Your Christmas morning traditions

[Winterfellismyhome]

I love threads like this --because im nosy

What are your Christmas morning routines?

When i was a kid we opened one present in the morning then had to wait until after dinner for the rest. It took hours as we were a big family.

Now as an adult, we do breakfast, then presents and spend the rest of the day being lazy

Get up early to turn oven on, make tea for me and husband, turn fairy lights on. Little ones bring their stockings on to our bed to open them. Downstairs in jammies to open presents from Farmer Christmas.
Breakfast of chocolate pancakes, pastries, Buck’s Fizz and fresh coffee.
Turkey in, get dressed, meet grandparents at the pub then all back to ours for Christmas dinner and more presents under the tree. Love it!!

Listen to DS chuntering to himself from 4am because he's been told he's not allowed to open his stocking/wake us up until 7am. Finally crack at about 5:30 so he comes in and unwrap his stocking in bed with us.
Get dressed, go downstairs and eat chocolate/drink coffee/prosecco and play with stocking stuff til 8:30 when we are bored and head to DMs over the road.

Then open our stockings there while breakfast is being made and waiting for everyone else to arrive. After breakfast we open all the tree presents.

Rest of the day is chilling and playing, trying to help DM in the kitchen and listening to the gravy argument

Presents first then breakfast then food prep. Lunch around 2pm. Then a few games then chill and watch tv.

Kids have stockings in bedroom so they play for about 1/2 hour (although not sure we'll get away with this now that they are 12 and 14 years old!!). Then we have an insane amount of crepes and chocolate spread, maple syrup, lots of fruit breakfast.

Prep work for Christmas meal, everybody chips in, turkey in the oven. Church is at 11.15, we go with GParents, then it's home and we open the presents. Food is at around 2.30, Queen speech, walk, wash up, movie. Tea at some point which is usually a cheese based affair.

As a kid we celebrated at Christmas Eve, usually the drunkest uncle in the family would dress up as Santa and distribute the presents at midnight. It was fab. I had a gazillion cousins, aunties and uncles, as well as various lodgers that stayed at my grandparents house, they had a boarding house rented by the room by - seasonal workers who couldn't go back to their families for Christmas. I have absolutely lovely memories of Christmas.

I love these! We never had stockings as kids so it's definitely something I want to do for DS when he's older

We had our first baby in March so this is going to be a very different one for us. The start of our family traditions I'm hoping.
Up until this year I would always sleep over my parents, my sister and I would wake mum and dad up and we'd all go downstairs, put Michael Buble on, have coffee and Buck's Fizz and open all of our presents in our pjs. Then we'd all go off and get showered and dressed, using our new shower gels and bits, then back downstairs for smoked salmon and cream cheese bagels and more Buck's Fizz.
I'm imagining the same sort of thing this year and when we have more kids, but with everyone coming to us for Christmas.

Our tradition when we were kids and still received stockings was:

• Wake up at a reasonable time- 8.30/9am ish, sometimes later

• Open stockings (which were usually on the end of our beds or hanging from the door handle)

• Have a quick breakfast (we were allowed to eat the chocolate from our stockings as part of a nutritious breakfast!!)

• Church

• Presents (or sometimes a quick lunch [e.g. sandwiches and/or soup] and then presents)

• Christmas film and/or dog walk

• Christmas Dinner at around 7pm

I loved waiting for the main presents and feel that it added to the excitement!! I never felt deprived by having to wait nor did I wish I'd woken up at 7am and opened everything!

We didn't go into the living room until we got back from church (because obviously then the presents might magically disappear [and/or my parents hadn't finished wrapping yet] and my parents used to "check" whether Father Christmas had been before letting us in.

I loved it!

I have 2 Christmas morning traditions by now. 1 xmas morning tradition when the kids are with me and number 2 is when they're with their father we began alternating Christmas.
Morning with kids: kids never wake up at crack of dawn so I always get a little lie in. Either me or DP will go downstairs first to to make sure Santa has been kids will go down once we say he has. Kids will open all gifts from Santa and then we'll have breakfast; bagels, bacon, eggs, croissants and plenty of chocolate of course. We'll all get changed for the day afterwards and then we'll open gifts under the tree, we open them one by one.

