We need your Christmas customs and family traditions

[CatherineMumsnet]

We're after all your customs and traditions - stockings, leaving stuff out for santa, dressing the tree, when you open presents, what you eat, carol singing and anything else that makes Christmas in your home.
Thanks everyone

I think posting this will make everyone else snigger but never mind; v.traditional Christmas is -

Put tree up about a week before Christmas with NO help from anyone, just me, my glass baubles and Allegri's Miserere on CD, Preceded by lots of men twirling trees for me at local market.

Pantomimme in Canterbury for ALL dc's (even the 17 yr old still wants to come

Christmas sacks made of hessian that even the non believers believe passionately in come Christmas Eve. DD2 says that the smell of hessian instantly reminds her of Christmas!

Midnight Mass by candlelight.

Sausage rolls.Huge bowl of Quality Street.

Long walk on Camber Sands on Boxing Day.

christmas eve
bake all baked things.. mince pies, sausage rolls, orange and spice mini cakes.. make the non christmas pud pud a steam spong pud which involves a lot of orange brandy and syrup ( for thos who hate xmas pud).. Dh drinks surplus brandy.

Cook ham, beef and pork joint.
prepare veg pick up turkey from butcher and prep that too.

put family pressies under tree.
all done with christmas classical music on.
put FC pressies out.. sprinkle table confetti stars around pressies and leading to fire place.. bite mince pie and carrot left out for FC.

christmas day.
hear dc's whispered voices and padding of feet into each others bedrooms.
tell them to put on slippers and wait for mum, whist dh sneaks downstairs to put treelights on to show fc has been.. he then comes back upstairs. ( it's the glow under the door).
whispered hysteria from dc's cos
they are looking under the door through the gap to see if the lights really are on.

open door. each dc finds their pressies.. we watch them open them.. then we have brekkie.. smoked salmon, scrambled eggs or boiled eggs and asparagas. buck fizz..

we play. make calls... have dinner about 1 ish.. play with dc's family come over and we start again!

oh and the xmas tree is a whole other post so won't go into that LOL

Seeing as we're (or at least I am) always ill over Christmas and one year we were waiting and waiting for a new baby... we spend Christmas Day in our pyjamas.

Christmas is very special for me, and it has followed the same pattern since I was little (with the exception of the Christmas spent in Kerala)

We decorate the three on 23rd December. We have a rice pudding like porridge for dinner which is absolutely delicious, with melted butter on top, a generous sprinkling of sugar and cinnamon. There is ONE almond in the porridge, and the lucky recipient gets the treasure: a marzipan pig.

Christmas is synonymous with Marzipan pigs here, some are covered in chocolate, some in chocolate and hundreds and thousands, but I prefer them with no coating at all.

The main day of Christmas is 24th December. We wake up around 9, have breakfast as usual, and rush up to see morning tv with Mickey Mouse, and Donald Duck, Bambi on ice, it is the same on tv every year here... Around is shown a Czeck production of Cinderella, made in the sixties I think, which is absolutely beatiful, it is in original language, but with a narrator! We eat a sweet bread with jellied fruits in, with real butter on top. Then I put ALL the presents under the tree.

I help my mum cook Christmas Dinner, which is a massive rack of pork. Real home made sauerkraut, and cabbage stewed in cream, potatoes, softly cooked apricots and prunes, and home made cranberry jam. Normally this is enjoyed with a Faustion V. We are too full for pudding.

Then we head up to the cemetary. It takes us a while to dress up in thermals, I can tell you, and normally we have to go in two cars. We have candles, seasonal decorations, a bottle of water to make the candles freeze stuck in the snow, and a spade. The Churchbells are normally ringing as we enter the cemetary. It is still, and serene, totally dark except thousands of candles on decorated graves. We decorate, light the candles, give thoughts to the year that has passed, we remember our ancestors, and head home. Around that time, the airforce is having an airdisplay of fighters flying in formatin over town.

It is time to eat when we get in, as my mum will have laid the table while we are gone. After the meal my mum goes to have a lie down, while my sister and I clean the dishes and finnish the wine. Time for coffee and christmas cake, and THEN: PRESENTS!!!!

One present on christmas eve, the rest on christmas morning.

Cats get turkey too.

