I’m done with Christmas!
No… I’m not being petulant, it’s true, my Christmas – with the children at least is pretty much over. On Saturday night we left out a Mince Pie and some Ginger Beer for Santa (James wanted to leave an ‘uppa Tea), and of course a carrot for Rudolph.
They woke the next day to find that Santa and Rudolph had cleared the plate, and left them some gifts and filled their stockings. We sat and opened their presents, which also involved PLAYING with every single one, and Miss A rustled up a fantastic vegetarian roast dinner as we listened to Christmas songs. It was a very lovely Christmas, but just a week early.
Christmas with a fractured family is tough, and indeed with two fractured families is even tougher – schedules have to be agreed months in advance. Then everything has to be sorted so Grandparents, Aunts and Uncles etc get some time with the children too.
The problem is invariably one parent will lose out, you could do what I do, and have Christmas a little earlier – or trying to split the day . Christmas Eve and Morning with Mum, Christmas afternoon and Night with Dad. Neither is really a perfect solution, there’s always some element of compromise, or disadvantage to one party and it’s hard to handle. Sure – I had a lovely time doing our early Christmas, so did the kids – but I know, on Christmas Day I’ll have a little mope that my two Mossters are a few hundred miles away with their Mums. They’ll be having an amazing time and being thoroughly spoilt, and be happy.
It’s not all bad though, two Christmases for a child is pretty epic – I’d LOVE to have had TWO Christmas Days, double the presents and double the fuss made over me. Some of my happiest times as a little one were at Christmas, I have such strong memories of how happy I was. My two get double that, every single year. Plus technology now means if they wanted to see me on Christmas Day, I’m only a Google Hangout or Skype away.
So, whilst it’s easy to get down and upset about how *I* feel, ultimately, Christmas is about the kids, and them being happy, makes me happy. As I sit and write this they are playing with their Christmas gifts from me and having fun, and in a few days, they’ll be doing the same thing with their Mums and having just as much fun with the other side of their family! So whilst I’m a bit grumpy, the kids are just fine!
On the subject of Christmas – the cool kids at Simpson Millar have produced an infographic about ‘Getting it together at Christmas’ which has some stats about Christmas as a Fractured Family below, and there’s more information here about it too.
