight. Love her really.

Tempted to do the crisp thing this year though

Can someone please explain their definition of a tree present to a 'tree present virgin'. My DP says its something little, like an inexpensive present. Um. All my presents are like that.

WTF?

Maycontainstress, in my family tree presents have always been the main big presents but it appears that everyone seems to do it differently.

we have always had table presents, but that was something that my dad started as he would buy us all jewellery for xmas and insist that we opened it between starter and main course, but now we let dc make their own christmas crackers for everyone instead.

Thanks everyone. Mum's started doing table presents too, bless her.

Presents everywhere!

Dh's tree presents are not the same as presents under the tree which we also have!!! It seems to be a little extra present that you get to open on Christmas Eve.

my in laws do tree presents, from the tree, (supposed to hide the identity of the giver), to be opened on boxing day, so it's not too much of an anti-climax.
my mum does little presents on the tree, for if people call in, or for boxing day if you're staying.
no-one in our families lets you open anything on christmas eve. i'm going to upset mil by starting on the christmas cake a day early (cos i can't be bothered with making a pudding)

This thread is hysterical and has really made me laugh - thank you. Dh's family live in Oz and we visited last year I was fuming as the kids had to wait for grandma to arrive and then have a cup of coffee etc before they could open a single present. At home they get them as soon as they get up. I suppose most people go with what they grew up with. I tend to find Christmas a bit boring myself - I think I will have plenty to drink this year!!

Oh yes, Meowmix, the inane conversations -
"Oh, yes, I was saying to June, wasn't I, June, that I'd seen Margaret in town and she'd put on a lot of weight. Or, no, it was Doris that had put on weight, wasn't that right, June? June?"

(June snoring loudly in armchair having lost the thread and consciousness half an hour ago...)

MY family were weird. As a vicar's daughter and only child I remember many years when I'd get dragged round the wards of the psychiatric hospital my dad worked in with my violin on hand to visit everyone. One year they didn't put up decorations, and one year we had lunch off plastic plates in the staff canteen because it was free. One year I got a duvet as a main present but no cover. One year they went visiting sick people without me and I sat on my own at home all afternoon. One year I cooked Christmas dinner because they were busy with church (I was about 13 I think) and we ate it on our knees.
Mum died this year and I feel as though for the first time we can do what we want as a family without her disapproving silently. Hope that doesn't sound too awful. Feel better for the rant. Christmas at our house this year. Just need a way to avoid ILs watching soaps.....

Having tree decorations of scabby birds made with real feathers.

Luckily dh did not want to continue that tradition.

My mum has some of those - they are robins with evil beady eyes! Sis and I used to compete to find the best place to hide the robins. I think she's finally chucked them thank goodness

Whoever it was (too many posts to remember) with the vodka cake - my MIL made an ouzo trifle one year - yum yum!!! And for starters we always had melon balls drowned in whatever other alcohol she could find - peach schnapps, more ouzo, vodka