Nontraveling Scrooge ? What Would You Do?

See my previous posts...I absolutely refuse to do the kind of insanity that you describe. I am happiest at home with just my children and DH...

My family gets everyone together in a central location. Closer for some, farther for some of us. We all have room to stay the night if we want. Older family members take precidence as far as them not being able to travel. You never know if they will be around for another holiday.
Somehow it just always seems to work. Yes...some juggling, but we all pretty much try to meet in a central location.

There is no way to make every single person in every single family happy and have every single event at this person's house and then that person's house. I have a fairly large family and we keep things casual. Showing up at different times is fine. There is always tons of food. We just gather and make the best of it. And, we always have a nice time.

Each family works things out for themselves. I have alternated quiet Christmas mornings at home with being in a house full of other family members and kids running all over and playing together. There is something beautiful about both, really. With a big family, we don't always get together all at once very often so to me....it's worth it.

Just my opinion.

I really agree with what everyone else has said so far, but I feel the need to add my two cents.
All you describe isn't about Christmas at all, what you're doing is about making sure people see each other.
Make it at your house, and ensure everyone is invited.. no hard feelings if anyone can't make it. Good Luck!

No way girl. We stayed HOME from the first Christmas we had kids. People came to US if they liked, otherwise we sent presents/cards, made phone calls Christmas day. However, we DID always do some travel on Easter, but not anything like you describe.. I don't really know if this upset anyone. If so, they never said so.

Your family is your husband and your kids. You enjoy your family the way YOU like.

:)

My husband and I are in a blended family. Since we both have to share the kids with the ex's, we just celebrate on the weekend that we have everyone together. who says xmas HAS to be on the 25th? so plan parties with the family in your own town that don't travel on the weekend before. no big deal. don't feel obligated to drive all over for the holiday, thats not fun for anyone. I hope you find something that will work for you, good luck.

Xmas has been a total disaster for me for 12 years! We used to have to travel to several different cities that were hours away from each other to appease my mom, his mom, his dad, etc. We now schedule something with his dad in town a few days before. My mom also comes here now which makes it easier, but we still have to travel 3 hours away to see MIL. I really hate it.

There are 5 of us and my SIL is a family of 3. We are all squished in my MIL's tiny, smoky 3 bedroom house. It would be soooo much easier if she came here, too, but she is too darn selfish. I have to cut short time with my mom--whom I hardly ever see--so we can travel. Also, our immediate family time is rushed. I was hoping my husband and his sister would eventually put their foot down but everyone's foot seems broke! All of my husband's family lives in the town of his mother so it seems unlikely anyone would ever go against the grain...Bah Humbug...

OMG ~ I just can hardly believe how crazy this sounds. Just pick one and everyone else will have to deal with it. Next year pick the other side of the family and so on. The most important thing is the joy and love of family and the celebration together not all the running around. What will be gained for your children. Will they grow up believing that's what you're suppose to do for Christmas, run, run and run. Time spent in the car could be spent enjoying and visiting. The most important thing is how you're celebrating with your husband and children at your own home. And maybe if everybody gripes about your decision too much, you'll all just stay home. This is my take, I know much easier said than done, as family wants what family wants. Good Luck and God Bless You, God knows you need it for the strength alone

It is hard traveling. We do it most years. My parents live out of state. But they have come to us a few times. Seeing family is important. If you don't do it (or don't make a time after Christmas to see people you've missed) then your kids won't grow up knowing their cousins either.

However, you will go insane doing what you do every year.

I suggest you do a crazy Christmas this year. Then stay home next year. Then the crazy Christmas the year after. Then stay home the year after that.

If you stay home EVERY year, then you're doing to them what they're doing to you. Everyone deserves to be the host every now and then, but everyone who is able should share in the traveling as well.

Once people know your schedule (let them know well in advance), they will adapt. Some will come to you when you're home. Some will not. That's OK-you'll see them the next year.

My suggestion:
Friday, Dec. 23, stay with your parents. spend some quality time with them. Have the elves leave some wrapped gifts near the tree.
Saturday, Dec. 24, drive to your brother's house (you'll save an hour :-)
Saturday, Dec. 24, have dinner with your father-in-law
Saturday, Dec. 24, stay with your parents. You'll already be in that town at your father-in-laws.
Sunday, Dec. 25, morning: celebrate YOUR Christmas with your parents.
Sunday, Dec. 25, afternoon, stop and visit Grandpa/Aunt/Uncle for late lunch
Sunday, Dec. 25, dinner, unwrap any gifts that Santa may have left at your house while you unwind.

We used to live an hour from family. We would start at 8a, visit the BIL down the road for 30min. Drive an hour to house #2 for 2 hours, drive 30min to my family #3. stay for 2 -3 hours I would eat a big meal, he would nibble, drive around the corner literally to his family #4, stay for 2-3 hours I would nibble and he would eat a big meal, and drive home. Last time we did that we got home at 10pm! Now we have Christmas with the uncle the week before or after depending on schedule. Christmas eve is now for my family big meal and all. Christmas day is for our house and his family.