When the kids are with their father; we have breakfast in bed and have a super lazy morning and we dont touch gifts until the kids come home.

Get up at whatever time our DS wakes us up (probably around 6/7ish). Make some proper coffee, open presents. Then make breakfast (always bacon sandwiches!) and crack open chocolates / sweets / crisps etc for nibbling on throughout the morning. Just the 3 of us this year for the first time so will then FaceTime the family. Crack on with cooking Christmas dinner, probably to be served around 2ish while DS and DH set up new toys. Then probably some child friendly games (guess who etc...) and a Christmas film. More chocolate probably! Then put DS to bed a bit later than normal, crack open some bubbly and watch films and eat more chocolate no doubt!

6.30am, go down& turn oven on to start cooking Turkey slowly, ds usually follows to open presents. Breakfast, probably something light, toast or boiled eggs. Ds sets up presents & messes around, we all get dressed around 10.30am, coffee, television on. Lunch served 12.30, eaten by 2.00pm, pots in dishwasher, sat down for The Queen at 3.00pm, watch television, veg out reading christmas books. 6.30pm sandwiches, salads & snacks, television on for Christmas soaps & main programmes, pjs on, in bed by 10.00pm.

DH is always up first. He gets the turkey ready for the oven, tree lights & heating on. He wakes me up at six (the absolute earliest he can without being told to bugger off!), turkey goes in and then we exchange presents. We phone family and then have a lovely, relaxing day. We prep dinner together but there’s no time table. It’s perfect for us.

Stockings are at the end of the kids beds - they bring them into our room and open them on our bed, usually while eating a bit of chocolate from the stocking!

Then straight downstairs to open tree presents. It’s carnage and I love it

Then we have a fry up for breakfast.

Can’t wait!

I am blessed on Christmas morning by having DC who like their sleep (though it's been another story getting them up for school every morning over the years!)

I don't think that will change this year as they're now mid - late teens.

So I get up around 7 or 8, make coffee and am quite civilised when the kids come in (yes, still) to open stockings on our bed.

Downstairs to see what's under the tree and a then a bit of peace while they both slope off to their rooms before the family arrive for a champagne brunch.

Our Christmas morning starts at 6:30am when dd1 is allowed to come in. Then we’ll wake up dd2 (who needs a lot more sleep even though she’s almost 6 ) they’ll open stockings on our bed - we treat the stocking as our main gift to them whilst they’re still little (9 and 5) so it’s fairly substantial!.
A relaxed breakfast, of absolutely whatever you want, dd1 loves granola and smoothies, dd2 chose fruit and cheesestrings, odd thing, and dh and i tend to have eggs and spinach on sourdough toast (our favourite)

From 9:30-12:30 we just twat about playing with toys, maybe go for a walk if anyone fancies, getting dressed, a bit glammed up possibly, FaceTime the in-laws, then go to my parents (a 10 min drive away) where my brother, and his family and my sister congregate for dads famous Christmas lunch, tree presents are opened after the washing up is done, plenty of booze, party games and much frivolity.

Crash into bed about 11-12 and sleep late Boxing Day cant wait!!

Presents as soon as we are all up, breakfast, a cheeky alcoholic drink, get dressed, chocolates, dinner, all pretty relaxed in my house but presents (stockings and under the tree) are opened straight away.

I honestly can't imagine waiting but to each their own!

DC crawl into bed with us when they wake up, DH goes downstairs to put the fire on and put the Christmas tree lights on so it'll be all cosy and look christmassy when they come down. He'll shout up "santa's been!" and we'll all head downstairs. DC open stockings first while DH and I have a cuppa. Breakfast will be something like croissants/Danish that we can eat in the living room while presents are opened. DH and I will have a glass of bucks fizz and DC also get a champagne flute with orange and lemonade, which makes them feel very grown up. Once presents are opened we'll all shower and get dressed. Then this year we will head over to my DP's (15 min drive) for Christmas lunch.