 |
| the metal trees were made by C and K - well, not the trees, but the beading :) |
Well, she cleaned and I decluttered and organised - we made a great team.
So the house is sparkling and I couldn't be happier.
We did outside stuff (all to keep the house looking nice as long as possible :)) and then went to get a smoothie from McDonalds (the only place open at 5).
The kids and D wanted to drive around and find a restaurant to eat but I said, "no, new tradition - we eat at home on Christmas Eve" and so we did.
And then while we were doing baths and so on, I decided on another new tradition - to make the Christmas phone calls tonight instead of tomorrow.
Because this is how it typically goes - we're always busy or unavailable when the calls come through and then my family leaves me 5 missed calls each (!) and it ends up being 7 - 8pm on Christmas Day before we talk.
So at 6:15 I started phoning. My brother then says as I'm saying my good-byes "ok, I'll talk to you tomorrow" and I was "noooo, that's the point of this call so we don't have them hanging over our head" :)
I'm a little bit jealous because they're all going to be together at my sister's place and we all love our food (my sister is worse than I am, if that's possible) so there will be a spread. She already sent me pics of the cupcakes she made.
I see on Facebook/ Instagram (Laura, your spread looked awesome!) that a lot of you do your big Christmas do on Christmas Eve.
Both D's and my families never have. It's always been Christmas Day, and a Christmas lunch at 1 pm :)
Another thing we started tonight was to let the kids open two of their presents otherwise it's all too rushed tomorrow morning before church.
Hopefully they'll appreciate them all a bit more this way?
My sister married into a Catholic family. They go to an evening Christmas Eve church service and then home to the in-laws for cake, tea and presents.
Next day is still the big lunch :)
What's your tradition?
Christmas Eve? Christmas Day? Supper/ Lunch? When do you do presents?
Merry Christmas! Our tradition is exactly the same as your sisters. Evening Mass followed by snacks and champagne at my parents place. Kids open a few gifts under the tree. Then we come home and they go to bed and tomorrow morning (or rather later) their other gifts will be under the tree and we'll open before breakfast.
ReplyDeleteLove the idea of calling on Christmas eve. We don't really need to make phone calls - our entire family comes together for lunch. At 1pm!
ps...have you ever experienced a White Christmas? I think it's going on the bucket list for us!
ReplyDeleteMay you have a wonderful Christ feast my friend. We do a small Christmas thing at home - fish traditionally for us, a it like having fish on Good Friday and no meat - so we do fish on Christmas eve. It is usually just us 5 and any grandparents or Hunters brother and family. Christmas lunch is the big event with everybody here. We open presents on Christmas eve and then only Chris,as father stockings on Christmas day ( only small little gifts)
ReplyDeleteJust blogged about our Christmas Day - we have just us 5 on Christmas Eve - go for a walk to see the Christmas lights, back home for pj's, hot chocolate and some Christmas stories.
ReplyDeleteChristmas Day we open pressies around 8am. Visit with our neighbours about 11am. My parents came over around 1pm, we eat about 2.30pm then relax/play with new toys/gadgets.
Hope your Christmas Day was a good one :)
We do gifts on Christmas morning and then we do a giant family lunch after that.
ReplyDeleteI like to wake up in our own house on Christmas morning, so we make all of the relatives come to us. ;) They like watching the littles open their gifts anyway, so they are happy to travel. After all of the presents, we generally spend Christmas Day dinner with the in-laws (they live fairly nearby) and our closest friends. This year, we had to postpone the in-laws because of a little snowstorm here. We never get snowstorms!
ReplyDeleteI would love it if you would post a picture of those trees more close up. Did you buy them or make them? The kids did a great job of decorating them with beads. Are they going to redo them every year or are you going to leave them the way they are?
Was that Laura - me? LOL you have two Laura friends.
ReplyDeleteIf it was me - thanks - we had a great time and I actually cooked a lot less that my mom (and D's mom) usually do because it was just the 5 of us and it worked out well. The only thing left over was the 2 puddings! I don't mind eating left overs but I find they often end up getting tossed so am trying to cook "less" unless I have a plan for the left over - like to freeze for lunch!
BUT that's totally off topic :-p
Our tradition is to eat :-)
We always had dinner on Christmas Eve with just the 4 of us and then on Christmas day my uncle would come round with his kids or we would go to my gran with all my moms family. Generally it was cold meat (from the night before) but whatever it was it was totally informal!
We open gifts on the morning of the 25th. Kiara woke up at 2h30am and asked me if we can go open!!!!
When I was growing up, I spent the evening of the 23rd with my aunt and uncle (the girls' GG), and then our whole family met at my grandmother's house for a big family lunch and presents. We'd get home, and my other grandmother would have come in from Mississippi.
ReplyDeleteI remember those times as a little hectic, but -- at least relative to being a little kid -- it was hectic in a super-fun way.
Those traditions went away when my grandmother passed, my second year of college. I sure miss that, of course, but we are settling into our Alabama trip a few days before Christmas, and being back here for Christmas day.
I did enjoy our candy cane scavenger hunt on Christmas Eve...maybe something to continue next year?
Hope you're enjoying the holidays!!!
We don't do any presents Christmas Eve. Presents for the kids are from Santa on Christmas morning and us parents give each other presents that morning too. Then we go to my in-laws and meet up with lots of DH's brothers and sisters and 9 of our 11 nieces and nephews. Lots of fun. We got home really late Christmas night. I think we got home at 1 AM, which was really the 26th at that point, LOL!
ReplyDelete