Help me plan a 90s Christmas

[Iamasentientoctopus]

For the last few years, Christmas has felt like a juggernaut getting larger and more expensive. I spent so long last year putting all of my carefully selected ornaments up, two Christmas trees etc I actually felt quite flat when it was all done. My house looked like an instagram post. Then add on the Xmas eve boxes, elaborate meal for 12, mountains of presents etc. I can’t quite describe the feeling but it was like the opposite of the warm festive feeling. I know I’m an adult now so Christmas isn’t going to be the same but I want to try and recreate some old school Christmas magic. I’ve had the idea of going full 90s in both decor and attitude and I definitely want to cut down on all the waste. So far I have on my list:

• A real tree with coloured lights and TINSEL. I’m going to let everyone else help me and I’m not going to obsess over how it looks.
• Traditional stockings left on the beds with a tangerine and little gifts - not making the stockings another £100 each!

I’d love some ideas/memories to add to my list. I’d love to get some of those coloured lantern lights my nan used to have outside but I’m also conscious I don’t want this to be another theme and spend a load of money! Thanks 😊

Definitely real tree decorated with abandon! Also you’re spot on with the tangerine in the stocking. I remember there being a book, something like a nail file or toothbrush and a tin of sweets along with some bits and pieces Santa had obviously put a lot of thought into.
We also had ‘garage decorations’ that you used to get with Esso points. They were the ones cut out of shiny stuff and folded out into strings you put on the ceiling. Make paper chains and hang them too, and obviously letters to Father Christmas.
edit to add: Christmas Eve boxes - definitely not!

I love the idea of a more simple, paired back Christmas! Last year we went away to a cottage in the Lakes, hugely cut back on the number of presents we bought for other people and our own kids and they mainly got money so they could have a fun toy buying day with it.

Christmas dinner was pizza and party food, we didn't have to worry about guests popping in and entertaining, we could just relax and it was amazing.

The most 90s part for me was my new Christmas tree lights, I bought these https://www.lights4fun.co.uk/products/150-multi-coloured-led-traditional-pickwick-christmas-lights they are just like the ones we had on our tree as a child, so nostalgic 😊

I could send you my Christmas decorations, they're from the 1990s but we're still using them.

I bought 2 sets in the BHS sale and I love the delightfully mismatched jewel and pastelly snow and ice colours.

Although we don't have a real tree as I hate putting the lights on so bought a prelit one.

The whole lot probably cost about £50 and while the tree is probably 'only' about 20 years old the decorations are 30 years old this year.

But your 1990s Christmas needn't take much planning as such because you don't need to do much.

You just put out what decorations you already have and do one food shop a day or two before Christmas so you have nice food in while the shops are shut.

Plus a trip or two out to buy Christmas presents because online shopping doesn't exist. I suggest you go on late night shopping Thursdays and look at the lights and get hot chocolate while you're out.

@Iamasentientoctopus I don't think I've moved on much from the 90s as that's when I got married.

Christmas cards stapled to red satin ribbon with a bow at the top and hung over doors. Red bows on the Christmas tree but white lights with baubles and lametta. Cinnamon spice bags on the radiators for Christmas smells. This bit is a bit more up to date.

I have never, ever had any other decorations and the elf can stuff himself. When our dc were little, there was no such thing as a Christmas Eve Box. We went to the Crib service at church instead! I suspect I couldn't take away a Chrstmas Eve Box if that was habit and tradition. I think it's bonkers but perhaps a grannie's job in the future (she hopes).

I hosted for 25 years, sometimes up to 10. Apart from volume, I found the catering pretty simple. Christmas Eve: Baked ham, roasties, broad beans in parsley sauce, Carrots, mince pies and boozy cream. Christmas Day: tea and biscuits, chocolate for the children, 9.30 mass, smoked salmon open sarnies, champagne and presents at 11.30. Turkey, roasties, parsnips, runner beans, Carrots, bought gravy, stuffing, pigs, cranberry, etc. Xmas Pud and something else - bought. Boxing day: turkey, ham, charcuterie meats, roasties, salad, pickles, good bread, pork pie, cheese board, trifle, Christmas cake.

In the early noughties, I had a company deliver and put up the trees and decorate them - I am not artistic and hate doing it. They still do it.

I think the biggest change is Christmas cards - we used to send about 120.

Just enjoy it and stop Instagram ming it. It doesn't have to be perfect. Don't argue or fall out either because there will come a time when parents aren't here to argue back. Our mothers are old and frail now and can't travel. One has carers. DH and I have split up the last few Christmases rather than leave one alone. It's fucking miserable but we make the best of it. The children come the week before.