I have a friend whose family wouldn't buy gifts until Dec. 26 for the after Christmas sales. Then they would go home, wrap, and exchange that night at dinner. It worked for them, they had a stress free Christmas and saved LOTS of money!! I've always remembered it.

You are entitled to celebrate Christmas with jus tyour nuclear family. What a fantastic gift to give your kids, a quiet Christmas at home. Maybe not every year, but you don't have to celebrate with every relative every year.

I go to my aunt's after we do Christmas with whatever kids are here that morning. Then we have DH's family's version of Christmas some day between the 22nd or 23rd and NYE. It's SO much less stressful! Pick on place and go with it, IMO. You can't see everyone ON Christmas. Who are you, Santa Claus? ;)

We also tend to go to my grandmother's on Easter, my aunt's on Christmas (his family another day) and do Thanksgiving at our home with my mom and the in-laws.

I would tell them that if they can't have an alternate day for Christmas celebrations then you will have to pick a place based on where your family is at that time (maybe everyone was recently sick so you are closer to home or you visited friends so you go farther...).

I think that you absolutely need to put a stop to the madness if all you do is travel. Will they come to you? Do you want them to?

I would be a scrooge, and I wouldn't feel guilty about it. But that's just me. When I was a kid, most Christmases were NOT spent with extended family, because my parents didn't want to travel. They invited people to come to us, but only very rarely did anyone take them up on that.
I didn't care, I had a blast every Christmas. When I was a teenager I felt like maybe I was missing out on the whole chaotic, whole-family-crammed-in-the house thing, but that probably had more to do with some tension between my parents that was going on at the time.
My husband and I used to fly up to my in laws every other Christmas and stay with them....my MIL assumed after we had our baby that that tradition would continue. NOT! Sorry, time for us to have our own Christmas at home and start our own traditions. I didn't mind traveling and spending the holiday away from home when it was just the two of us but now that we have a child, no way am I doing that on a regular rotating basis. They are welcome to come and see us but I really don't think we should be expected to travel with a small child ever other year. I mean sure, at some point we will fly up there for Christmas....but don't expect it every other year.
She's not pleased but I don't feel guilty about it. Besides, my husband told me that when he was growing up most Christmases were spent just with his siblings and parents.
Do what works for YOUR little family.

You are not a scrooge. Pick one location and rotate each year, including your own home. As another poster said, you will never make everyone happy and this is insanity! If they don't understand, they are the scrooge for stealing your Christmas.

My kids are 12 and 9. My parents are divorced. DH's parents are divorced and remarried. My entire family lives about 4 hours away from us. I feel your stress. We've always tried to "do it all," traveling every other year to spend Christmas with my family, and painstakingly planning all five of our family "Christmases" on our around the exact dates so as not to hurt any feelings. This always seemed to involve a great deal of negotiation and guilt tripping, ugh! Now we are finally comfortable enough to say no more. We are not traveling for Christmas. We will sleep just the four of us in our own house on Christmas Eve (though we many spend the evening at one family gathering in town), wake up here Christmas Day, just play and enjoy each other. I have friends who started doing this right after their first child was born. I look back and wish we had done the same. Going forward, we are staying home. As much as the kids love seeing their cousins and relatives, they are thrilled to spend Christmas just in their own house. And so are we. It's not that we don't want to see our family. We'd just rather spend time visiting relatives without the stress of a big holiday.

I would consider staying home if it is too much drama. My extended family decided many years ago to have the big extended family Christmas the weekend after the holiday. As a kid I loved getting to celebrate twice.

ok so this is what my husband's family does and it works SO well! One year we and all his siblings and their husbands and wives go to his parents, the next year it's all about my side of the family. No fighting, that's just understood. I LOVE creating my own traditions with my kids at home, so we've taken some years off or had family come to our house.

I think you said it best..."But we can't leave out the most important Christmas of all. Me, my husband and our kids at our house after Santa leaves the gifts here. ". Stay home one year. Visit another (one place)
the next. Be a little selfish - which is really in the best interest of your family IMO. Best of luck with your decision, I know it's tough.

I have read all the answers and must say in the end it is your decision.

With that being said remember you never know when something will happen to a loved one. When my kids were young we went to 5 houses in the same city so to spend time with family. The kids had 3 great-grandmother's for several years. We spent New Years at my parents house with 2 nd great-grandmother and had Christmas at the stroke of Midnight. What a way to bring in the new year. We found another time of the year to travel several states to see the 3rd one.

In '88 we moved several states away from everyone. We did good to make it once a year to see them. Now our kids are grown and live several states from us. Last year was the first year in 4 that all our kids, husbands parents and us were together.

