Read how Mumsnet users make their Christmas magical

[AbbiCMumsnet]

This activity is now closed

From picking out the perfect Christmas tree and hanging mistletoe above the door, to tracking Santa on NORAD, the Christmas period is full of magical moments for both parents and children alike. Whether you have certain traditions you do every year, or you want to try out something new this time around, IKEA want to hear the ways you make Christmas magical.

Here’s what IKEA have to say: “This season is about gathering your loved ones, being cosy and enjoying time together. Everyone has their own way of celebrating. Whether you put up a tree or simply light a candle, it’s easy to create a home that is designed for magical moments.
We love offering solutions to make it easier and more fun to interact at home, whether sharing a meal, playing games, or just having a chat. When guests are visiting there’s nothing like lighting candles to get the festive mood just right. Try some Christmas scented candles (out of reach from little ones), with the winter spices ginger, cinnamon, cardamom, cloves and nutmeg, to help you create a welcoming feeling of warmth and cosiness.”

Which Christmas moments do your children love the most? Do you write letters to and leave treats out for Father Christmas and the reindeer? How do you keep the magic alive as your children get older? Which magical Christmas moments were your favourite when you were a child, and have you tried to recreate them with your own children?

Share how you make Christmas magical on the thread below to be entered into a prize draw where 1x MNer will win a £300 IKEA e-gift card.

Thanks and good luck!
MNHQ

Standard Insight T&Cs Apply

Often we have a small gift arrive in the post (gloves for instance) and I pop it into their stocking to be opened on Christmas morning. I tell them "Santa picked it up on his way through" - it makes the sleigh ride more believable.

Now you mention it, I have a tradition of always getting a few jars of lingonberry jam from IKEA's foodhall for the Christmas table. Everyone actually prefers it to cranberry jam and it always goes down a treat with the turkey!

The family dynamics have changed so much over the last few tears years that we decided the one thing that starts Christmas for us is waiting until everyone is together before we decorate the tree. I get everything ready but nothing is unwrapped until we are all together. Music Christmas CDs ready and off we go. It always helps us feel together for once and get into the holiday mood remembering all the different decorations too.

Christmas is my ultimate favourite time of year and we have lots of traditions.

We tend to put the Christmas tree up the first week end in December /last week end of November listening to Christmas music and have a hot choc and stollen when we’ve finished. We get a new ornament every year for the tree.

Dd LOVES driving around (well, me driving, her looking out!) looking for houses that have gone all out for decorations and we go and admire them/wish dh wasn’t such a Scrooge about electricity.

Of course there’s the obligatory trip to a garden centre Father Christmas and school Christmas fair etc.

We have festive candles and scents to make the house smell lovely and I’ve hand made quite a lot of our decorations too.

Often I make a wreath for the door and dd and I make a table decoration with holly/mistletoe etc we forage from the garden. We make a gingerbread house the week before Christmas for dd to have for pudding on Christmas Day. We also make Nutella Christmas tree bread and stollen. The making of it is as important as the actual eating of it .

We have a box of Christmas books we brings down every year and read for bedtime stories. Dd and I were talking only yesterday about what our fave books were from the box and which ones we were looking forward to reading most. We’re both impatient for next week 😁.

We have Christmas bedding and on the night before the first December every year I make the bed with the Christmas sheets on under then covered with dds normal bedding so once she’s asleep a bit of festive unwrapping of bed sheets and it’s like magic, she wakes up with Christmas covers to symbolise the start of Christmas!

This year I’m doing a special Christmas breakfast for 1st December which dd will love as it’s the first time she’ll be allowed chocolate for breakfast!

We have painted a wooden advent calendar as a family and I’ll be filling that with treats and I’m also going to do homemade crackers with genuinely good presents inside so there isn’t plastic tag waste.

Christmas was always magical as a child and I really want to recreate this for dd, and Ds (once he’s old enough to participate!).

We have a Christmas Eve present of new Christmas PJs, and then choose a film to watch. We alternate Christmases with both sets of our parents which means the children see everyone, and they all get to spend Christmas with them.

Me and Dh are quite traditional. Christmas prep in our household doesnt start til 1st Dec and decorations dont appear til mid dec at the earliest. We started a new tradition of going as a family to the local garden centre to choose a real tree. We love decorating the tree altogether, though I have to adjust the ornaments as dd and ds put them low on the tree! Christmas eve is special as we all walk to church for a special christmas eve service then home for fizz and smoked salmon. Yum!

