What you do on Christmas Eve? Share with McDonald’s - £300 voucher to be won

[EllieMumsnet]

Whether Christmas Eve in your household is the calm before the storm or the storm before the calm, it can be a great day to just spend some quality time with family and/or friends. Christmas Eve is celebrated in a whole host of different ways, with traditions varying from going for a long walk, to having chinese takeaway for dinner, to even guessing what the presents around the tree are. With that being said McDonalds would love to hear what you and your household gets up to on Christmas Eve.

Here’s what McDonald's has to say: "“We know it’s a hectic time of year for families, so if it’s a quick coffee when you’re out shopping or popping in on Christmas Eve for some free Reindeer Treat carrots, we are here to help you get #ReindeerReady on your way to Christmas 2018!”

Is Christmas Eve a time where you stay in your Xmas pj’s all day and watch films? Perhaps you like to go to you the pub with friends and family? What about going for a winter walk around your local park? Are you still prepping the presents and dinner for Christmas day? Do you and your family host an annual Christmas Eve party? Or maybe you have a traditional Christmas Eve breakfast, lunch and dinner that you look forward to all year round?

Whatever you and your family gets up to on Christmas Eve share it on the thread below and everyone who does will be entered into a prize draw where one MNer will win a £300 voucher of their choice (from a list).

Thanks and good luck with the prize draw!
MNHQ

Standard Insight T&Cs Apply

Usually panic buy whatever i've forgotten and get stuck trying to get out of the tesco carpark for 2 hours. Then wrap everything. Then go for fondue with family.

Christmas Eve is my favourite day of the year. If It falls on my day off then it’s even better, but even if I was working these are our annual Christmas Eve traditions.

North Pole breakfast, done this for the last 3 years and the boys love it!!

Christmas Eve hamper, full of the usual goodies delivered by the elves at some point during the day!

Baking cookies for Santa

Some form of Christmassy craft

Bath with Christmas bath bombs

New pyjamas on to snuggle watching a Christmas film and open the first tub of Cadbury heroes.

Milk, cookie, carrot and reindeer dust set out and read the night before Xmas before going up and putting their sacks in their bedrooms.

Everything inbeteeen can be changeable but those are our definite must haves.

I'll be working this year but only until lunchtime. Then I'll tear home to prepare the house for family coming round. We will go to our early evening service at church and then back to cater for 20+ at home. Everyone brings something food-wise so shouldn't be too stressful.

We go to the zoo, wears everyone out and it's usually quiet. Great way to get some fresh air and clear everyone's head ready for pyjamas, takeaway and movies (singin' in the rain must be watched on Xmas eve!).

Not much. Might get a look at any festive sales that have started early online? (My immediate family and I celebrate on a different day, because they all do their own thing on 25th.)

This year I'll be alone for the first in many, having broken up with my partner of many years. So I will be enduring it more than enjoying it, unfortunately.

Christmas Eve is Snowman Night in our house

New snowman pyjamas for everyone (even 16yo ds1 suspends his dignity for one night!)

We all make snowmen with card, fabric, glitter etc, then name them and station them around the house

Then we decorate homemade gingerbread snowmen with icing, sweets, coconut etc

We take them into the living room and have them with hot chocolate from our Christmas Eve snowman tea set, while watching The Snowman (and ds1 cries, every year).

Then stockings/sherry/mince pie/carrot out, and the boys go to bed. Then we wrap presents and fill stockings while watching Carols from Kings on catch-up and midnight Mass.

I love Christmas eve :)

DH and I usually work and DD is looked after by grannie. In the evening we will have a nice dinner and watch a Xmas film. Send DD to bed and crack on with the wrapping

We eat fish pie, do veg prep for the next day, watch The Snowman, put out goodies for Father Christmas, crack into the Quality Streets and go to Midnight Mass and/or a crib service.

So we visit the local Pantomime, and then go back home for a take away in front of Home Alone!! Family time. No shopping! The Reindeer treats sound like such a sweet idea too!

We always go for a long walk with the dog on Christmas eve. This isa vain attempt to try and tire the children out so that they sleep well! We do all the veg prep and then go for a drive around to see all the Christmas lights. We each have a small present when we get back after tea and then prepare the snack for Father Christmas. Once the children are in bed we have a tipple and some snacks xx

Something easy to eat, cleaning, last minute prep for the dinner which can only be done the day before & going to the shops for any missed items!

The morning is usually rushing around getting last minute bits and pieces done, but I do try not to have too much to do. We may see family for a coffee and mince pie at some point.
In the afternoon we go to
Church for the crib service, then to the pub for a drink with friends, then home to eat, put out stockings, leave mince pies, brandy and carrots for Father Christmas and Rudolph (although we now have a 13 and nearly 10 yo so perhaps not!) then to bed.
When the dcs are finally asleep we retrieve presents, stuff stockings and put everything else under the tree.
Christmas Eve is my favourite part of the whole shebang- I love it!

