What are your best tips for a fantastic Christmas?

[Mothersload4]

I love Christmas and already can't wait! what are your best tips for a fantastic and easy Christmas? I have found assigning everyone their own wrapping paper a game changer!

Prep and freeze food. I make the gravy, red cabbage, bread sauce and cranberry sauce. Really helps to reduce on the day stress.

Staying somewhere else preferably miles away,

So you prep, pack and go. If you forget cream, pickles, whatever, it’s too late. You make do and it doesn’t matter.

The worse Christmas days are like weddings where you are trying to make it “perfect”.

Minimising all the gifting of ‘stuff’ and making it all about seeing friends and family, eating, drinking, going for walks and having a great time. Etc etc

I love Christmas days out and have already got some booked! Nothing better than a December walk with all the lights twinkling! Totally agree about seeing people and enjoying everyone's company.

Finish your present shopping by Halloween : )
Cook and freeze everything you can in advance.
Make a timetable for cooking, working backwards from the time you want to eat.
Cook the turkey on its own, then cover it in foil and a pile of towels and let it rest for two hours while you cook everything else.
Relax. No-one cares if it's not perfect, it's not worth getting stressed about.

I plan activities ahead, booking early the panel, Christmas lights at national trust, Santa visit etc.

Get or make your very favourite food, doesn’t have to be Christmas food. No mince pies for me! Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall does chocolate cake for Christmas. Lovely!

Don't get bogged down with details. No one will care (or remember) that you couldn't get exactly the brand of Cumberland sauce you wanted, or that the colour of the Christmas napkins doesn't quite match the colour of the table candles!

Reduce your stress, make some lists, be flexible, relax! It will all be over in just a couple of days! 🎄 🎄 🎄 🎄

Make it small and get it organised early.

Don't book or buy too much, take some time to just enjoy little things.

All you really need is food for Christmas day.
You don't need enough sweets/alcohol/snacks etc... to feed a hundred people for a week, you need one nice dinner with a dessert and something simple for that day for those who want to eat again that day.

The less you do, the less you spend and the less you are stressed.

Every year I make my Christmas smaller and every year we enjoy it more with less waste.

Possibly not quite in the spirit of Christmas but I strategically arrange my A&E shifts to avoid things we’d rather not go to and a lot of my colleagues do the same!

Don’t get me wrong I love Christmas and I do like hosting / seeing family and friends but this tends to avoid some of the ridiculous pressure.

Also agree with pp suggestion of cutting back on all the consumerism where possible. it definitely helps with the pressure

What op said, stay somewhere else and keep things simple

I'm trying to get sil to host at the moment

Either go on a holiday somewhere far far away so you only have your own family to suit (we are going to Switzerland this year) or have your big meal on Xmas eve in the evening. That way no one misses out on present opening and family time by being the cook and lunch in Xmas day can be relaxed leftovers.

Also, I do what spooky said and offer to work over Xmas

😁

Another point is.....don't get lured into rigidly spending alternate Christmas Days with In-Laws, or always being the host yourself, make sure you keep plans flexible.

Once Christmas plans are set in stone, it's much harder to change them without causing family upset. But as your family dynamic alters, you will inevitably want to do things differently some years, so go for spontaneity wherever possible.

Remember that Christmas is about everyone enjoying themselves at some point. So try to plan enjoyable moments specifically targeted for each person interspersed over the whole season. This might mean that not everyone does everything together or in the same way, and it also means that YOU should get those moments as well

Book a hotel room NOW! Otherwise you could have to make do in a stable.

Foil trays to save on washing up (and if you're a pre Christmas prepper you can chuck everything in them for freezing).

Spend only what you can afford firstly.
Use your nice tableware the whole season and not just on Christmas Day. Relax as it is a glorified Sunday dinner.

To create the rules and traditions which work for you and your family.

for me, it was making sure that there is time for warm/close moments with my son. All the big stuff gets us excited and I do enjoy planning and doing it all, as we all do...

But those small moments - opening presents, playing with a new toy by the Christmas tree, going for a cold frosty morning walk, tucking into bed on Christmas eve, seeing Christmas lights up for the first time etc. anything small and intimate you can share with your children, without all the craziness of hosting, large families, cooking, buying, chaos, etc. Those are the times that are actually worth it.

That was the adjustment I had to make after having children, prioritize those, and don't let the craziness stop those, or none of it is worth it.

I save money throughout the year so I can go away or stay in a hotel near family; this way I get time to do my own thing. Staying with my family becomes too intense and cracks begin to show after a few days. My dm prefers us to stay with her but dsis is difficult so I compromise by staying at a local hotel.

I do so much of the “little things” in the run up, home made Christmas cakes and Christmas puddings, gift wrap printing with the kids, day trips, pantomime… that on the day, I give myself a break and buy almost everything already prepped by marks and Spencer.

I’m in the kitchen for a total of two hours. The rest of the day I can enjoy with the kids and my husband.

Refuse to book stuff in for December, until December! I find that I’ll sometimes book a big thing in way in advance, forgetting that we’ll be really busy that month and end up resenting doing something I’d normally love.

We live abroad, and have worked out that coming back to the UK for a week or so before Christmas and then returning to spend Christmas just as the 3 of us and our dog works best. This way we get the fun build up of Christmas, seeing all the family and attend the parties our friends host, and then come back home and have a pressure free Christmas Day. Then we’ve got no socialising to do and can spend that blissful period between Christmas and new year in our PJ’s, zero social obligations. Plus we can fill up the suitcase with British Christmas chocolates/biscuits etc on the way home. Works pretty well!

Keep in mind, it's just one day or two at a stretch. There are no rules to abide by. Gifts are optional.