Merry Christmas! Or is it?!

Good morning.

Its 12.47am on Christmas morning (merry Christmas!) and I've just finished up doing everything, and gone to bed.

I texted my husband (at work on nightshift) to proudly tell him all was done and how tired I was, and his response?  'All what?'. Devastated. All that work, unappreciated.

Not sure about you, but I shop, wrap, pack stockings and bake any Christmas requirements by myself, no input offered or received from hubby. I'm lucky if I get a present, let alone get his help buying any. And now he is taking advantage of teenage daughter - his next Christmas elf-slave. Sigh.

But even after hard-working-mum-rant, I love the rituals of Christmas. Its my MIL's birthday on Christmas Eve, so routine starts with this.

Christmas Eve, my neighbours come over and we all celebrate my MIL's birthday with some dinner or nibbles, then we open Christmas presents from each other, not family, just neighbours. We sit around eating and gossiping and the boys have a drink or 2. Its pretty casual but a great evening. Then, hubby and I sit around and wrap the kids presents (he does this under protest when I am just too tired to do it by myself, and its not every year, and I have to yell to get it). I usually have non-family wrapped and out of the way, but the kids are verrrrry sneaky so you just can't leave stuff laying around. Hot tip, the car boot....

Then, everything is packed into big santa bags. Next, the stockings are filled with lollies and small amusements, we eat the stuff left out for santa and its off to bed.  Both the kids (15 & 12) like to leave stuff out for Santa. Its nice they are not too sophisticated to get into the magic of doing these fun things for Christmas. This year, Ben put a cake and milk out, came back and added 2 chocolates and then came back to add a Christmas light before declaring everything ready for Santa to arrive. So sweet!

Its an early morning for us on Christmas morning. Bethany is already an early riser, but has an astounding capacity to be able to wake up at 5am on Christmas morning. And her tradition is to a) inspect the presents without touching to see who got more and see if she can tell what it is by looking at it and then b) wake up her sound asleep brother to get him involved in the action. They are allowed to open their Christmas stockings as soon as they wake up and eat lollies, open the little toys. Then, and sometimes before they open stockings, they come in and wake us up. Craig continues to sleep, I drag myself out of bed, go to the loo and darling daughter makes me a cuppa - a necessity. This is all before 6am. WHY????? it will still be there in 2 hours but no, we are subjected to this torture every year. Once I have my cuppa, they lug everything into our bedroom and start opening their pressies, taking turns to open one at a time. Craig continues to sleep and pretends to open an eye when he hears 'Daaaad, are you watching?!'

After this exciting time (!), Craig and I open presents, then the kids go next door to the IL's and get their presents from them, and run back to show us.  We get dressed, get our pressies off IL's and have breakfast.

Breakfast is always ham and eggs and toast, LOVE love love fresh leg ham at Christmas. Sometimes its at home, sometimes over at our neighbours house. They put on a fab brekky, legends for taking it on.

After brekky, we run around getting ready to go out for lunch. I'm not sure I should even start on lunch, its 1.03am and I am soooo tired. Perhaps lunch description tomorrow. Its worth waiting for.

But I wouldn't change anything. I love the traditions and the happiness I get out of watching the kids, and would not swap it for anything. I have a beautiful life, as said by the famous Troy Cassar-Daley.

Merry Christmas, hope yours is a special one.

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