Reply to How to avoid traveling to in laws every thanksgiving and Xmas

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Just do 1 either Thanksgiving or Christmas.

[b]You both have to get over the idea that holidays are about extended family.They aren’t.  [/b]How old are your kids and how many do you have? Do you like Thanksgiving food?

Personally I would travel for Thanksgiving and do Christmas at home. None of us like Thanksgiving food so making a bunch of food that we don’t even like when it would only be the four of us was silly. Though our best Thanksgiving was actually going on vacation and eating at a nice restaurants for Thanksgiving, no one ordered turkey.

Personally I also like having the house decorated for Christmas, doing Christmas stuff leading up to Christmas and on Christmas Day just staying in pajamas while the kids play with their toys. DH grew up with always going to Christmas at his grandmothers so his parents never decorated or did much for the holiday which he found sad. He loves that our house has all the Christmas bells and whistles. [/quote]

Hers the
Op here. Part of the reason I want the holidays to be about extended family is because I want my kids to remember that it’s important to spend holidays with grandparents too. I know DCUM is big on hard lines and boundary setting so this is not a popular view, but I would be very sad if my kids never wanted to spend the holidays with me when I’m old. I would absolutely travel to them though if they prefer it.

To all those saying my DH should do more, he actually does a lot on the actual holiday day (tgiving and Xmas) when he has no work. But almost all the days leading up and after it, he has to work for at least a few hours everyday. He runs his own business so he is never truly off- when there is work, there’s work. It feels unfair to ask him to then do hours of childcare after working. [/quote]

This isn’t the way this works. You are giving your kids memories of spending holidays in Florida with their grandparents and cousins. What you aren’t doing is creating holiday memories as a family.  When they are older and have their own families, they get to pick where they go and what they do. This is the only time in your life where you actually get to decide what they do for holidays. You are wasting precious years doing things you don’t want to hoping it will work out for you later. It’s not going to.

[/quote]

Op here. This post really spoke to me. I think I really needed to hear this, thank you. [/quote

NP I had lots of friends and even some boyfriends who had no nuclear family traditions for holidays. As soon as their grandparents died, all traditions fell apart. Several of them went to their boyfriends or girlfriend's houses instead because they didn't have traditions or a place to go for holidays. "My parents didn't celebrate much."

You only really have 18 years to have the magical holidays that you want. I believe kids deserve to wake up in their beds. Grandparents can always travel to you instead.[/quote]

Here's the thing. You can always create new traditions. My in laws changed how we do Christmas post the grandparents getting divorced and it worked out fine [/quote]

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