The Challenges of Christmas Day

Tis the season…our second Christmas as a married couple is quickly approaching! It’s amazing how time flies isn’t it?

It seems like yesterday that I was writing a post about last Christmas and the *joys* (I say that both seriously and sarcastically) of starting your own family traditions. It is joyful in that my husband and I are now are our own family and it is very important to establish our own traditions. However, we have found it quite the challenge with the demands from both sides of parents who each want us to maintain all the holiday traditions we had as children. Easier said than done when we both have families that live nearby and both want/expect us to be with them on Christmas day. Boy, oh boy does it make it fun for us.

We have resorted to the fact that as long as it’s just us we can continue to drive around the hour parameter our family lives in on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day to spend time with everyone but as soon as we decide to throw a little one in the mix we’re going to have to stop the craziness.

The complicated part of the equation is that there are already grandchildren on my husband’s side so the scheduling gets even harder. My entire family including my husband is only 6 people so without us its just four (aka no fun).

That being said last year we had a plan that seemed to work pretty perfectly (especially since Christmas Eve was on a weekend last year). We spent Christmas Eve morning/day/afternoon with my husband’s family where we pretended it was Christmas day. We then loaded up and headed to Christmas Eve service an hour away with my fam and then went out for dinner to celebrate my dad’s birthday (which just so happens to ALSO be Christmas Eve). Christmas morning/day we spent with my family and then headed back to my husband’s grandmothers for his extended family Christmas. Finally we did our own Christmas together the day after Christmas. Exhausting but it worked.

Problem is this year as you all know Chrismas Eve falls on a work day which means I’m going to have to take a vacation day to do Christmas with the hubby’s family and will be unable to take an extra day the day after to celebrate with my husband.

So…for all you married people out there (especially those with both families nearby)…I’d love to know?  How do you celebrate Christmas as a couple and also divide time between both families?

On another note I just celebrated my first anniversary as a blogger! Wow, does time fly! Influenster was kind enough to send me a free box of chocolates to celebrate. And aren’t they just beautiful? Thank you Influenster and Ferrero Rocher!