Please explain what I do with Christmas stockings as I’d like to start the tradition

[Confusedstocking]

I often see chats about them but don’t understand. As a child I’d be given a shop bought netty stocking with chocolate bars held in place, as the backing was cardboard with a puzzle. Asking DH AND HE SAID they just got an orange or something in theirs. Showing our age!

I made stockings years ago but just hang them up. Not much room in them but what do people do? Buy little presents, wrap them up individually and stuff them in the stockings to be opened before the main presents or are they left on the ends of beds or door handles? Please explain to someone who really doesn’t know and in pictures only sees them hung at fireplaces but wants to build Christmassy family traditions. TIA

Our stockings were always from Father Christmas. They were hung (or laid) beside the fireplace along with a mince pie and glass of sherry for FC and a carrot for the reindeer! With light sleepers and teenagers who stay up late, it is much easier to organise stockings by the fireplace than upstairs in bedrooms and it's also more fun for children to open presents with family first thing in the morning rather than alone in their rooms.

The stockings contained a variety of small items, chocolate coins, socks and underwear, bath stuff, stationery, small book, etc. Items were usually roughly wrapped in tissue paper rather than proper wrapping paper.

We do regular sized stockings which have a mix of fun and practical stuff. For example I put things like crayons, little bath toys, older DD gets stuff like face wash, moisturiser, little bits of make up. Both get a bag of chocolate coins, lipsalve and an orange in them. They’re put into the bedrooms to be found in the morning then opened as a family in one of the bedrooms in pyjamas before going downstairs for main presents.

My children have traditions from 2 different cultures.

Tradition 1, put out (polished) shoes for St Nicholas on the night of 5th December.

Tradition 2, put a stocking at the end of your bed for Father Christmas on Christmas Eve.

When DC were younger, I put small toys, crayons, a book, socks etc spread evenly across both. An Apple and a chocolate figure in the shoes, a satsuma and chocolate coins in the stocking.

Now they are older we have settled into a tradition of more traditional edibles for the shoes (apple, nuts, chocolate, candy canes, cookies, not wrapped, or just wrapped in cellophane) and more modern little gifts for the stocking (this year a chocolate orange, pastel highlighters, body spray, flavoured lip balm, a book, a card game, all wrapped in red paper).

They love both traditional and modern equally, so I’m sure your children will love whatever you do.

We have always allowed them to open the presents in these as soon as they wake up, no parents needed, whereas presents under the tree are opened together as a family.

We have sacks and put them by the fireplace, so no chance of waking up dcs (though they are are teens now). We used to put a tray with milk, mince pie/biscuit and carrot for reindeer.

I put in small presents that are not wrapped eg. chocolates, socks, gloves, hats, toiletries, small toys, small books, hair bobbles etc.

Big presents from family are wrapped and under the tree.

With small Santa believers you can include something you mildly disapprove of and be performatively huffy that naughty Santa has given such a thing.

Foreshadowing a main present is fun too - when DD still just about believed she got an iPod as her main present, Santa gave her an iTunes voucher and we were VERY confused 😉

Teens - amusingly banal stuff. Student DD will have new Dishmatic heads in her stocking this year.

I wrap stocking presents, but I only have one child so can afford the time and effort. I do it in part cos I have a memory like a goldfish and enjoy ‘guessing’ what I wrapped a week previously.

As pp explained, the entire tradition is connected with St Nicholas. I grew up in Germany and we still observe the stocking/boot tradition in connection with the actual St Nicholas day, December 6 - children leave an actual boot in front of their door and it is filled overnight, traditionally with nuts and apples although chocolate has made major inroads. The Dutch are even more hung up on this, and still have St Nicholas day as the major gift-giving occasion rather than Christmas.

Stocking were one of my favourite bit of Christmas as a kid. There is something absolutely magical about waking up in the dark and feeling the weight of a stocking at the bottom of the bed.

