Hellobee Boards

We've been really fortunate that I have the week of Christmas off (although that's changing next year) and Hubs is able to take the week off as well, so we always see family on Christmas. We alternate each year between his family and mine, so this year we'll be seeing his mom the weekend before, his dad the day of, and my family the weekend after.

I have Christmas Eve and Day off this year, and have to work the rest of the week, but we are traveling to my parents for both days, MIL is coming with us. I think going forward we will spend Christmas Eve at our own house every year, and then travel somewhere for Christmas day, or host family here. In other years I'll likely save some of my vacation time to use around Christmas too, but it all got eaten up by maternity leave this year!

@adnama: Ugh, that sucks! Do all your family live close to each other?? Ours are all an hour apart, so I declared it's too much driving to try to see more than one set of family a day. Maybe after this year, you should tell your families that it's just too stressful to try to visit everyone in one day, so next year, you're going to start alternating between your side and DH's side. Maybe start with DH's side since it's your MIL that would apparently freak out. Then just say that the following year, you'll have to see them on a different day or the weekend or something.

We usually go to see at least 2 sets of family on Christmas Day. I'm hoping to change that next year since we'll want to spend the morning at home with our LO!

Not usually. We spend Christmas Eve with my family and usually the Saturday after Christmas with his. We always celebrate "Jewish Christmas" with DH's two best friends and go out for Chinese food and a movie. I'm not sure if that will fly once the baby comes though!

Yep, we do both! My extended family gets together on Christmas Eve. Since it is at my parent's house, we stay there and do Christmas morning with parents, grandma, siblings, and nephews. Then have breakfast. Then we drive 4 hours south to DH's family. Then stay a day or two, depending on if we have time off work. This year we both took the rest of the week off.

Our families live on opposite coasts, so it's definitely a one or the other thing, but we have always gone to see family for Christmas. This year we are spending it with DH's mom and brothers, which will be extra fun since we will tell them that I'm pregnant then. They are on the west coast, so we'll fly out and stay about a week. We alternate with my side, but I agreed to do more Christmases with his since we see mine more through out the year.
Once we have a baby, though, who knows. I don't see anyone coming to us, especially while we are still in an apartment.

@adnama: Oh yikes! I'm glad my families don't live close to each other, so I can skip seeing half of them if I want to!

My in-laws actually get kind of screwed with the way we do holidays too. I split everything straight down the middle so Hubs family gets 50% of the time and my family gets 50% of the time. But Hubs parents are divorced, so that really means his dad gets 25% of the time and his mom gets 25% of the time, while both my parents get 50%! But I figure it's not fair to my family to split things 3-ways, just because they are still together and Hubs parents aren't!

You may continue to have issues, but if/when you have kids, you could always use the baby as an excuse: "It's just too stressful for the baby to do so much traveling between places in one day..."

We do Christmas Eve with DH's family, and we rotate where we spend Christmas Day. This year we'll spend part of Christmas Day with my mum and then have Christmas dinner with my dad and stepmum's family. Boxing Day will be Christmas dinner with DH's family.

Can't wait until Christmas (and the time off work that comes along with it)!

@Nskillet: It's so crazy isn't it? That's great you've figured out a plan though! I've already warned that once we have kids we aren't making a 3 hour drive all the time. MIL almost fainted I think

We actually leave for a trip to Croatia with my family this Christmas Day! So we'll probably spend Christmas Eve with DH's family...

We'll go to an amusement park with my family, and then to Chinese for dinner. We're Jewish, so seeing family isn't super important.... but it's tradition that we do these things and really there's nothing else open to do.