Traditional fight with inlaws must be carried out AFTER lunch since we've all made an effort to cook it and we will SODDING WELL ENJOY IT before we start the 'he said, she said' argument we've had every year for the past decade FFS

Okay x-mas tree ( i'm in the mood now LOL)

one week before christmas day.. we go out.. led by me.. to find THE BIGGEST perfectly shaped beautiful christmas tree going. This can take a while!
DC's get excited then a bit bored.. DH starts to say all of the trees are fantastic and perfect.. but there not.

I eventually find the tree.. yippee.. DH tells me it's too big.. I insist it is just right.

lug said tree to car.. which is a small 1.2 punto..realise that dc's and to adults are not going to fit in said car with said tree.
said tree is too big to go on the roof..

dc's pile out of car.. dh shoves tree into car.. with much panting and groaning.. forces the door shut.. and drives tree home.

Dc's and I stay at said garden tree type place and look about until dh arrives back to pick us up..

get back home.. put tree in tree stand.. and undo the netty type stuff.. tree springs out.. and Fills the room.. the top is bend over on the ceiling .. dh adjusts the tree to fit in room muttering all the time that it was in FACT too bloody big!

then there is much drink and folly and dancing to xmas music whilst decorating goes on with all.

( sorry)

Christmas Eve, candlelit midnight mass

Christmas Day, Stockings from Father Christmas, off to SIL to give presents. Meet MIL and FIL there.

Off to my parents at 12 noon for christmas lunch followed by Queens Speech whilst consuming copious amounts of alcohol.

Then we gather around the Christmas Tree and open presents (this can take a while)

TV and 40 winks

When DD was 3 she named a favourite toy bunny "Baby Jeezers".

So now Baby Jeezers site at the head of the table on Christmas day and we all sing Happy Birthday.

Xmas Eve - my mum, step-dad and sister rock up around 3pm. We exchange presents to each other over a glass of something chilled. Then we all eat together. Girls then open their xmas eve presents from me, - pj's a new xmas book and a new dvd. They wear new pj's, watch new dvd, get Santa's mince pie and glass of wine ready and then go to bed and i read them their new book and also the Xmas Story pop up book to them.
Have another drink with family downstairs and they tottle off. DP and I tidy up, leave behind mince pie crumbs and a thank you note, we drink more wine and fall into bed.

Xmas Day - girls open stockings and DP makes scrambled egg & smoked salmon. We watch xmas tv, and get dressed. I leave to pick up my dad and drop him at my PIL. Then come home, collect DP and the girls and go up to DP's mum & Dads. We drink kia royales and eat pigs in blankets etc. Dinner is served, we have frois gras to start. Then turkey and all the trimmings. DP's mum is an amazing cook. We then get the sticky drinks out and put the girls in front of the TV while we drink said stickys and pick and eat more than we should.
Then we retire, divvy up the pressies and watch girls play. We steal some turkey for a late night sarnis, call a cab for my dad, bundle girls into warm clothes and shove them into buggys with blankets and hats and scarves and walk home. Put them to bed and fall onto sofa with a turkey sarnie and some more booze and the TV.

Boxing Day - , let girls slob and play, as do we, then we go back up to DP's parents have bubble & squeak. Then we drive to my mums and join in the family party, my aunts, uncles, cousins, their kids, close friends of family etc. Kids get more presents and eat nibbly food under the dining table while we pick, chat and drink.

Then it's back home again where we stay for at least the next 36 hours!

Family traditions:

• The poorly disguised look of disappointment on inlaws faces when they realise we yet again failed to buy them 5 carat diamonds for christmas
• The cat pissing on the christmas tree while everyone eats christmas dinner
• The repair bill from fixing a new catflap to the back door when said cat attempts to drag large turkey carcass out the catflap
• DD eating too much chocolate (for breakfast ) and vomiting down her top as we lift her into the high chair at lunchtime.
• Me heating up the wrong part of the double oven and wondering why the turkey is just sweating a bit but otherwise totally raw four hours after putting it in
• Elderly relatives getting completely blotto on wine despite insisting 'I'll only have half a glass' (refilled often) and passing out in the sprouts

I bloody hate christmas.

Oh and I also buy them a special outfit each tht they wear on Xmas Day and then I babywipe it clean and they wear it agian on Boxing Day. (I spend more than i should on said outfits)

They also have their own minature xmas tree each and each year since they were born I buy them a special xmas decoration each.