Assuming no one is working we all go out for a walk together, usually involving a trail or hunting for painted rocks.
If we are staying at my mum's we.usually have a takeaway for tea & then leave Santa a mince pie & beer and carrot for the reindeer

We have Christmas dinner on Xmas Eve.
We started doing this when when dsd was younger, as it didn't feel right having dinner without her. We're vegetarian, so she didn't have to eat 2 huge, identical dinners 2 days running - she would have something weird and wonderful with us and then a more traditional lunch with her mum and stepdad on actual Xmas day.
I liked to give her her presents from me/us, then, so would give DS one of his, too.
Even though they're both adults now and I'm long since divorced, me DS and DS2 (not my husband's) still do it.
Christmas Eve just seems Christmass-ier somehow. The anticipation hasn't yet turned to anti-climax!
So, I cook, and we all eat and drink.
(then frantically build/wrap toys once DS2 is finally asleep!)

DP is a theatre tech so I've generally taken DS there for the last show of the day, then we've caught up with friends and then watched the Nightmare Before Christmas before bed.

This year we're going to a different theatre to see a shorter show as it's our littlest's first Christmas (11 months) and her older brother is at the point where he's dropping his nap so there's less chance of them napping during the show!

Clean the house.
Nip out and buy any last minute bits of food if necessary.
Then cook something light but tasty for tea. In the evening we have friends who come round for drinks and present exchanging.

First Christmas in our new home, Christmas eve I might do a little cheese board, some ham and have some wine whilst I finish wrapping presents to family. Might watch a christmassy film! I'm very excited!

I am usually panic wrapping during the day.
We then head into our village in the evening for a carol service.
Then home to some festive food and drink and finally resting knowing everything is done

My mother in law was Swedish, and in Sweden Christmas is celebrated on the 24th. There is a a big family meal with presents, Swedish Christmas foods (fishes, cheeses, meatball and vodka) and merriment.
8 years ago, my mother in law died at Christmas time, so now we celebrate the Swedish Christmas in her absence, still with all the merriment but we always raise a glass to her each Christmas Eve Skål
We’ve had 2 new additions to the family now... so we hope that the tradition and her memory will be kept alive through them!

Christmas Eve is always spent doing lovely christmassy things and doing our final preparations. We listen to Christmas songs, watch Christmas films and start enjoying some of the Christmas foods we've bought.

We cook the turkey on Christmas Eve night to be prepared for the next day. We leave a mince pie, milk and carrot out for santa and his reindeer as the DC go to bed (in new Christmas PJ's). Then me and dh get all the stockings and presents ready. I get very little sleep because I'm too excited. Love it

We go for a walk round the local little zoo and then have all our neighbours round for drinks and nibbles.

Our whole road was flooded a few years back and in the aftermath we got to know all the neighbours really well. So we started having everyone round on Xmas eve.

It's a lovely way to keep the community spirit (we also have a road tidy up and bbq once a year!) which is unusual for London and people pop in for anything from a quick drink for those who celebrate Xmas on the 24th, this with little ones who drop in on their way home from the crib service or those who come along before heading off to midnight Mass.

We only have a small house really but it's lovely to have it filled with so much love and laughter.

The girls go to bed around 9 after leaving a mince pie and carrots for father Xmas and they're usually so worn out it's straight off to sleep and not up too early the next day!

Xmas Eve is a fun-filled family affair as it's my aunties birthday so we have an afternoon of food & drink with all the family at her house with the kids playing and exchanging gifts. Two more babies in the mix this year it's going to be carnage...

That's all followed by more food (might as well eh?!) with a traditional Chinese takeaway for tea and once the kids are in bed the evening is spent doing last minute wrapping watching Xmas films. Love it! It's the calm before the chaos 😬

our family tradition is to go out somewhere lovely for dinner on Christmas Eve (this is primarily always been a treat for me as I always cook on Christmas Day for the extended family. The fridge is normally groaning with food that no-one can eat, on pain of death, as it's all for the BIG DAY, so we eat out). It's become such a lovely tradition which we all look forward to. Afterwards we still sprinkle reindeer food for Santa (the kids are 20 & 14????) but they still run about like thieir possessed with the reindeer food, sort out a whisky and a mince pie for Santa and a carrot for Rudolph before heading to bed to leave their dad and I to sort out the Christmas presents with a whole wink wink thing going on. I keep expecting the eldest to want to do his own thing on Christmas Eve but he seems amazingly committed to sticking with us. Happy to accept it as long as possible! I suspect this might be the last year though which does make me feel rather sad.

I literally spend the entire day in the kitchen! But I love it. Lots of food prepping going on and the back door is constantly opening as various neighbours drop in. It’s a traditional country thing round here for people to call with the neighbours to wish them happy Christmas. Around 8pm we all head to mass then home for bed before Santa comes

It's my birthday so I try to make it feel like a birthday as well as being Christmassy.
I always take the day off work and aim to go out for the morning like a walk along the canal and a pub lunch.
After lunch the grandparents arrive to stay overnight.
We have a special dinner with birthday cake and then sometimes go to family church service.
To get the kids tired we do an evening walk around our village to look at all the Christmas lights.