The holiday season forces most people to feel a bit like a rubber band being pulled in various directions in order to accommodate all family’s feelings and happiness. If you’re like most people, you have a Christmas with your parents, a Christmas with your grandparents on your mom’s side, and a Christmas with your grandparents on your dad’s side. If you’re like me and you come from a divorced family, then you have to throw one more Christmas celebration on to the calendar, because now you have to celebrate with both mom and dad separately. Throw getting married into the mix and then having a kiddo of your own and you’re just plain SCREWED! So how do you do it all? How do you make yourself happy, your husband happy, everyone’s families happy, and your children happy [insert scream here]?

Well I don’t have a lot of experience in this department since this is only Lincoln’s 2nd Christmas, but here’s how we celebrate in our family… I think we do a pretty good job, but next year there will be some changes since we need to create traditions of our own.

Long ago my dad established New Year’s as “his” Christmas with his kids. It’s awesome, because we always have plans for New Year’s, we never have to worry about being on the roads with drunks, and our tradition never interferes with actual Christmas day and we still receive/give presents! So there’s one piece of the puzzle that helps make the holidays easier.

I got really lucky with amazing in laws who knew how important it was to me to have a Christmas at our home. So they came this past weekend from Arkansas and we celebrated our Christmas together a week early. They made sure to take off extra time so they could accommodate our family. We will still see them briefly for actual Christmas, but there is less pressure since we spent a full weekend with them and conquered our gift giving. If anything they got the shortest end of the stick (travel wise), but they took one for the team considering they have more than 38 years of their own Christmas traditions.

So that leaves us with the week of ACTUAL Christmas. Since my husband is from the Houston area and my sister currently lives in Houston with her children and husband, it makes sense to be in Houston for Christmas. My mom comes to Houston as well and has been for years since my sister beat me to the punch in the baby making department. We will split Christmas festivities between my side of the family (mom, sister, and maternal grandmother) and Wesley’s side of the family (mom, dad, maternal grandmother, cousins, uncles, aunts, etc.).

Yes, Christmas ends up being totally drawn out by splitting up the holidays this way, but so far it works for us! Wesley and I have already decided that next year we are going to have to shake things up… Lincoln will be 2 ½ years old and beginning our own Christmas traditions is a must. We may not see as many people for the holidays, but I guess that’s the price you pay for getting married and making babies.

We’d love to hear how you split up the holidays! Do we have any holiday experts out there that found the perfect recipe for splitting up the holiday festivities?

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