How can I make the day different to a standard Sunday at home ?

[thebearschairs]

As per most of us, plans changed. I'm actually relieved but it will be just me and my two kids for Christmas Day. When Boris broke the news I had lovely ideas of how special the day could be for us all but since then, the days have been a struggle..

I really need ideas on how to make the day special without the structure of guests. Fragile MH so need it to be easy and low effort..

So far I've got...
Stockings
Special breakfast
Presents - will try and spread these over the day
Maybe a FaceTime with a family member
A game?
Possibly a walk but not sure I can face the resistance and grumbling about it all.

I've got visions of the kids either fighting and shouting whilst I'm trying to cook or glued to bloody Roblox. There's a place for a bit of screen time but not all day.

Anyone got inspiring thoughts on how to make it nice and memorable after this shite excuse of a year.?

I will also be on my own with my dc who come to me Christmas afternoon. I would agree with taking the pressure off to make it an instagrammable day. I'm going with the saying yes approach as a pp said - that will make it special and unusual for dc
my eldest is autistic and hates surprises so may well meltdown when he gets here with the come down of it all. Screentime: crack on, that's all he really wants. I'll squeeze in a Christmas film and maybe a walk, followed by a mezze board tea of one savoury and one sweet. But mostly I'll be aiming for everybody fed and nobody dead

Merry Christmas everyone

I hope everyone's days have gone well. I've achieved everybody fed and nobody dead (although there's an hour to go yet...!)

Hi Misty
Ummmm well we are also still alive. Fed. Breathing but I'm destroyed!

So many squabbles strops and both kids declared it a rubbish Christmas at various points.

So hard doing this jolly Christmas alone (despite that being standard for me) MH v fragile tbh.

I'm amused that people have read my op as a need to be Instagram-able. Im so far away from worrying about that SM shite it's not true !

Ours was better than expected (joys of low expectations!)
They loved their presents (they had more than usual due to trying to compensate for lockdown) and seemed genuinely grateful.

Got the youngest out for a long walk whilst eldest had screen time.

Dinner went well and they ate and enjoyed most bits of it.

Spent some time playing with their new things-making slime etc. with them.

Watched a couple of films-one with each of them while the other one did something else.

So managed to avoid much of the bickering that spoils most days.

Steady supply of alcohol from breakfast helped too

Sorry op-I didn’t see your post before I wrote my fairly chipper one. Hope I haven’t made you feel worse.
Hope you manage a semi enjoyable Boxing Day

Sorry your day didn't work out well @thebearschairs

Mine was actually okay. Few squabbles but nothing too awful. I had a bit of a row with my family just before Xmas and normally I hide that sort of thing from them but I don't need up telling them about it and I think it created a sort of 'us against the world' vibe which was helpful. My kids are older which really helps too. 8 and 12 together can be hard work.

I hope the rest of the week is better and you can relax a bit today.