What are your plans for Christmas 2009?
Is your tree up yet?
Do you have any old traditions that you follow for Christmas and New Year?
What do hate about this time of year?
What do you love about this time of year?



I'm full of questions today

Become a member and make these ads go away,
Registering is simple, fast and FREE !

The black tree went up last night

We're all going out to a Thai restaurant Christmas eve. "All" is myself and my 3 children, my sister, her hubby and her 3 children with various girlfriends and boyfriend. My "big sis" and her family are coming from Spain. I haven't seen her in about 5-ish years so I'm really excited about seeing them all. There will be another family there too, "our other sister" as we call her.

I always stay home Christmas eve, and to be honest, that's how I like it but it should be really nice having everyone together.

Christmas day we're going to my sister's house.

I don't really have any traditions except.... the kids all have to have new PJs for Christmas eve, I still do stockings.... yes even Josh who is 19 still has his stocking. They all say that's the best part .

My one and only 'thing' for new year is, I have to open both outside doors to let the new year in lol. My mum used to do it and it just stuck with me. Weird Irish people

I hate that my mom and dad aren't here. I miss them all the time but even more this time of year. Christmas was my mum's thing, she'd go nuts and Christmas was a fantastic time when she was here. I hate the shopping and the stress. This is the ONLY time of year my stomach ulcer goes in to over drive....like now for instance

I love the kids faces Christmas morning. I love when they get their stockings and come sit on my bed to open them and then we all go downstairs together to open prezzies....why am I bawling?

What are your plans for Christmas 2009?
Same thing as last year. Christmas Eve at Mama's and Christmas Day with Jackie at her boyfriend's mama's.
Is your tree up yet?
Nope. My roomie took the tree when he moved out.
Do you have any old traditions that you follow for Christmas and New Year?
Always Christmas Eve at Mama's with family, friends and lots fo food.
What do hate about this time of year?
I hate not having money.
What do you love about this time of year?
Everyone seems nicer.

Check back with me in a few weeks and I may have a different attitude about it.

Jojo

What are your plans for Christmas 2009?
to ignore it as much as possible. this year it seems it will feature a hospital visit since mum will be there. I had actually relented and agreed that nick could cook donner and invite my parents and brother and sis in law for dinner, but that is doubtfull now


Is your tree up yet?

i don't have one. emma has vaguely skirted about the issue, the answer is they can do what they want in their room, but i don't have christmas trees up.

Do you have any old traditions that you follow for Christmas and New Year?

yep. pretend they aren't happening and sulk when people insult me for being 'heathen' lol

What do hate about this time of year?

the cold, the stress, the crowds, the commercialism, the greed

What do you love about this time of year?

when i think of something i will tell ya

What are your plans for Christmas 2009?

Christmas is always hard for me. Last year I was at my ex's on the 26th-6th. This year will be like past Christmases, I'll be at my boyfriend's parent's house for Christmas. We'll do dinner, presents, etc. I won't go to my family for Christmas because my daughter's birthday is the 14th of December and I can't afford to travel down for both. Even if I could, my mother would be upset that I took her away for Christmas. Later, my daughter's father will travel down and get her, and she'll go with him for a day or so, then he and I will meet somewhere and she'll come with me for a few more days and open presents here. Typically, my boyfriend, Shelby, and I would travel out of state to Indiana and have ANOTHER Christmas there around New Years...but this year one of his cousins decided to get engaged 4 weeks beforehand and have a wedding during the weekend that is ALWAYS family Christmas. She's a little *B* and basically ruined it for everyone. So they post-poned family Christmas until presidents day most likely. We're not going to the wedding. Makes me mad because Shelby loves Indiana, there are lots of kids and dogs there and she doesn't get to play with other kids every much.

Is your tree up yet? No. We aren't getting one. I bought a 3 inch snowman statue for my desk

Do you have any old traditions that you follow for Christmas and New Year? Dec. 14th-Shelby's birthday. Dec. 24th-Tony's step-dad's families dinner. Dec-25th-Tony's parent's house, Dec 31st-2nd Indiana with Tony and Shelby.

What do hate about this time of year? The weather. The snow combined with all the travel makes me nervous. A couple years ago I was driving my daughter back on Dec 31st. We got hit with a really bad snowstorm. We barely made it. 8 people died on the stretch of road we were travelling and a ton of other cars were wrecked. We couldn't see where the road started and the ditch started. What was normally a 2 1/2 hour drive took me 16 rountrip. I was bawling the whole time and Shelby kept asking why. I told her "I dont like driving in the snow". And she said "It's okay mommy, when I get bigger I'll drive you everywhere so you won't cry". *Joins Luvs with the bawling*. I watched someone flip an SUV over a bridge railing out of nowhere. Watch someone else crash into a restaurant. I'm less nervous while driving now in general because I made it through that. My boyfriend refused to drive us that day. My mother still hates him for that, heh.

