when to create your own holiday traditions?

[Sunnyday]

Another thread got me thinking, when is it time for adults to start having their own holidays alone?

My family didn't celebrate Christmas even though I was raised in the faith. So my husband and I never had to negotiate whose family we had to spend the holidays with. It was just a given that it was his family and his extended family.

But now that we have our own kids, it is getting to be so hard to spend over a week at the in-laws to spend Christmas with them and then attend two separate family parties for my mother-in-law's family and then my father-in-law's family.

We live three hours from them. I don't care at all about Christmas, parties or gifts, so I always have gone along with my husband because it was important to him. And now with the kids, it is hard but I still go along because my in-laws are willing to put out the effort and with great joy to do Christmasy things for the kids while it would just be unnatural for me.

But every year, the big family parties are getting harder to plan because we have to take every one's schedule along with their partner's own family holiday schedule into consideration.

When did you guys just say enough is enough? I have my own family; it's time to do the holidays on my own.

[Deleted]

Part of my problem with holidays is that it was always one-sided.  I didn't really have family, but I loved my ex's family.  We never had to negotiate.

Now my kids have to plan four families to account for us, the ex, the grandmother, and the inlaws.  I know it is hard.

I don't know when it is time to negotiate your own holidays.  I would just be offended if my kids did it because it implies that I am "too old" or "unable to manage."  I am not retired or even 60.  That strikes me as really offensive at my age.

[swamp]

I started doing it when I had kids. I just did it. Sent out the invite and have them the option to come or not. 

[gooddecisions]

Why do you have to spend a whole week? Start your own whenever you're ready, but it sounds like there is room for compromise in there if you still want the kids to see the grandparents over the holidays. We get up, open presents just us, then leisurely drive a couple of hours away to see some family, have a holiday "dinner", open more presents, maybe spend the night (maybe drive back that evening), see some more family the next day and drive home later that day. I would hate spending a whole week with family unless they lived on a beach or ski lodge or somewhere we enjoy vacationing (and I had unlimited vacation days).

[gooddecisions]

I also agree with the others, extend the invite to visit at your house and if they don't come- it's on them. It was important to me that my siblings, my parents, my husband's siblings and his parents all knew they were invited to Thanksgiving at our house. I didn't have expectations that anyone would come and didn't pressure anyone. One sibling's family and one set of parents came and it was fine.

[NoNamePerson]

My ExIL's live 300 miles east of us and my mother lived 300 miles west of us. We alternated for the first three years and but when my son turned 4 I put my foot down and said we were staying home and everyone was welcome to come to our home. ExIL's never did but sometimes would come weekend before Christmas. Worked out OK and we established our own traditions.

[MarleyKeezy78]

Perhaps it's time to start celebrating Festivus 

[Apple]

Once I had my son, Christmas became about us, less about extended family.

We still usually do dinner at my mom and dad's Christmas Eve (ex's family didn't celebrate, and ex may or may not have come, can't really remember).  There is always an open invite to stop by on Christmas, and some years we do, others we don't, it just depends on what WE want to do or feel like doing.

DS is an only child, and several of the traditions growing up involved things you can't really do with just one kid, so we have come up with our own over the years.

[Pants]

I'm hosting my family on Christmas day for the first time this year. Then the 26th we will head down to their house 4 hours away for 4 or 5 days. We used to do DH's family on Christmas eve, then drive 4-5 hours at night down to my parents to be there on Christmas morning. DD is 18 months - NO WAY is that happening again anytime soon.

[grits]

We almost always spent Christmas morning at home. We might go around 11 to my dad's parents for a family gathering. It would be a nice meal, and just visiting. No gift exchange.  The whole family had a lot of fun.  When they died, We spent it at home, and had aunt and uncle over.  A few rare years dad had vacation, and we went to my mom's parents.   If we did Christmas at home, we either went a few days before to my mom's parents or a few days afterwards.  They lived 365 miles away, and it used to take 6.5 hrs to drive there.  Christmas was one of the few times we ever got to see her parents.

[sheilaincali]

Once we all started to get married and have kids my parents pretty much "assumed" we'd start our own Holiday Traditions.

All of my siblings have kids, two of us live in the same town as my parents, my sister lives 3 hours to the south and my brother lives 4 hours north of here.  DH is estranged from his mother and has been for last past 5 or 6 years (as recommended by his therapist) so no holiday with them anymore.  This is not a bad thing, trust me.
 
Depending on when Christmas is we will either celebrate the weekend before or after but Christmas morning has always been for the individual families.  That was DH's one request- he said that our son would always have a  Christmas morning at home with us and any other celebration would/could take place after that. 

Helps that I had DS when we lived in Alaska and by the time we moved back to MN my brother's wife had had a baby and was pregnant with her 2nd.  So we went from "one last family vacation" for Christmas 1997 to two and a half grandkids for Christmas 1999. 

** edit to explain- "by when Christmas is" I mean what day of the week it falls on.  If it's a Tuesday we'll celebrate the weekend before (22nd and 23rd) if it's on like a Thursday we will get together that following weekend (27th and 28th)

[cronewitch]

I think when the kids are old enough to know who Santa is. He should come to their home while they are in their own beds. Every family is different but that would be my ideal if I had children and what my SIL did for her kids. We grew up a half hour from the only grandparents we knew and at Christmas my aunt, uncle and cousins would come stay with them. We went over Christmas eve and all the kids played in the basement while the adults played cards and things upstairs. About 8PM Santa would show up but we were too slow coming up stairs so never saw him. Then the toys were under the tree so we opened them. It was nice, grandparents, great grandmother, great aunt, great uncle, aunt, uncle and cousins and us so it took a long time to open gifts. We would go home about midnight and take the cousins for the night then go back Christmas day for dinner with everyone. We never had Christmas at home but it was still good.

[giramomma]

My only Christmas "thing" is that the kids are at our home Christmas morning. That, takes care of the traveling issue.

We do have some traditions, though, that are left over from our childhoods. We have DH's elf on the shelf (though he has one eye. I call him winky.) Making cookies and decorating sugar cookies were a big thing in my house. Decorating cookies (for any holiday actually..not just Christmas) is a big thing with my kids now. Our other traditions include looking at holiday lights, going to special displays and then having lunch at a specific restaurant, etc. We don't do very elaborate activities at all.

I didn't ask if it was OK to start our own thing. I told. If we wait until our parents pass away to start our own traditions, we will have missed it completely with our kids. I also will expect that we will give our own kids space to negotiate the holidays as they see fit.