I think stockings are better in the child's room than hanging on the fireplace. (Firstly, it usually grants us an extra 20mins in bed whilst DS explores the contents. Secondly, I think the impact of the stocking is lost when it's left next to the 'pile' in the living room.)

Our stocking tends to have modest cheap gifts. Card games, bubble bath, fidget toys and the like. The foot of the stocking is usually filled with edibles. Typically a satsuma, chocolate orange and a mini tub of Pringles.

We do the mince pie and baileys for Father Christmas and the dc hook the stockings onto the bedroom door handles.

Small toys, chocolate, socks and maybe a book or smellies now they’re bigger, they usually bring them into our room to open (and hopefully wake dp up a bit). Father Christmas also used to do one biggish gift off of their list each as well, different wrapping paper to the rest of the gifts. As they got older it might be a game or something to share.

A tip I found on here years ago was to fill the stocking early, so I knew what fitted and then pour contents into a carrier bag each so it was all ready and quick to do Christmas Eve.

Ahh everyone does it so differently!
we have pillowcases that they decorated when they were small, they came out on Christmas Eve and went on the end of beds to be filled in the middle of the night with wrapped presents from Father Christmas (all presents under the tree from us/family).
Opened on our bed in the morning.
Now they are older (2 adults and one teen) they are left downstairs and filled and left in the front room. Sod waiting for them to go to sleep now!
My stockings however are legendary, I go so OTT with them, buying things for my dc makes me so happy! It’s the most expensive bit of the Christmas shopping I think 😂
my advice if I had to start all over again would be smaller stockings (pillowcases are massive and harder to fill when they get older and their stuff is smaller) and have identical ones so if they are left on the bed or in the bedroom you only have to walk in once to do the switch, not walk in and get it, leave, fill, then go back in and put it back and leave again. It’s too high stakes.

Yeah Santa always brings something noisy that you wouldn't be allowed here... we have had recorders, kazoos, panpipes, whirling sound tubes, whistles etc...

This year a harmonica.

Why do I do it to myself lol.

I and our kids love stocking presents- we love nik naks.

For the children:
small toys- including novelty christmas toys
fun stationery-mini highlighters, erasers, novelty pen etc
chocolates- choc orange, tube of smarties etc.
little book or notebook
We have DDs so always hair bows, costume jewellery, 'lipstick' (lipbalm, they're under 7)

For me:
makeup
perfume
chocolates
little alcohol bottles, particularly novelty flavours
bath bomb
coffee or tea to drink while opening main presents

DH:
hot sauce
biltong in weird new flavours
shower bomb
gadgets
usually something for his motorbikes
gloves/socks/bobble hat

We don't wrap our stocking presents, and the DC just tip them out on their beds and rifle through them

Ooh I love stockings!
we have carried out my family tradition of stockings after lunch. Main presents/ presents from everyone else as soon as we wake up ( early even though ds is nearly 15 now!), then stockings full of little things after lunch. I do wrap them, sometimes v well so it takes time to get into! We do silly things so this year ( sis, mum and nephew here too and will all get stockings), we have wind up grannies to race. Treats, Christmas, a game each, smellies etc, but do whatever works for you!

We also do St. Nicks boot on the 6th too... St. Nick leaves their Xmas jumper and sweets in the boot.

I have 3 children 8, 3 and 1 and this is what is in theirs. I don't spend a fortune on the stocking. I hang it on the outside of their bedroom doors and they open them before we go downstairs. I also don't wrap these gifts.

In our house the stockings hung on the bannister as we don't have a mantle piece. Santa filled the stockings with small unwrapped gifts which always included a satsuma, chocolate coins, walnuts, an unboxed chocolate orange, age appropriate puzzle, toy and colouring book etc. socks, finger puppets, small battery powered light or torch. As they got older there was a Costa voucher and a memory stick: just small age appropriate things.
Father Christmas would leave the stockings at the end of each child's bed. The purpose of this was twofold: 1) the excitement of the stocking would wake parents before the DC came tearing in so we could compose ourselves and 2)) after the initial unpacking on our bed the DC had something to play with before breakfast so we could eat together and then open the living room door once we'd all eaten and got dressed.
We bought stockings embroidered with each name and they have been reused for years. As adults, when they are here for Christmas, they still want stockings! By next year there will be a DGC stocking too!
For main presents FC only ever bought one main gift; it wasn't wrapped and had a silver bow
And a silver tag with the name on. All gifts from family were in gold or coloured paper with proper labels.
It just helped keep everything going without too much complicated explanation for years.