When I was growing up we would go out and tramp around in the snow to find the right tree,(grew up in Vermont) cut it down, drag it up the hill, let the snow melt off it, then put it up in the living room and decorate it as a family, then turn out the lights, sit in front of the fire and admire it (no, really!)

My MIL has a nice tradition of having proper real tinsel on the tree (made out of lead) and also having real candles which are lit and we take bets on the first candle to blow out. (Someone always in the room when they are lit, obviously!)

Just general acute depression, normally.

We like to keep things simple.

xmas eve - we always go to the crib service and look at all the xmas lights on the walk back, have xmas eve dinner, open xmas eve pjs, get dressed for bed and watch a xmas film. the kids drink hot chocolate with marshmallows and the adults drink mulled wine/baileys/scotch. then we put out water and a carrot for rudolph and one of the above drinks and a cookie for santa and we put our pillow cases in the living room where we would like to sit and open our pressies in the morning.

xmas day - first person to wake up gets everyone else up and we all go downstairs together. everyone picks one present out of their pillowcases to open and plays with it whilst the adults make breakfast and drink bucks fizz. All the pillowcases have a £1 coin in th bottom cos of the story that father Christmas once dropped some gold coins while coming down the chimney. The coins would have fallen through the ash grate and been lost if they hadn't landed in a stocking that had been hung out to dry.

After our yummy english breakfast we go to church. We come back and open the rest of the pillowcase presents whilst lunch is cooking. we have xmas cds playing non-stop throughout the house all day. we eat at about 2-3pm then we open family/friends presents and watch tv, play games etc. For supper we always have sandwiches and nibbles and then the kids go to bed and the adults stay up and get drunk tehe.

My mother always serves up half a grapefruit with a cherry on top for breakfast. I'm sure it was probably chic in the 60's.

Normally we all go to my parents for Christmas, they have a big house in the country and me and my siblings, some cousins, often a couple of great aunts and uncles... around 60-100 people pile in, all the children sleep in the playroom and everyone gets new pyjamas the night before.
On Christmas ee we go to church and have a party with friends and nibbles, wine etc.
Children go to bed at about 10ish, tree is put up in the drawing room and presents left underneath! Stockings are delievered at about 2-3am by the 2 or 3 most sober grown ups!
Children normally wake at about 6-7am but know 8am is when they can come through to their respective parents! Stockings are opened when they wake up!
At about 8:15 everyone goes down for a big champagne/bucks fizz breakfast with lots of danish pastries, bacon, nuts etc.
After breakfast we all go into the drawing room, light a big fire and open all the presents!
After present opening the DCs play with new toys until about midday when everyone gets dressed and goes for a walk around the woods and lake, if its snowy sledging is involved
Meanwhile Christmas lunch has been prepared by an assortment of adults (I am part of the cleaning up team as I cannot cook for toffee) The main meal is eaten at about 4-5ish and after that in the evening at about 7-8ish friends often come over again for old school party games (pin the tail on the donkey anyone?) the kids tend to fall where they drop throughout the evening and by about 2ish everyone goes to bed.

Xmas has been this way for as long as I can remember and its so magical!

Then between boxing day and new years we often go to DHs parents or they come to ours.

• Make biscuits to ice with golden balls and hang from the Christmas tree (tree is extremely tasteful affair: my colour scheme only and one new ornament each year chosen by me )

• Week before Christmas start reading 'The Best Christmas Pageant Ever' to the DCs as bedtime story.

-Christmas Eve I always intend to do what my friend does and make Shepherd's Pie and Angel Delight for dinner, but always forget. We do read the Christmas story to the DCs when they are ready for bed from my favourite Children's Bible

-Christmas morning is a working morning for DH but the kids are allowed to open one present before church. The rest are opened before lunch.

-The best bit is putting the children to bed and watching dodgy Christmas telly with the leftovers.

BCNS- had to lol at your post!! The Christmas tree arguement is a firm tradition in this house too! DH ALWAYS starts muttering about an artificial one this year, I insist on a real one. WE go to the garden centre where I immediately fall in love with one which would be more at home in Times Square, he spies one that would fit on top of the TV

And so the haggling begins. We come home with a tree that he thinks is too big and I think is too small. We knock 75% of the needles off it trying to get it in and out of the car (cue more moaning from DH!), then we ALWAYS need to saw a bit off the bottom to fit it in the pot (cue more moaning..)