Please remember life is short and once a loved one is gone they are gone. My Mom passed away 3 1/2 years ago and I would give anything to see her one more time.

To me Christmas is more the merrier. Staying home is lonely.

Christmas is LOVE and spreading the LOVE.

Get thru this year, then magically 'win' a cruise or something to get you the heck away from home for the week during Christmas (and not to family's house)!!!

How old are your kids? What are your priorities? Is it Santa or family? How often does the family get together? How's your oldest brother handling the divorce? How often does your children get together with his? These are questions only YOU can answer. Guilt is NOT something that should take presidence, but it may be that still small voice telling you that Christmas is a time for family and traditions are essential for kids. I don't know what the answer is - I live in Texas and my family is in Pennsylvania. My parents go to my brother's house in Florida for Thanksgiving (and we go there when we can) and they come to my house for Christmas (and my brother and his family come here when they can). We all meet in PA in July for my Dad's side of the family's reunion every year. My kids know how important family is to me. Everyone's situation is different - you and your family should sit down and discuss what's important to YOU - doesn't matter what anyone thinks.

When we lived in Illinois I put my foot down. I said no to my mother and my mother in law. So for us we stayed home and had Christmas, just us. I did not travel on Chrstmas day nor the evening before.
Now it doesn't matter because we live 1200 miles away form everybody so if they want to see us they need to come here. We go home on Thanksgiving.
Enjoy your family, start a new tradition, and do not feel guilty.

Can you visit either side for New Years, a post Christmas celebration? That may be one way to compromise. I say driving all that way is too much! If you must I would skip the staying over at your parents and drive home that night. (Kids will fall asleep in the car anyway.) Then have your Christmas at home, then drive to see his family later. There is no reason you need to have 2 get togethers with your side especially with all that extra driving. Maybe one day you can invite people to drive 2 1/2 hours to your house and just stay home, if they don't come so what less stress for you. Even if you do that every other year it will be much less stressful.

I had to put my foot down and my in laws are only 20 minutes away. Thanksgiving I'm staying home. We have an 8 month old and I just don't feel the need to cart him all over the place! So my inlaws said they would rather stay home as well, yay for me so much less stress!

You are fortunate to have both families so close. My family is 2000 miles away and I haven't spent a holiday with them in years!

I'm sure it will work out, don't feel guilty what ever your decision is, do what is best for your family!

Since we just lost my sister-in-law to a long battle with cancer this summer, I have an even larger need to be with family as often as I can, for as long as I can. We will be doing a lot of traveling this Thanksgiving and Christmas (all out of state). Some will be by car and some will be by plane, but it will be a bit crazy.

To make sure that I don't get stressed out, I am doing much more shopping ahead of time. I will be making cookies, doing Christmas photos/letters, deciding on food, buying groceries, etc. much earlier. I don't want to be the one at all of these events who is tired and irritable so I am envisioning now how I will behave, what I will talk about, what food I will bring, etc. In other words, I am planning to have a Christmas that is blessed above and beyond any previous Christmas.

So, instead of thinking about all of the craziness, I suggest you think about all of the positives that you will GET to experience this Christmas instead. Start putting toys away so that you have a bunch of "new" toys to bring out every so often on the road for your kids. Find some fun children's Christmas music to play in the stereo during the long stretch of the drive.

Figure out which parts of these Christmas celebrations are the hardest and add something fun to it. Is it the drive home? Take along extra pillows and blankets so everyone is comfy. Buy your favorite drinks that you never normally buy so you have something to look forward to on the drive home. (I never buy those Sobe drinks but that is a nice treat for me on a long drive.) Can you hire a high school student to help during the busiest time of your business? If you don't know an energetic student, ask around. There are some amazing, self-motivated kids out there who would love to make some extra money.

You mentioned that you hate the large crowds. Decide who you really want to spend time with at these parties and pull those people aside at certain times in another room or outside and enjoy a nice conversation. Even if it is just a few minutes, it will feel like another nice treat.

I understand when people suggest just staying home inviting people to come to you, but you mentioned that it is difficult for some to travel. I would suggest you travel as long as you can. It demonstrates a love for others that you will make it a priority. I always feel bad for my cousins who never come to family events anymore. Yes, it is a hassle, but we always enjoy seeing each other.

We have celebrated Christmas on different days with our kids before because that family celebration was very important. The kids just had to make sure we let Santa know which day to come. He never forgot or got mixed up. My kids realized that Santa enjoyed a little variety.

It is really all in your attitude. I heard once that the mom sets the tone in the house for the whole Christmas season. I was glad I heard that when my kids were little because the next Christmas was one of packing and moving out of state with my husband already moved! We moved on Jan. 2nd. We would do all of the fun Christmas stuff each day then as soon as the kids went to bed I would pack until I couldn't stay awake. I was determined to provide a fun Christmas. It is a decision.