What do you do on Christmas Eve?

[Keepingitsimple101]

I know some people will be working but does anyone do anything special?

We usually go for a walk then have a takeaway.

We are all ready for Christmas Day with presents wrapped and food shop done.

Garden centre / local cafe for a late morning coffee, walk and cemetery to visit this gone. Some wrapping with Christmas carols, round to family for drinks and light nibbles. Might try and meet an old friend for a wine at our local and dog walk, so a pretty busy day!

Clean the house

wash my hair

go to church

drink fizz

Good luck and wishing you a speedy recovery ❤️

DH is working all day on Christmas Eve and I'll be at home, doing the (millionth) pre-Christmas clean and tidy, arranging all of the presents under the tree, cooking buffet food and arranging a Christmas Eve buffet - then watching a movie and I'll be going to bed earlier than most kids do (I have to take strong pain relief for Spinal Stenosis and it really knocks me out - sounds bad but to be honest, it will feel nice, lying in a warm, comfy bed, watching a movie as I doze off to sleep as I'll no doubt be exhausted and in pain).

No alcohol for me on Christmas Eve but I shall be having a glass or two of red wine on Christmas night.

Christmas starts with the Carol Service from kings college at 3pm. The opening with a single chorister singing once in royal David city is pure magic especially when you know that they have two choristers lined up and one gets the tap on the shoulder just before starting to sing! Children knew that and kept out of the kitchen! It used to be a family service then a nice tea with fish, later moved to midnight communion now celebrating at my daughter and back to afternoon christingle service with the grandchildren. Ooh and veg prep.

That sounds lovely

Get all the veg prepared, set table. Christingle service then a sandwich buffet for tea with Nigella’s Poinsettia cocktails and either muppet Christmas Carol or miracle on 34th street

We usually stay in, put on Christmas music, and have a movie marathon. Maybe a takeaway if we’re feeling fancy. Keeps things simple but festive

DS and I are going to the local cat cafe and will probably stop at the garden centre for breakfast on the way. Then we’ll potter about at home until late afternoon when ExH will come over and the three of us will go out for dinner at the Indian restaurant in town. When we get home DS will be given his main present - it’s jointly from ExH and me and we’ve decided DS can have it early because I’m working on Christmas Day and we both want to see him open it.

I usually work but have booked annual leave. We will be prepping veg and precooking some stuff, to take time off being in the kitchen on Christmas Day.

Other than that maybe some board games, my elder kids might go to the pub with their grandad for a bit.

We're usually at home getting things sorted (food for lunch next day, tidying etc), long dog walk, trying to tire out the kids then easy tea, bath, picture in front of tree then bed. This year we're having breakfast with Santa so will be up and out early then doing everything else in the afternoon. Hoping to go look at some lights once the kids are in pj's, for us that means a drive as we're in the middle of nowhere. Then once the kids are asleep getting the presents down (they're 6 and 2 so still firmly believe) and then panicking about the guests arriving the next day 🤣.

We will have a nice dog walk, come home, do some tidying and prep for Christmas Day then we will have friends round for drinks and nibbles in the afternoon. If we weren’t doing this we would probably go to some sort of church crib service.

Once the dc are in bed we will get all of the presents down and relax with a pint of baileys.

My FIL is joining us for a nice long walk in the morning. MIL will join afterwards and I'll have prepared a quiche, scones and a pot of tea. We're having a side of salmon for dinner followed by a black forest style chocolate roulade which I'll make tomorrow. No need to prep veg, stuffing etc this year as we're doing away with a trad Christmas dinner this year and heading out to the go forest for a long run/bike ride followed by a buffet style dinner. It already feels quite liberating!

Work until lunch, then prep the Xmas day veg and make the stuffing. The adult kids turn up around 3pm I imagine (I said no later than 1pm) and and, after opening Christmas Eve boxes, we will spend the afternoon / evening playing board games and perhaps a Die Hard film if we can’t face any more games. Dinner is a buffet which is already prepared so just need to heat up a couple of bits.

Walk the dog in the morning - then the afternoon and evening are dedicated to food, drink, crap films and doing as little as possible 😂 we don’t have children though so it’s all very relaxed.

It'll be my first day off for the break. I've got a gym class in the morning, then I expect I'll read and eat mince pies and drink tea in the afternoon. DP will make a roast (we have our Christmas dinner on Christmas Eve), then we'll probably watch a film.
Christmas Day is leftovers and whatever old films are on.

I'm off this year as my work rota was changed so xmas eve will be having a buffet breakfast and doing our xmas eve hamper then completely relaxing in a bath and putting on my pyjamas in the afternoon. Putting out a buffet and watching a movie. I'm most looking forward to the tradition I've always had of having a cup of tea and xmas cake at 11pm ish. Used to do that when adult and teen dc were little after putting out their gifts. Will be up until after 12 am so I can say merry xmas to the teen as that's a new tradition we have being doing for the past couple of years and the adult dc always text a merry Christmas also at midnight.

Our dc are now 2 adults and one teen, we will all be off on Christmas Eve.
Dh will potter and do some prep for the next day, I may do some last minute house stuff or wrapping but the cleaner is here at the moment so won’t be loads to do.
Dc may be sent to shops for anything last minute.
Then we are meeting all the in-laws (mil, fil and all dhs siblings and their dc/partners etc) for a big walk. Everyone is coming back to ours after for mince pies and whatever else gets baked and fizz/tea.
They’ll only stop for an hour or so and then we’ll light the fire, I’ll do some last bits of wrapping and hopefully lay down for a bit 😂
Dh will rustle up some dinner of some kind.
That’s about it really, bit of housey stuff, nice walk and get together and some prep for the next day.

I'm going to be making puddings for boxing day and getting quietly drunk while DP delivers presents to his side of family.

Mmm I love Christmas Eve. Previous years traditions were:

north pole breakfast (pancakes, marshmallows and strawberries really)
panto at 10 at local theatre
back to Xmas Eve boxes, and fresh pajamas
play some board games or mario
meet up with family for drinks at the pub
dinner at harvester

however a couple of years ago I got a job where working Xmas Eve was mandatory for all workers (no I’m not an elf) so this has changed a little!

This year I’ve drawn a nice early shift so although breakfast and panto has been dropped, I should be home with Baileys in hand for 2pm

Food prep in morning, welcome guests (our kids, grandkids and parents who are staying) at lunchtime and then just sit around for a few hours till we go to a local attraction at tea time, then pub by the sea for a few drinks, collecting pizzas on way home. Eat pizzas and watch some telly then bed with my lovely family under my roof.

We'll take the dog for a good run around in a field in the morning, then bath him as he'll no doubt be sodden and muddy! In the afternoon it will be a walk to the local pub for a Christmas drink in front of the fire, then wander home to do some food prep, sort the presents and watch Home Alone and Elf. I'm actually looking forward to it more than Christmas day!

Not much during the day. In the evening we (there's just DP and me here), exchange our Christmas gifts and have a lovely meal. We've done this since 2020 when, for the 1st time in my life (I'm going to be 60), Christmas Day was solely spent celebrating my birthday.

We will always either be hosting or being hostes for several days over Christmas. This year we will be away staying with family. I expect we will go for a walk, play some games and then have a lovely home-cooked dinner in the evening. We sometimes play some Christmas music together too, as quite a few of us play an instrument.

I’m not working but I’ll be picking my DD25 up from the station and catching up with her and then making a pudding for Christmas Day to take to our family. We might pop to the pub and then have a nice meal with salmon at home with champagne. Not too late a night as 25th will be a big one!