ALT-3 Secrets to Enjoying Family Holidays
Family holidays can be very stressful especially when you try to combine long standing traditions and two different families. Being one of the lucky ones I can tell you how we have blended families and traditions and continued to love one another through compromise and continual change. Each year also brings its own set of challenges when celebrating with more family members than your immediate family. Especially as families become busier and more involved in activies.
Our family consists of my side and my husbands side. On my side we have a mom, dad, sister and a brother. On my husbands side he has a sister. We are very lucky because the traditions my sister -n-laws husband had growing up matches mine...we both spend Thanksgiving and Christmas with our families. So when both of us married into the family that didn't leave much wiggle room for change but my in-laws stepped up to the plate. Instead of breaking our traditions,we decided to compromise and spend the Saturday after Thanksgiving and Christmas eve with them.
Compromising instead of argueing open up doors that may have been closed if an arguement had been started. On Thanksgiving day my in-laws actually come to my parents house for dinner and typically do a craft or game with the kids. They treat my neice and nephew as if they were their own grandchildren and everyone enjoys laughing at my dad. Laughing at my dad has become a family favorite pastime and up until a year or so ago my in-laws refused to participate. They couldn't imagine us doing this, but after being around for a while and finding out we were just teasing and giving him attention they started to join in which made the evening even that much funnier because he wasn't expecting it.
Compromsing on holidays also came on Christmas. When my kids were little both sets of grandparents would come over real early in the morning, have breakfast with us and watch the kids open their presents. Then my family would go to my mom's house for Christmas dinner. We weren't even thinking the first Christmas after my husband's sister got married that it would leave my in-laws alone during the day. About five o'clock that Christmas day, we received a call at my mom's asking if it was okay for my in-laws to come over because they were lonely. Of course it was, so they came and now it is a tradition for them to arrive on Christmas day to visit about five or six in the evening.
The nice thing about these changes and compromises is that our children get to spend time with both sets of grandparents and know that not only do they know each other but they like each other. It is a gift that cannot be bought with money but one that my kids and niece and nephew will treasure for many years.
