(My Dad as Father Christmas & me!)When I was little we would go to my Omi & Opa's house on Christmas Eve. There was family, bratwurst, weiners, meats & cheeses, sweets, singing & stories. Candles were lit on the tree next to the chocolate ornaments that were beckoning for us to eat them. We would open our present from our Omi & Opa that were usually pajamas. We would immediately change into them to "model" how beautiful they were. On the way home from the party we would try to figure out where in the world Santa was & if we would make it home in time & hoping that he hadn't skipped over us because no one was home. The last memory of the night would be in the car trying to fight the sleep that was coming. The next thing I remember was opening my eyes in my warm bed that I magically got transported to in the night.
On Christmas Day we would wake up, open our presents, eat breakfast that Dad cooked & then go to my Grandma & Grandpa's for dinner & more presents. The excitement of the toys & Grandma's house was almost overwhelming. We just opened tons of presents and there was more waiting for us there! Holy cow!! How did we get so lucky!
These were my traditions. Things I grew up with. My Grandma passed away when I was 19, she never saw me get married. My Grandpa moved away (but since FaceBook we get to visit more often.) My Opa died when I was 10 & my Omi passed away after my 2nd child. We had a couple of Christmas Eve's at her house with her before my Mom moved it to her house & invited her Brother & his family over there for the special night.
When I married Zach he came with his own set of traditions. Very much like my family he went to Grandma & Grandpa Olsen's on Christmas Eve. Although there were no candles on the tree, bratwurst or weiners, there was a spread of food that was fit for a royal banquet & toys galore. They would stay at Grandma Olsen's until after midnight and every moment spent there was exciting. The anticipation of Santa coming in the morning was hardly bearable.
The next day they would open their presents and then go to their Grandpa & Step Grandma Child's house for breakfast. After breakfast, family & presents they would come home, take a nap & then go off to Grandma Child's house for dinner & more presents.
Grandma Olsen passed away a few years ago & since then, the oldest daughter (Zach's Aunt Jacci) has had the fun festivities at her home with Grandpa Olsen & all of us, much the same as how my Mom moved everything to her home. We are so blessed to have all of Zach's other Grandparents still with us & having these great traditions still going.
When we got married and started to mesh both of our traditions together it was very hard but doable. It went something like this...
Dec 24th
5:00pm Omi & Opa's, We light candles on the tree, we eat bratwurst & weiners, when my Uncle Micahel's family leaves, we leave too. My Mom always wanted us to stay & open presents with our family but we have to leave early to get to the next party.
8:30 pm Great Grandpa Olsen's. We arrive late. Play a game & open presents.
12:30am Finally home & we get the kids to bed.
1:00am Santa comes
2:00am Mom & Dad get to sleep
Dec 25th
8:00am Open presents
10:00am Great Grandpa & Step Grandma Child's for breakfast.
1:00pm Grandma Sandy's to open presents
3:00pm Omi & Opa's to open presents
5:00 pm Great Grandma Child's for dinner.
8:00 pm Home, kids are exhausted so we send them to bed.
From Christmas Eve to the end of Christmas Day we spent 6 hours in driving time (although everyone lives locally), the kids hadn't seen their presents from the moment they opened them that morning, everyone is exhausted & tired, the kids are having meltdowns & this Mom is starting to have a breakdown. It wasn't so bad when it was just Zach & I, I don't think we really noticed a huge change when we added our first child to the equation, but somewhere around 2-3 kids it got CRAZY! Now that we have 4 it seems impossible. We finally decided to make a change this year.
Someone said "It's about time! You guys should have done this a long time ago!" It's not that easy! These are traditions that we've had since we were little kids & I know if my Grandma or my Omi & Opa were still here I would want to hold on to those traditions as long as I could! This decision was a very emotional one. The problem is... there's only 24 hours between Christmas Eve & Christmas Day & we are blessed to have so much family around us that we want to see. We decided to let our kids have THEIR Grandparents & we would take OUR Grandparents out & spend time with them on a day that was not Christmas Eve or Christmas Day. The truth is that we're never anywhere long enough to really enjoy it because we're always off to the next place so this seemed like a good way to stretch out the Holidays. We want to see everyone we can, just not all between 5:00pm on Dec 24th & 8:00pm on Dec 25th.
We took all of our Grandparents (the kids Greats) out to lunch & traded gifts. It was actually more enjoyable because we got one on one time with them. At the parties things are so crazy that we never even get to talk to them!
Christmas Eve we went to Omi & Opa's house (my parents) & after the bratwurst, weiners, candles burned out on the tree & jammies were on the kids, we stayed. For the first time since we've been married I opened presents with my whole family there. It was so fun to see what my nieces & nephews got & what my Brothers & Sisters got or gave. I think it meant a lot to my Mom & Dad to have our whole family together for that. We could see the party still going on at Aunt Jacci's down the street as we left. It was 10:30 at night & we knew that the Olsen party wouldn't end until after midnight so it was tempting to make a stop, but the whole point was to let go of the chaos & craziness. We got home & the kids got in bed at around 11. Zach & I stayed up cleaning & after Santa came we played a little Beatles Rock Band until 1:30am.
Christmas Day: Grandparents came to watch the kids open presents @ 8:00am. We started off by watching a church video called "Joy to the World". The presents were opened, Omi & Opa were playing the PS3 & the kids were happily playing & excited. Our parents left, I made breakfast, we played, spent hours trying to get toys removed from boxes & then Grandma (Zach's Mom) called & said she was on her way back from Grandpa Child's breakfast. We met her at her house around 1:00pm. We ate snacks opened presents and visited until the kids were too tired to be reasonable. We went home & had a nap. It was much needed by the parents & the kids. The kids slept for about 2 hours! It was great, it gave me time to make some ham & au graten potatoes for dinner. We ate more, we played more, we watched a movie together, we talked, laughed & got to spend some time with our kids.
It was a hard change to make but I think it was a better change. The time we spent this Christmas was relaxed and easy. It was nice not to worry about what time it is & trying to get 4 kids packed up every hour to rush off to the next place. It was so awesome to spend quality time with our parents & siblings this year and it worked out great to take time a few days before and spend a couple of hours with our Grandparents & give them our gifts. It's taking us a while but we're getting better at this. It's a work in progress. I learned that my kids don't care what kind of food we have but they do care that I'm playing with them & their new toys. Next year the change will be that I won't spend as much time in the kitchen making homemade rolls & au graten potatoes. (They don't like it anyway!) Maybe we'll have sandwiches, spaghetti or frozen pizza! Who knows!?! We're still figuring this holiday thing out. We'll get it eventually.