What do you love about this time of year? The colors. The smells. Watching Shelby open presents. I also like shopping a bit during Christmas, but I am normally anti-shopping.

I always decorate either on American Thanksgiving or December 1st. This year, it was yesterday. I also started to put some Christmas music on the sound system.

As always since 6 years (except for last year), we are flying to North Carolina for Christmas. We leave on the 23rd and come back on the 27th. Hubby is off from the 23rd until January 4th (he still has 2 weeks vacations left). Weater permitting, we will go to my parents for New Year, probably leave around the 29th/30th and spend a few days with them.

What do I miss? Having children... I always miss Stéphanie like mad at Christmas and during the Holidays and on December 26th, it will be 6 years that we lost David due to premature birth...

What do I like? Seeing my family, smiles on people's faces, doing acts of charity for others, including strangers. And Christmas hymmes and music at church services!

Tina, I am so happy that you will be surrounded by your family, this year and will see your sister from Spain!

May your Christmas and holidays be excellent, folks!

My tree is up and I put up most of the other decorations a couple nights ago... Just have wreaths to go up now.

I'm not exactly sure what we are doing over xmas itself other than we want to just have xmas day here with us and my mom and brother instead of going to Calvin's mom's with 500000 other people. She won't like that idea but I think it's prudent to spend one with them and one at home. We might go there on xmas eve instead cos Darian leaves on the 26th. My brother should be here the 24th to 27th but he isn't positive yet.

It's a much smaller xmas this year but that's okay cos they really dont need that much crap.

On xmas eve we open a small gift each, tradition started in my family to shut me and my brother up and stop us from driving our parents insane haha. I always get the kids a Webkin each so they can go online to play. Hit paydirt this week cos I found them on sale for $6 instead of $16!!!! Got one for matt too. Holy crap that saved some $$! We eat treats and snacks and don't really cook a big supper, or soemtimes mom makes a pot of chili. Dont ask me what chili has to do with christmas LOL it's more about being quick and easy and filling I guess

Xmas day we usually all do stockings for each other with small gifts but we're just doing the kids this year. I thought of suggesting to mom that we just put treats in our adult stockings... a small bag of chocs each would fill them anyway and that woudl be YUM lol. Then we each open a present until they are all done. I make bagels with bacon and cheese for brunch.... and then we relax while the turkey is cooking.

Boxing Day is cleanup day, relax, take a closer look at presents, put stuff away, etc. Usually I have my tree down by the 1st of Jan or on the 1st lol.

What I like this year - the awesome sales. due to a bad economy isn't great, but good for my bank account since C has made $10,000 less than last year and I got laid off in November. There have been some great deals out there and I've been snapping them up since summer. I think i paid full price for 3 things and the rest were on sale lol.

What I dont like - the yearly stresses from D's dad that always come but each year I keep hoping for total peace. I'll just keep hoping and maybe one day it will happen!

Domi hun I had not read your post until after I read mine. HUGE hugs. I can only imagine what you must feel at this time of year, and well, every day too. My friend lost her 2 yr old daughter on Easter weekend 19 years ago and every Easter is like that for her. Her family buy her little angels throughout the year and her tree is now covered in them, all reminders of her little Brittany. My friend that suffered several miscarriages has little angel decorations and figures around her home too. She said it helps because while she knows she will never forget, she feels like it helps her lost babies know that they will never be forgotten as well. It's so hard to talk about I have to steel myself to get this written.

I will be holding you and your Stephanie and David in my heart these holidays too and I think about it a lot when I am fed up with how bonkers my kids are acting... it's like a huge wakeup call to think about how different our lives would be if Matt had not been strong enough to come so early. It makes me stop in my tracks and be more patient with his crazy antics and while I joke that Darian might really be a Damien, I love her to pieces and appreciate all of my time with her. Massive huge hugs for you Dominique! xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

another update - I read all of your post Meta and wow - that would have been so scary. Winter driving is totally crap here too but we dont go out of town at xmas usually so it's been okay that way. Lots of times the highway between here and Calgary gets shut down but there are hundreds of cars already on it and they have to choose - pull over and risk running out of gas then freezing to death or getting hit by someone else, or carrying on and ending up in the ditch with the same problem. My brother is the only one who has to travel but usually he takes the greyhound bus, or his friend picks him up and he is a decent driver so far.