Christmas eve traditions

[marshmallowhands]

What are your Christmas eve traditions? We usually go to mass and open a special gift (pjs and a book).

Id like to get more ideas of fun things to do!

[karinothing]

We actually do most of our celebrating on Christmas Eve. We do our big dinner then and open all presents.

[bunch]

As kids we went out for Mexican and saw a movie. Now we host a big family dinner and open a single present.

[Deleted]

Jewish Christmas- Chinese food, movie, look at lights

[pierogigirl]

Pretty much the usual:
Cookies for Santa and reindeer food for the reindeer
new pjs
1 present
read Christmas stories

[gibbinator]

We go to mass with dh's family then head back to the ILs for dinner

[yellowbrkrd]

We always go to my Grandma's for Christmas eve. We have pizza, open gifts and play games. We usually don't get home until midnight or so.

[luvmagoldn]

Cookies for Santa near the fire place. Reindeer food on the driveway.

Mass and big family gathering with lots of food and presents from relatives. Noche buena (basically eating Filipino dishes at midnight).

After the kids are in bed suuuuuuper late - bleary eyed placement of the Santa gifts, stockings, etc.

For us, Christmas Day is just our family of five.

[Deleted]

I am cooking for 37 people. We do a modified seven fishes with my family and DH's family. It's a huge production- my aunt, sister and cousin come over at 10am and we start cooking then. Everyone else comes over after mass. The kids eat first and then the adults have a nice sit down dinner. It's by far my favorite day of the year.

[suburbanzookeeper]

We look at Christmas lights and come back and open presents (Santa comes while we're out). I usually do a big spread of apps/finger foods instead of a big dinner since we do a big dinner on Christmas Day with DH's family. I do stockings on the 6th which is St. Nick's day www.stnicksday.com/ so it kind of spreads things out for us.

[liveintheville]

They'll each get to open a gift and we'll bake and decorate some cookies.

[Willis Jackson]

For some reason the idea of opening a gift on Christmas Eve bugs me. It's like it's cheating or something.

[vanillacourage]

An amaaaaaazing dinner at my inlaws and then we open gifts with them. True gluttony. Then we go home, put the kids to bed and DH and I drink spiked eggnog and watch "It's a Wonderful Life".

[Deleted]

Before baby, got drunk and ate like pigs with my family after midnight mass.

Now that DS is here, I would like to make an attempt at attending an earlier service and watch movies afterwards. We'll see, especially since we aren't near family this time and we are in a new city this year.

[ladygrey]

We have oyster stew, go to church, then come home and open gifts in front of the fireplace.

[anna7602]

Big family dinner that lasts hours. Present-opening with all the extended family, then midnight mass, then home to open more presents.

We used to open all of our presents except for ones from Santa on Christmas Eve.

This is our first year so far from family and it's just the three of us. I think we'll do a scaled down version of the big dinner and will open all presents except those from Santa.

Not sure about midnight mass. I love the lights, but since DD won't have the usual long car ride on Xmas eve to relax/sleep, I highly doubt she'll be awake enough to go to midnight mass.

[Deleted]

As kids, just milk & cookies for Santa and threats of "there will be no Christmas if youdon'tstayinyourrooms. I MEAN IT."

As adults, we open our stockings.

[brit1017]

We always read "The Polar Express" before bed. My mom did it with me and my siblings when we were little (hell, she still reads it every year to my sister, who just turned 18

[Deleted]

Early evening mass, drive around looking at lights, new jammies, and a new Christmas book

We'll probably have dinner at my inlaws' first and then everyone comes over to our house for Christmas day.

We'll probably also let them open one present on Christmas eve.

[slug*bug]

As a child, it was my family's main celebration: making cookies for Santa during the day and evening church followed by opening all of our presents (somehow Santa knew to come to our house while we were at church and I never questioned it-ha!) One of the things I remember most was the meal of heavy appetizers we'd eat while opening gifts around the tree: next to gifts, it was my favorite part of the night.

DH grew up opening all of his presents on Christmas morning and it's a really big deal to him to wait, so I think we're going to compromise and let DS open one gift on Christmas eve. If I had it my way, though, I'd keep Christmas Eve as the 'big' celebration: I remember being really grateful that Santa came early to my house as a kid. I think I would've exploded if I'd had to wait 'til the next morning.

[karinothing]

Dec 19, 2012 22:31:16 GMT -5 Willis Jackson said:

For some reason the idea of opening a gift on Christmas Eve bugs me. It's like it's cheating or something.

Ha ha. We never opened them Christmas morning becuase my mom had to sing at the 11am mass. Santa brings stockings Christmas morning.

I really prefer doing Christmas eve becuase 1. it is acceptable to drink and open presents and 2. becuase night time seems more magical because we can light candles, I guess it just has better ambiance?

[SusanBAnthony]

Dec 19, 2012 22:31:16 GMT -5 Willis Jackson said:

For some reason the idea of opening a gift on Christmas Eve bugs me. It's like it's cheating or something.

We opened it before church. I think it was bribery to keep us quiet during church (usually my parents picked which gift we got to open- a book or something quiet like that). I don't think we are going to do that because we don't have enough gifts for the kids. First world problems, lol.

We are apparently going to schlepping an hour back and forth to my fil's on Xmas eve. Divorced in laws suck. He will make some big dinner, so we won't even see or talk to him hardly, and he won't let us help. Meanwhile the kids will be destroying everything breakable in the house. I am bitter and crabby about my in laws right now, can you tell?