Ideas for a festive celebration / family time after visiting ILs for Christmas

[notlisteningwithmother]

If you're not spending Christmas Day at home, do you have plans to do something special before or after?

We've hosted Christmas for the last few years, but MIL said it would be impossible this year because SILs shift work means that she can't travel. We agreed to go to ILs for a few days, only to discover that SIL actually has the whole week off work and didn't know that she was being used as an excuse!

Setting aside the fact that I'm a bit with MIL, the DCs are upset that they will be missing the family Christmas traditions that have built up over the last few years. I'm taking the view that Christmas Day is only one day. We can still do the things that they enjoy during the December build-up, put the tree up, bake a cake, eat my body weight in panettone, and the usual run of school Christmas events before we go to ILs. But once we get home, it would be nice to have something to look forward to.

Do you do anything special between Christmas and the end of the school holidays, which isn't until 6th January!? We don't usually celebrate New Year, but maybe this is the year to start . Or we could invite our neighbours round for drinks / buffet between Christmas and New Year now that we know the ILs won't be here. I think I just need something to organise that isn't Christmas!

Could you go to a show/panto one afternoon and dinner out afterwards, just your family? Then on another day do the get together with neighbours? Sometimes the days between Christmas and New Year can be a bit ’flat’ and you would all have something to look forward to.

In your position I would be a bit annoyed with MIL as well, why on earth did she resort to such underhand means to get you to go to hers? Would you have refused?

I would cancel my visit to mil and tell her why & also emphasise that if she had invited you then it's a different matter. It's because she lied and manipulated to get what she wants, that's unacceptable. If you go then she will repeat her tactic because she knows that it gets her results.

I know that's not what you asked but I wouldn't let this one slide. Your dc are already upset in missing Christmas at home. Your mil has had years of having Christmas with her children how she wants it so now it's your turn.

Completely agree with gatepost. Let her know that the children are upset about not being at home, that you asked SIL directly if there was any way for her to change her shift pattern, and she has let you know she's not working at all that week. Then something to the effect of "this is great news for the children, will you be joining us?"

Honestly, it doesn't matter AT ALL what day Christmas falls on unless you are a Christian.

Nominate a day to be Christmas Eve, and do the traditions you have just exactly as if it were the real thing. The next day is Christmas Day, the following one Boxing Day. It's a totally moveable feast.

We have successfully done this many times! You can easily have two Christmasses this way, with presents from one family on one, and from the other on the next.

Thank you for the replies.

There are two parts to this. As some of you have pointed out, MIL has not been honest with us, and we've made plans with her based on what turned out to be an untruth. Gatepost makes a good point about different generations and where is 'home' for Christmas. My parents are no longer alive, so being home for Christmas means being in my own house as far as I'm concerned.

But DH will still be spending time with his family, and if we'd just had a proper, honest, 'would you like to spend Christmas with us' invitation then we might have chosen to go. MIL is usually pretty straight with what she says, and I think DH is a bit worried that there is something else going on. Rather than argue, we'll go this year and make it work.

Verticality that's what I'm thinking. Christmas Eve and Christmas day are hard to change. The DCs will want to wake up on Christmas morning and see it for what it is, and that excitement will be with us wherever we are. There's a religious significance to the day for some in the family. But I like your idea about bumping activities onto different days. Thank you.

Making a gingerbread house is just as possible on Dec 27th. A picky buffet dinner on Christmas Eve eaten in front of the fire would work just as well on Dec 28th. The traditional boxing day walk can become a NYE walk. And maybe a panto girly. A friend told me that if they are away over Christmas Day then they celebrate St Nicholas earlier in December, or Epiphany / twelfth night as the end of the Christmas season to give themselves something special to do as a small family.

Given how flat I feel as December 25th ends, it might do me some good to have a year when all the planning and excitement does not go into one day. The year that DD started with a D&V bug on Christmas morning is a good reminder of the benefits of being willing to move some of the normal Christmas stuff around. So I'm imagining our usual Christmas day breakfast becoming a very nice 'welcome home' on the morning after we get back. With crackers and bubbly.

I really do need something to plan! It isn't that I have all the time in the world to do it - I just enjoy the escapism. Which probably explains why I'm on this board in September

I’d get DH to have a word with his mum and find out why she felt she had to be so underhand, and essentially lie about SILS shifts. Why didn’t she just ask you if you’d like to go to hers? If there is something going on, and she’s normally straightforward with you both perhaps she would like to tell him?

I’m pleased that you are making plans around going for Christmas, it all sounds exciting.

I'd sort it out with MIL before you make any plans - the DC are disappointed, they want to be at home as do you and now you know it was a lie.

Way it works in our family is to treat Christmas as a season and not a day. I want to be at home at Christmas Day and am not moving for anyone. However we have enough traditions to fill a month and enough types of food we must eat to feed an army. So Christmas takes a long time and there is plenty of room for seasonal visits to all family.

In your situation, I'd stay at home and see the ILs close to Christmas Day but not on the day. After all, SIL is off work the whole week