I'd completely forgotten NORAD until this post, I loved that as a child! I can't wait to be able to do that with my son. Christmas for me is about lots of food, and lots of laughs. It's very relaxed in our household and hosted by my mum who beats us all out of the kitchen so she can crack on with dinner. We are also doing elf on the shelf for the first time this year!

We wait until after my little girls birthday to put the tree and decorations up. We have some special baubles that we have collected on different trips away to put on the tree. On Christmas eve we have matching pyjamas and will watch a Christmas film. In the morning we get up early and open presents before having a special breakfast. After that we spend the day with family and friends. Food plays a big part in the day. This year my little girl is getting the Ikea toy kitchen for her present. I hope she likes it as much as I do!

Our children are up and grown now but we still go all out, as we have the grandsons over a lot, and I like to help make the Christmas period magical for them. We have boxes and boxes of decorations, and I love to see all the old favourites once we get to December. Loads of lights to cheer up the dark nights, all the traditional food. Presents wrapped with care and on display under the tree (always a real one, always too big!). Christmas films and books, Christmas music, baking with the grandchildren. Christmas candles and scented reeds. There'll be 12 of us round a table meant for 8 at a squeeze on Christmas Day and I just can't wait!

Christmas tree goes up December 1st always and from then on we light the advent candle every night, have our advent calendars before school every morning and just embrace the Christmas spirit until Christmas Eve when all the family arrive, we go out to our favourite Greek restaurant and we just spend time playing board games, catching up and enjoy each other's company.

We always have one evening when we have a family picnic around the tree and it sounds so silly but everyone loves it!

I keep Christmas magical by not starting the festivities too soon. I'm organised, I've done most of the shopping, things are booked, we'll be doing a lot of nice things, but not until December.

If it's everyday, it's not magical.

I think our favourite is decorating the Christmas tree together. We all help and pick which decorations to use and decorate all together.
I also think it's great when we all have time off work and spend some good quality time together, playing games and watching Christmas movies. You can't beat it.

We all go to my sisters on Christmas Eve, a tradition started when Mum was alive as we would all exchange gifts and then mum would spend Christmas at ours. Now, because my youngest doesn’t want to leave his auntie’s house I have started doing a Christmas Eve box. The first year it was just pyjamas but now he gets a mug, hot chocolate and a new book and he absolutely loves it.

We always buy our tree together, choosing "the perfect one". Then decorate it together.
Christmas is totally family.time.

Kids get to decorate the tree - however they want it. We usually try and make a new decoration each year. We all go out to watch the Christmas lights switch on locally. And I used to love seeing all the illuminated christmas decorations outside other people's houses - we weren't allowed to have that on our house as kids, but now I love putting up the strings of lights etc.

Our favourite tradition is playing Advent Calendar bingo - everyone chooses what they think will be behind the doors, and we cross them off as we open them. And choosing a tree, then struggling to fit all the decorations on it (can never resist a good Christmas decoration).

Now mine are older we don't need it to be so magical but we do lots of Christmas crafts and baking together

We love Christmas films and will be watching lots of our favourites between now and Christmas. We love The Muppet Christmas Carol, Miracle on 34th Street and Elf. We also love making Christmas song playlists.

Decorating the house with holly and Christmas cards. A roaring fire and the smell of a real tree. Evenings of christmas films and walks around the local streets spying on other trees and Christmas lights. I can't wait!!

we love new pjs xmas eve

We go to a family service at church on Christmas Eve where we sing carols, and then go home and decorate out gingerbread house.

It's all about the Christmas dinner for my family! We love having all the rellies round too. We do a charity Christmas fun run and eat out in a lovely pub on Christmas Eve. See friends and family. It's spending time with people you love that makes it magical for us.

When we start the Christmas baking: mince pies and cinnamon biscuits. We decorate the house and watch Christmas films while munching on treats.

We love flying out for some winter sunshine

Always try to make a local outdoor carol session. There are a few near us - some outside historic buildings with twinkly lights and lots of atmosphere, some with brass bands etc. Anyone can go and join in or just listen...mulled wine, apple juice etc. One is late on a Saturday afternoon and is a great antidote to Christmas shopping and all the pressure.