Holiday fun

I have Christmas on the brain. Yes, I know it's October.



I went to Hallmark this morning because the Keepsake Ornaments debuted this weekend, I picked up a few ornaments, along with a small piece for my Department 56 North Pole Series village. Yes, I know it's October (and a high of 85 degrees).


I love Christmas. It's my favorite holiday by far, and I'm very attached to the traditions of Christmas. To me, Christmas symbolizes the celebration of family. In fact, the theme of my bridal shower was Christmas in July, and everyone brought me something for my husband and I to hang on our first Christmas tree - the celebration of the beginning of our new family.



As my family has grown and we've moved farther away from them, I've had to start planning for Christmas earlier. We all have to balance our own vacation schedules with our spouses, our siblings, and our in-laws, but my side of the family has always found a way for us all to be together for Christmas. For the last few years, our solution has been to gather at my parents' house in Illinois on Christmas Day.



Since moving to Charlotte, I've had to deal with a new aspect of holidays - flying. We'd always lived in driving distance before, and even though it was a pain and we had to make adjustments based on snow and ice conditions, we were always able to see our families with no problems. In fact, we even were able to take a trip to Mexico with my husband's family one year and still make it to see my family on Christmas Day.


Last year was our first year of flying home for the holidays. Our plan was to spend three days with my family and two and a half days with my husband's family. Our flight on the evening of December 23rd was cancelled, and we weren't able to fly until the morning of the 24th. It made for a somewhat hectic Christmas Eve because we had to drive to my parents' house that morning, which was two hours from the airport, but overall it worked out fine.


This year, however, is already shaping up to be a challenge. My husband's family proposed taking a trip this year. The trip was my husband's idea actually, but when he proposed it, he thought we'd go on vacation after Christmas as a way to recooperate from the holidays. However, due to my sister-in-law's vacation schedule, the proposed trip would happen from December 23rd until December 26th. From a logistical standpoint, this means that we'll be flying from Charlotte to our vacation destination, and then somehow getting to Illinois to see my family, before heading back to Charlotte.


My husband's family doesn't seem to understand why this is problematic for us. It seems that they don't recognize that this trip involves multiple destinations/flights for us, extra costs, and needing extra time to see both families. It means spending multiple days on airplanes and extra hours in cars.


And it means not being with my family on Christmas, or maybe even at all.


My husband's family (his parents and older sister) don't have many Christmas traditions. In fact, they don't even have a tree. And really, his sister doesn't technically believe in Christmas (that's a loooooong story, but she claims to celebrate Winter Solstice or Yule, though she always asked for Christmas presents... like I said, looooooong story). When we've been with my in-laws on Christmas Eve, my husband and I go to Mass alone. We've always invited the family to go with us, but they've always declined. Sometimes my mother-in-law would go to the Lutheran service, but more often she'd say she was going and then ultimately end up not going. My father-in-law refused to go to anything, and my sister-in-law would sometimes say she was going to services with my mother-in-law and then bail, and sometimes lecture everyone on the evils of organized religion (like I said, looooooong story). They have never said anything about us taking off around dinner time to go to Church, but I always felt weird leaving them for several hours while we attend Mass.


We stopped exchanging gifts a few years ago, largely because it had dissolved into getting gift cards for each other. I found it dumb to essentially exchange cash - here's $50 for Ikea compared to your $25 Borders gift card -and suggested we spend money on doing something together as a family. This actually went over pretty well when we instituted it. One year, my husband and I bought theatre tickets to Meet Me in St. Louis, while his parents bought massages for everyone and then his sister bought lunch after our massages. I thought this arrangement worked well. We did non-Christmasy things, but spent more time together as family than we would've otherwise.


My family (my parents, three sisters, two brothers-in-law, niece, nephew, and now youngest sister's fiance), on the other hand, have a lot of Christmas traditions. For starters, we always go to Mass on Christmas Eve. Attending Mass on Christmas Eve is incredibly important to me. Regardless of what else is on my mind, or how stressed I am leading up to Church, the moment I step into church on Christmas Eve, my mind is cleared. I focus on the the music, and the Nativity, and spending time with my family, and suddenly I'm overwhelmed by Christmas spirit.


We have other traditions too, involving looking at Christmas lights, eating particular food, and opening presents, and we recently added a gingerbread house building contest (except we use graham crackers, and they're not necessarily houses). I enjoy all these traditions, but moreso I love sharing them with my family.


Thus, for the last couple of years, we've spent both Christmas Eve and Christmas Day with my family. In 2008, we went to his family's house for three days before Christmas and drove from his parents to my parents on Christmas Eve. Last year, we arrived on Christmas Eve and then left to see his family on the early morning of the 27th until the 29th. I enjoyed this arrangement a lot. We celebrated a more traditional Christmas with my family, but still spent quality time with his family. My husband agreed with me, which was important to making these arrangements. He enjoyed the Christmas celebration with my family, and appreciated the time we spent with his family.


And yet, somehow, his family doesn't seem to understand this.



Like I said, my husband understands my frustration completely and supports me on the decision to spend Christmas Day and sometimes Christmas Eve with my family, but can't seem to get his family to understand our choice. When he expressed our mutual concern about not being with my family at all on Christmas if we went on this trip, his parents got angry and complained that we hadn't spent Christmas with them in a few years. My husband pointed out that Christmas and Christmas traditions aren't that important to his parents (as evidenced by their eagerness to be on vacation over Christmas), but they argued that it was important that we spend time with them. My husband pointed out that we did spend time with them, and we tried to spend quality time with them, but they were more concerned that we spend Christmas Day with them than listening to my husband's reasons for why we couldn't do the trip the way they wanted to do it.


The conversation ended with my in-laws telling my husband that if we weren't going to go from the 23rd to the 26th, then we weren't going on the trip at all. To me, this made sense. It didn't work in our schedules, it was going to be ridiculously expensive, so why force it to happen? Unfortunately, it was meant to be a threat, as a way of forcing my husband and I to choose between his family and mine - as though if we didn't go on this trip, we weren't going to see his family at Christmas at all.



And that's why I'm angry.



His mom and sister were at my wedding shower, so I know they are aware of how important Christmas is to me. I shared my disappointment the first year they decided not to put up a Christmas tree. (They decided it was a pain, even though they left it up and completely decorated in the basement all year - just had to carry it upstairs at Christmas!) It's hurtful to me that they're trying to keep me from my family, and that they're forcing their three schedules on us instead of accommodating ours, especially because we're already traveling to see them. I'm upset that they don't want to acknowledge that we're trying to balance two families. But most of all, I feel like we're being manipulated, and that they're threatening to withold their love and attention in order to get what they want. And I'm angry that we're not allowed to make our own choice and do what we want to do, all because we don't want to hurt anybody else's feelings.



Really, I am sure this will all work out fine. We won't go on the trip, but we'll still see his family, and we'll be with my family on Christmas Day. I just hope that his family won't make my husband feel guilty for being with my family on Christmas.



Guilt is the opposite of Christmas Spirit.