I refuse to ever throw a Christmas decoration out, and I buy new ones each year too- each one reminds me of the year we.....Drives DH crazy- he would have a fibreoptic thing on a shelf left to his own devices.

Every Christmas I slave over the Good Food mag to make the PERFECT Christmas dinner, and it is always too much. I like everything to be completely traditional and insist on making mince pies and cranberry sauce even though noone likes them, then I get cross that noone eats them.

Every year we decide that we are cutting back, and that the kids really don't need or appreciate the huge amounts of stuff they get. But every year we go OTT and they get too much. And they don't need/ appreciate it.

The adults open their presents at midnight on Christmas Eve so we can concentrate on the kids in the morning.

I take the kids to church while DH walks the dogs

We always play Trivial Pursuits on Christmas Night

We always have a glut of wrapping paper and cards, then forget and go out and buy more the next year, only to discover last year's stash in february.

On Boxing Day we take bets on how long it will be before MIL says "Well, that's it all by now!"

We have eggs florentine for breakfast.
And always end up having dinner too late.
Then we have the most amazing Christmas pudding made by Granny - although this will be the last Christmas we get to do that; fortunately she thought to make the puddings before she passed away. They will taste extra good this Christmas.

Phil Spector's Christmas Album

Champagne and nibbles

Log fires

Expensive wines

kids present overload

tasty food overload

more wine

more tasty food (-perhaps finally the cheese board extravaganza!)

games, crosswords,

more wine

chocolate

pass out

I can't wait

I'm working this xmas

For me it always used to be and has remained the same minus one thing. I'll get to the minus one thing in a minute. Slightly amended due to where I now live.

Tree goes up first weekend in December - new tradition. Christmas Eve, mince pies baked, turkey, duck or lamb prepped and the veggies ready.

Stockings that have been left by the boys are gathered and filled and replaced outside doors.

Christmas am - Await excited screams, then one by one we open or Stockings . Breakfast, Bucks Fizz for mummy and croissants with ham and cheese for all. The review stocking fillers. Christmas Dinner is 2pm and we always used to be finished in time for the Queen's Speech, corny but true. Now we just retire to the Family Room. Then we hand out all the presents to one and all and one by one we open and admire. Then more alcohol and bad television. PM, smoked salmon and nibbles, more alcohol and if the weather's snowy, sledding yeah.

Tree still goes down for Twelve Night. Some traditions are hard to break.

We're in Australia now, so still working on our change of hemisphere traditions.

At the moment I buy all of the toys in the July sales [job done emoticon], so that's when it all starts for me .

In October I start the extremely brandy-ridden Christmas cake [can fell elderly neighbours in one bite].

1st December we start with the felt advent calendar and possibly a playmobil one too.

We start playing the Christmas Compilations I put together on the Apple TV, which has all the old christmas videos and dodgy Christmas compilation albums.

Then I get a real tree a few weeks beforehand and we decorate it with one new outrageously overpriced bauble from David Jones every year, supposedly topical.

Dec 16th is DD's birthday, just to complicate things.

Dec 21st I generally remember to send the cards to the UK, always emblazoned with my motto "better late than never" on the back of the envelope.

Christmas Eve we make the reindeer food and put it outside with a carrot for rudolph and a mince pie and drink for Santa.

Then after DD is asleep we put the presents under the tree and fill her stocking (chocolate coins, satsuma, pens, little books etc).

At about 5am DD gets up and the morning starts with champagne for us while she unwraps her presents.

After the present unwrapping frenzy we play and DP starts with a huge traditional Christmas Lunch, despite the 38' heat. We have brussels (specially imported), roast potatoes, stuffing, roast parsnips, lamb and turkey joints, cauliflower cheese, peas, carrots in honey, gravy, bread sauce and yorkshires. We eat it outside and marvel at the sun and say how it isn't the same when it's not cold.

Normally too full and too hot to eat the alcoholic cake after that.

Then play with DD and her new presents, maybe watch a film. Later in the day we video skype back to mum and family in the UK.

This year DD and I arrive back in Sydney on Christmas morning, so will all be different.