We have never gone mad with presents and stockings. £100 each for the DC £20on tat for a stocking. They still get a Pokemon Annual - family joke! When they were teens they were offered a stocking or £30. They went for £30. We used to have fun with mince pies and whiskey for santa. DH used to misplace a log and put a sooty footprint on the carpet and bottom stair (hoovered up easily).

>>whispers<< try to remember it's about the birth if Jesus, the advent of Christianity and love.

I mean this respectfully, but do you think the feeling you describe could be a feeling of overconsumption? I feel like that at Xmas. Things don't make you happy, people and experiences do. I don't think the answer is buying more decorations when you have beautiful stuff already. But I do like the idea of a retro Xmas.

That’s exactly what I’m talking about. I did say in my original post that I would like some lantern lights but I’m not going to buy any as I don’t want it to be about spending money. I’m not talking about decorating my house to look like a time capsule or anything, I’m asking for ideas and memories to capture the feeling of a more traditional Christmas.

Watching The Snowman was a big thing in my house when I was younger. And now I watch it with my adult children. We all get up to dance to Walking In The Air 😁

In the 1990s DM & DF were still using deccies from the mid-seventies! I think that's what took for, the inherited, the old, the traditional. My tree has adopted a similar vibe. When I was married there was always a theme. Now, it looks like the Christmas tree couldn't decide what outfit to wear.

My parents had tissue paper and metallic decorations that folded up and that you could pin to the ceiling. Good luck finding some. I found tinsel once at a local hardware shop. Try local markets and discount shops. You can still get paper chains in discount shops or online. We also had a small inflatable santa to display too. (Sadly the dog popped him as the decade closed). He was from the seventies too.

My mum still gets a bit of wool or string and pins it to the wall, then rests cards on it as another decoration. No fancy display.

We never had proper napkins or any of that fsncy stuff for the table. Mum bought cheap paper napkins snd didn't have a Christmas tablecloth, just a paper one bought from Woolies! Very plain, simple table. No special Christmas crockery. No centrepiece. Crackers were small! And you got a cheap useless item inside. Not the big, fancy crackers like now.

I blame Instagram for a lot of the rxcesses of Christmas. Oh, and I muss Woolies.

As someone who was an adult in the 90s I don't think Christmas has changed all that much except there's now more happening in the run up to Christmas.

So, don't put your tree up till the Saturday before Christmas and keep it up till 12th night. Don't go to a Christmas wreath decorating workshop or Christmas Light Trail (you can watch the lights being switched on in your town) or a Heritage Santa Train. You can go to a pantomime and a Christmas Carol Concert.

@Iamasentientoctopus I see what you mean now...I have just finished my morning coffee. You want to create the 90s aesthetic without buying lots of stuff. You definitely have to put on TOPTP from the 90s in the morning, Eastenders Xmas special in the evening. And don't forget you need a Radio-times magazine so the kids can circle all of the programs they want to watch (no flicking through the listings on the TV)!

It all started much later than it does now and there was much less of it somehow - I even got offered Christmas delivery slots for the supermarket last week! So stressful. It made what there was a lot more special.

Oh, and the 90s were when people stopped having coloured lights and started having white lights, it was the 50s to 80s when coloured lights reigned supreme.

It sounds like you need more experiences rather than purchases as a pp mentioned. And I don’t mean spend £££ on ‘Xmas memory making’.
Instead of buying a wreath can you go for a walk on a cold day and pick some greenery to make your own?
Make and decorate your own Christmas cake/Yule log?
We always had a christingle orange and went to a carol service.
Invite friends/family round for sherry and a mince pie?
If you have children, get them to make paper chains or use Xmas cards to make decorations.
Aim for a few meaningful experiences/events done with care instead of the usual December mayhem.

Paper chains. Make them out of anything - newspaper, wrapping paper, coloured paper. Hours of fun!

One thing that has changed would be that adults in my family would buy each other gifts like blenders, toasters or other small electricals. Christmas in our family did involve a lot of gift giving, which did involve a lot of communication and fairly early Christmas shopping so there was quite a build up like there is now. Because of Amazon Prime etc I couldn’t get excited about a new appliance so we don’t bother. We used to only get new things at Christmas and birthdays in the main so we were all quite excited about that rather than the true meaning of Christmas. I don’t want to sound ungrateful but I doubt I would have been as excited about Christmas if it wasn’t for the pile of presents to start things off on Xmas morning.

My ILs have ruined Christmas for me. It’s turned into some kind of puritan wall staring competition.
i absolutely want to join you OP in your 90s Christmas.

I'm 44. The year I was born, my mum went to Woolworths and bought a set of fairy lights.

She still puts the same ones up every year.

I dream of having similar ones but they're ££ now as "vintage" so I make so with warm white ones.