@GrumpyPanda my Dutch friend told me that Sinterklaas and Dec 6th is mainly a children's thing now and more people celebrate Christmas and give presents then.
She got me into the habit of eating Speculaas biscuits for St Nicolas's day, and I like the way he arrives by boat.

Just think very carefully about how easy it is to maintain whichever option you go with. It is very hard to undo these kinds of traditions once you start! (It's why I've always avoided Elf on the Shelf like the plague!)

We have football socks as stockings. They come in pairs, so I give DC one to put on their bed, pre-fill the other, then do a switcheroo on the way to bed. Only the stockings come from Santa in our family, and it isn't too huge to have to fill as they get older and the stuff they want gets smaller.
They always contain chocolate coins, a satsuma, a packet of sweets, a Lego or Playmobil blind bag and an item we don't allow them to have normally eg lip balm or nail varnish to 'prove' it can't have come from us (we always comment that we're not very happy about the gift/Santa should know better etc). The rest will be the little gifts we've bought them that might otherwise get lost under the tree eg fidget toys, dolls house food. I wrap everything except the food and blind bags to slow the process down and give us more time in bed. (They bring them through to us to open in our room, but it gives time to come to properly!)

I think you'll find everyone has their own tradition. When I was growing up my mum saved up all year to pay for Christmas. We used to have a giant plastic stocking which we got on Christmas morning from Santa - Terry's chocolate orange, socks, little fun things - magic flannel etc, but some more expensive bits/toys too. That would keep us going all day then we would open main presents after dinner, so around 4pm. Not sure DS (3) is going to be able to wait until 4pm so will most likely stagger gifts. This year he has a big Christmas sack in place of a stocking - second hand brio train toys, second hand dinosaur figures, dinosaur socks, bubble bath, monster truck etc.

We use pillow cases in our house. Buy two for each child identical. Pre fill one with the presents and hide. They put the other out at the foot of their bed. When asleep you swap the empty one for the full one. Simples.

My friend puts the Kellogs mini cereal boxes and mini pringles tubed in her kids stockings. This fills up the space and she doesn't need to buy too much junk.

My son overheard my grandson ( his son) talking about the stocking he gets at my house to his girlfriend. Apparently he was telling her how fabulous it always is.
I asked him myself if now that he was an adult ( he's just turned 18) wasn't he told for a stocking. His answer was absolutely definitely not, which made me smile.
Mind you I also do one for my son and he's nearly 40. So be careful of any traditions that you start as you maybe doing it for decades 😀

Does anyone do them for adult children?

As I said, @Chouxpastryishard - everyone in our family gets one, (that is, the household plus maybe one or two close relatives who aren’t actually in the house on Christmas Day but share the day through Facetime). So all ages - oldest over 90.

Do you have children? How old are they?

People do stockings differently - wrapped/not wrapped, in bedroom/downstairs etc

We wrap little presents and open then upstairs before going down to the bugger presents under the tree. DD1 is 4 and this year we're putting some chocolate coins, a sparkly Alice band, a mini paw patrol colour by numbers book, and a pad of stickers. We don't do much in stockings.
DD2 is 18 months and I'll probably get a ball, maybe a toy car or something for her. She won't be fussed either way.

Ours are hung on the fireplace mantle. We originally just did them for children, but dd asked us to start including adults once the Santa illusion fell away. We do little presents, typically unwrapped. Generally inexpensive, but my goal is that they be useful or useable. I often include things that would get purchased anyway like new markers or notepads. Plus some chocolate.