I know this can be a major source of contention in many relationships, so I'm not trying to brag when I say that I may be one of the luckiest newlyweds alive.
The Mr.'s favorite Holiday is Thanksgiving, so he asked that we do every Thanksgiving in Oregon with his family. And his family was thrilled! That meant that we'd do every Christmas with my family in San Diego which made me and my parents ecstatic! No fighting, no bitterness. Everyone was a winner. Amazing, right?
But the one thing I've missed for the past couple of years is helping my Mom decorate the house, particularly putting up the Christmas Village.
My Mom and I have been collecting Department 56 Dickens Village Christmas houses and accessories for almost 15 years.
We buy a house and an accessory every year. I love it!
But this year, I'm going to be able to drive down to San Diego this weekend (before Thanksgiving) and help my Mom put up the Christmas Village! So excited! I'll be sure to post photos of our setup when we're done.
How do you divide the holidays with your significant other and your families?
Are you happy with what you've decided?
Even if you are happy, do you ever feel like you miss out on your family traditions because of dividing the holidays?
And more importantly, do you any of you do Christmas villages? :-)
33 comments:
New reader here! Love your blog! That is amazing that your husband lets you have Christmas with your family!! How glorious!! We do the old rotation every other year. One year we will do Thanksgiving with his family and then Christmas with mine. Then the next year we will flip flop it. It works pretty well but I did just realize that I hadn't been to my hometown in two years because of this little arrangement! Oh well!! Lucky you that you don't have to deal with that!
OMG! My mom has been collecting the Dicken's Village for 25 years! We are getting her Dicken's home (25th Anniversary Ed.) for Christmas this year along with an accessory. I got the Dept. 56 Season's Bay houses before they were all retired, so I am going to put them up next week! This is the first time that I have set them up in a LONG time so I am excited to carry on the tradition.
We are rotating Thanksgiving and Christmas right now. My parents live in the same town we do so it's easy to see them more often. Once we have kids we will still rotate Thanksgiving, but we will have Christmas Day at our house. Since my parents are in town they can be there and if the in-laws want to come down they can. We may leave to go to the in-laws the day after Christmas to spend some time, but Christmas Day is the one we want in our home for our kids without traveling.
We have started a collection of Christmas houses. We usually by them on clearance from Lowe's when they go on sale. I don't know if we will keep collecting because I don't know where we will put them!
We have a Christmas Village too!!
We spend all holidays with Big Man's mom and sister's since we live with them. My family lives in PA so it's hard to get the time off and go see them during the holidays.
My mom and I have been collecting the Dicken's homes for about 25 years! They are amazing! We also do a big village under the tree. It makes me favorite time of year even more special.
Luckily, most of my family lives out of state and we're not very close anyway. We spend most holidays with his family. This Thanksgiving we're spending with my mom and brothers, the only family I have locally. But I feel kind of guilty about it...
Thanksgiving is mostly spent at my parent's house. Thanksgiving is my favourite holiday! And I am understandably biased when it comes to my Mom's Thanksgiving dinner. It's how I grew up! But we have had Thanksgiving at his Mom's before.
Last year we worked out Christmas so that it was perfect for us! We had Christmas Morning with my parents and had a Christmas breakfast. Then we drove to his Mom's for Christmas dinner. My family tends to be early risers, so this worked out well.
My parent's have a big crab dinner for New Years. If we don't have anything else planned we usually stop by for that.
And we do Easter dinner at my Mom's. His Mom does not usually hold an Easter dinner, so that only leaves one option.
It is working out great for us!
Even if you are happy, do you ever feel like you miss out on your family traditions because of dividing the holidays?
I don't think our family really had any traditions besides my mom cooking the dinners. Aside from putting up a (fake pre-lit) tree, lights, and wreath there was no other decoration. I don't feel like I am missing out on anything by not being there for the entire holiday.
We do not do Christmas Villages. :( But I would LOVE to go all out and decorate the house like crazy for the holidays!
We haven't mastered the holidays yet, but I LOVE my Dickens village! We add to ours each year also. I can't wait to put mine up!!
I am blessed too! My husband's family celebrates the holidays the weekend before Thanksgiving AND Christmas. SO we will head up to AL for Thanksgiving this weekend and next weekend we spend it in FL with my family! Totally lucky ;)
My family has always done xmas on xmas day and D's fam has always done it on xmas eve so it works out perfect for us. We share!
Thanksgiving we trade off. My family is going to his P's this year. We have a small family so it works well for us.
I've been considering starting a Christmas village this year. One at a time... slow and steady wins the race. =)
We are pretty lucky as far as families go. We live relatively close. We spend Thanksgiving with his family, rotating between here and Tennessee with extended family. We spend Christmas Eve wtih my family and Christmas with his family. Then, we usually hit a movie just the two of us on Christmas night. It sounds busy, but it's really not a rush. Our families are only about a 1/2 hour away from each other.
Will you share pics of the village?
Aw, that's awesome that you guys can split the holidays - that makes SUCH a difference for the stress level!!