Our tree is absolute chaos and I love it. Every decoration has some meaning, the DC made about half of them, nothing matches, there's way too many things, and it's perfect. That feels quite retro to me when I see everyone else with their colour co-ordinated spookily soulless trees!

Go big on tinsel! I couldn’t give a rat’s arse about coordinating decorations so our tree is a glorious explosion of tinsel, flashing coloured lights and decorations we’ve had for 20+ years, including the clothes peg snowman our DD made at nursery. It’s exactly the kind of tree I had growing up before my mum got seduced by Good Housekeeping into having themed decorations. Now every time she comes to visit at Xmas she gets misty eyed with nostalgia and wishes she’d kept all our childhood baubles. I’m never updating ours!

Oh haha good X post but yes this exactly!

Exactly this! A tree without tinsel is like Christmas dinner without crackers.

You’re still talking about consumption, just with different styling/fheme.

If you want your household to spend less on gifts, random stuff, meals, outings, you can just do that but use bits of decor you already have.

My 90s stocking had mainly practical things in it, socks, deodorant, stationary. Chocolate orange and coins were a highlight and usually eaten immediately.

I'm not sure it's specifically a 90s Christmas that you're nostalgic for, but a Christmas where you were the child and the adults did all the hard work and you were able to just sit back and enjoy it!

I think the only way to recreate that is either to spend a huge amount of money paying someone else to do it all for you or to just buy fewer presents for everyone, be less bothered about how your house looks and what food you're making and get your partner to do more of the work.

Was just about to say this, get the radio times and follow the terrestrial/cable schedule without relying on apps. We do this every year, a few things get recorded but we all watch things like the Snowman at the time it’s on, no excuses. Last year I realised my kids thought the Gruffalo’s Child and Stickman are from the same era as the snowman 🤦‍♀️ we watch those religiously, too.

Send cards, to absolutely everyone, all neighbours in the street and give the bin men and postie a box of roses. We always take treats to the old people’s centre round the corner for their Christmas tea that they have. It operates as a food bank, too so everything is very much wanted.

Our stockings have always been lowkey but my kids are always so excited by them! I do almost the same thing every year - bathbomb, key ring, something to eat like a flapjack or something to tide them over till breakfast, a tangerine, something like a funky pen like a fountain pen or gold marker or similar. My kids are teens and you’d think they’d demand more but they’re not that type of kids, and I think they’re so familiar with these types of stockings it’s become a nostalgia thing for them. Helps that our stockings are quite small!

Start up a Christmas cupboard in the kitchen. Once it’s gone, it’s gone! It’s so exciting seeing that mum has added in some teacakes or something that you won’t be able to touch until X December. It builds it up and makes it special. Admittedly in my house it’s more like a bonanza or greed starting in around November and every Ocado delivery brings treats, mince pies and stuff that used to be so special and exciting. I want to pare it back this year so I’ve just started emptying and organising a wall cupboard to start a Christmas cupboard. I remember as a kid getting excited about a packet of Sainsburys jam tarts landing in the Christmas cupboard. I would be fit to burst after a month when my mum would say shall we get some treats out of the cupboard. True anticipation, which is definitely something missing from life in general these days. No delayed gratification. My kids also don’t get everything on their list, my friends tie themselves in knots fulfilling the lists but I’m like umm no it’s not a strict shopping list it’s an ideas list.

I tried this last year. I did end up
spending much more money that I intended, it isn’t easy to find because tinsel isn’t good for the environment nor is glitter. I was really proud of it by the time it was done - no one liked it. One comment was it looked a bit cheap and tacky ( I did try to keep the costs down)

The dc were visibly disappointed with their stockings. I think your own family traditions are what’s important here, and the dc look forward to what they have come to expect from Christmas.

Receeating the magic of Christmas does put a lot of pressure on the day. Especially if you haven’t got the excitement of young children.

My most ‘succesful’ Christmas was having a party with lots of 70s Christmas songs and drinks. I had a more natural theme with twigs and candle light. I focused on being together rather than gift giving. Tried to add some nourishing elements it was great. Good luck op

Christmas as an adult doesn’t hit the same but I am not sure you will be able to get the same nostalgic feelings from planning a 90’s Christmas because the overplanning that goes into it l kills the mood for the planner.

We still have the best Christmas. Our house is tiny and seven of us squeeze around a 120cm round table with no room for festive decorations. We have a tradition of playing certain games. We have a fry-up on Christmas Eve (everyone holds off on fry-ups on the lead up to Christmas and this one is special) and share our secret Santa’s. (5 siblings). DH and I make sure that we are available to join in and not tied to the kitchen. We spend our evenings playing games. The early evening is spent with people leaving to visit partners and partners visiting us. There is no pressure and no focus on the material. We love it.