It has beenchallenging figuring out a plan that works for the holidays. My huband loves christmas villages and wants to grow a colelction of our own. He got on piece last year from his parents. So funny, usually boys aren't into that sort of thing!
haha. I have never seen another family with the Dickens Village. My gram has a VERY large collection. She started giving my mom and aunts pieces when I was young and now my mom has a huge display. I do not have any, but I am sure I will get my Gram or mom's some day. I will need to dedicate a room for storage!
My husband's family is all in New Zealand, so it is Always my family for ALL holidays. Easy? Yes it is. BUT, it makes me sad. I would like to have his family closer to split the time with. I really would.
I do not have a Christmas village.
My hubby and I devide our holidays like this. His family in the morning, mine in the second half of the day. It works and we are both happy. The only problem I have is my brothers. They have to split holidays with there wifes also and it causes us to be apart on holidays. I hate that. I want all the family there when we are there. I get sad when only half of us are there. :(
I'm so happy for you that you get to go see your mom and dad and decorate the house with them this year though.
It definitely is a challenge! We're lucky since our parents live about 30 minutes from each other, however, it's still tough! Even if we spend half the day with my family, it makes me sad to miss the other half!
That is so lucky that it was so easy for you to divide the holidays!
My husband and I both love Christmas, so we are going to split them with our families, every other year. This is my first year EVER spending the holidays away from my parents, so I'm a little apprehensive!
we split it up every year, Thanksgiving at one then Christmas at the other which means traveling to Texas and Washington every year. But no matter compromise, its always a bummer not to have every holiday with your "own" family, you know?
we split it up every year, Thanksgiving at one then Christmas at the other which means traveling to Texas and Washington every year. But no matter compromise, its always a bummer not to have every holiday with your "own" family, you know?
We started splitting holidays last year. So last year we did Thanksgiving with my family and Christmas with his and this year we're switching. Its a little sad to me that I won't be going home for Thanksgiving this year, but since our families are several states away its hard to come up with a better solution.
Balancing holidays is never a fun thing. That's great that you have it all worked out. I wonder how I will deal with this next year when I am newly married and the holidays approach!
I love those villages!!! My mom has one and it's so fun to put it together every year!!! I can't wait to see what you mom's looks like!
My in-laws live in Canada so we dont get to spend any holidays with them. My husband is a juvenile corrections officer and they dont let any employees take time off during the holidays. Thats a bummer because he wants to go home for Christmas. Maybe someday someone will have mercy. We have a little cheap village we bought. It is cute though. I also have a fall one that is up now. That one only has 3 buildings but it is cute.
Hi! Clicked over here from a Blogher link. My husband and I are both children of divorce and all of our parents are remarried, so we have to figure out how to split holidays with FOUR sets of parents. Crazy. I'm also a 2008 bride, so this is our second holiday season as well. Last year we spent T'day here and this year we'll travel. That will be the holiday we alternate, but every Xmas will be spent with my mom and extended family.
And my mom ALSO collects the Dickens Village, but she doesn't really display them anymore. Hmmm. Might be time for eBay!
my fiance has a full set of the snow village collection of department 56 houses. now that we're in our new home, we're not sure how we'll ever display them all! his parents would devote an entire room to them!
We alternate every year on Thanksgiving - one year with his fam, the next with mine. On the year that we spend it with his fam, we meet up with my fam for a late movie on Thanksgiving night...it has become a tradition that I look forward to and I still get to see my fam. :) His family celebrates Christmas on the 23rd, so that leaves Christmas day with my fam! Works out really well!
I'm thankful that we don't have to divide them. His family has a timeshare in Orlando, so every year we see them at Easter there and stay in Tampa for Thanksgiving and Christmas!
How nice that it works out for you guys! We still do Thanksgivings at our grandparents', so we rotate years with each family. For Christmas we get to make it to both. We are from the same town, so it is easy to do Christmas with our families. The Christmas celebrations with grandparents and extended family happen on random weekends in Dec.
Love your village, we have one too, they are SO cute! Dividing the holidays is so hard! I wish we had a place big enough and we could have both of our families here! Yeah right! We'd need to live in a barn for that to ever happen!
I LOVE Christmas villages! That's such a neat tradition that you and your mom have together.
Splitting the holidays is seriously one of my biggest fears about getting married, lol. Clearly, I think that my family does it the best and no one will ever cook like my mom, lol.
We've managed so far to evenly split the holidays and flip flop them each year. However, I think this will be the last year for that since I want my child to have Christmas at home when she/he gets here... Guess we'll have to see how that plays out!!
I love your village! My mom in law gave me one and I can't wait to start expanding on it.
(I'm so behind!!) I love the village:) such a fun tradition! I thought of you when I wrote my most recent post, I mentioned a tiny bit of background:) My Mom is my only fam around here, so we always go to one side of Hubby's fam for Thanksgiving and the only for Chrstmas, then we celebrate Hanukkah as our fam. And sometimes my Mom comes and other times she wants to spend quiet time at home or with her fiance now. I would love to spend more holidays w my fam (Hubby agrees too:)) but they live so far away. My Aunt in AZ always does the first night of Hanukkah at her house, so we got to do that last year and had such a great time! Hope you're having a great start to the week=)!
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