This is what we do:
On the evening of Solstice, we exchange gifts and those gifts are books.
On Christmas Eve, the kids open one present, which is pajamas.
On Christmas morning, the kids wake up to the gifts from Santa, under the tree (no wrapping!)
Then, they come and jump on our bed and we open all the other gifts.
Growing up, we were allowed to open up one small gift on Christmas Eve, Santa presents in the morning, other gifts after breakfast. I grew up in Maryland in a “culturally Christian” but non-religious family.
I have to object to the “I’m not Christian” option, because it’s no excuse. I was raised Jewish, my partner was raised Muslim, and we’re both atheists. We have a wonderful tree and exchange gifts.
I grew up with my Polish family’s traditions, so the main event was on Christmas Eve for us. All presents were opened then, the big extended family party was on the Eve, we didn’t eat meat that day, etc… I’ve never opened any presents on Christmas Day. We would also get a smaller gift on St. Nick’s day (December 6.)
British Here, and of course, you open everything on Christmas morning. Christmas Eve and Santa is still packing up his sleigh. We haven’t put a glass of sherry and a mince pie out for him (and a carrot for Rudolph) or hung up our stocking yet. What’s more, my mother told me there was no point trying to stay awake for him because he visited all the children in all the hospitals in the world first.
There were no presents under the tree from Mum and Dad, because they had to pay Santa.
Christmas Eve presents is a strange foreign custom, operated by Germans and the like.
One present Christmas eve which was always Christmas pajamas so the pictures looked good the next day.
Stockings were left on the foot of the bed and we could open and play with anything inside until our parents woke up. Quietly was preferred but reality was the noise level slowly rose until they were forced out of bed.
Presents were opened at home Christmas morning and then the order of grandparents was different every year.
After my parents divorced we threw out the calendar and decided it was Christmas morning when we said it was, same went for birthdays. This served me well after my divorce as I was much less stressed on the years when I didn’t have the kids for Christmas morning.
Swede here and the 24th of december is when all the action is over here. I would get a small gift on christmas eve morning. Then the traditional swedish julbord usually between one and three. After lunch the mandatory hour of the Disney Christmas special, as I remember it was the only time of year swedish television showed Disney cartoons so it was a big deal. When Jiminy Cricket had sung the christmas gifts could finally be opened
I think my dad is Wesleyan and mom belongs to the church of Sweden so she would be Lutheran I guess, religion was never discussed atleast not around me so never believed in anything.
You don’t. You open your presents from your aunts and uncles and grandparents and siblings and parents. And I already told you, Santa doesn’t even wrap presents. He opens them and sets them up for you.
Oh. I think I see your problem. Your parents didn’t love you. You should have worked harder.
Growing up, we were all allowed to open ONE present on Christmas Eve - one from a sibling. The rest waited until the morning. And not until AFTER breakfast, which was just an added bit of parental cruelty.
This is the way we did it, therefore it is The One Only True Correct Way Of Doing Things. :).
Now that we’re a mixed household - one lapsed Jew and one lapsed Catholic - we do Hanukkah gifts during the 8 evenings, and Christmas gifts on 12/25 only. If Hanukkah happens to overlap 12/25, we tell the kids they got that evening’s gift early.
In my mostly non-Christian extended family, no presents are opened on Christmas Eve: we wait until the morning, when everyone (including those visiting for Christmas) can gather together to open the presents together.
We always did one on Christmas Eve, but every year my Dad “forgot” that was the tradition and said we had to wait until morning, and we would spend all afternoon of Dec. 24th trying to convince him to let us open one that night. Then he would finally give in, and then we’d go through the whole thing the following year. It was a tradition.
We did all on Christmas morning. My brother and I were allowed to open the stuff in our stockings before Mom and Dad got up, but everything else had to wait.
The days of bouncing around waiting for them to wake up so we could open gifts ended sometime in high school. I distinctly remember my parents having to haul me out of bed at noon one year. Last year we didn’t even bother until about 8PM Christmas night.
My parents got tired of us all (there were six of us) bouncing off the walls, so they started a tradition of giving each of us a book on Christmas Eve. We would all settle down with the books for the rest of the evening, giving them much needed peace and quiet. The other presents were all opened on Christmas morning.
(For some reason, the tradition on Christmas morning was that the youngest kid had the job of handing out the presents - one to each person, opened in age order, youngest to oldest. This continued until the presents ran out.)
This almost cost us our marriage the first year. My wife is from a very German Catholic family from Milwaukee and they opened everything on Christmas Eve. I’m a presbyterian Swede from Indiana and anything opened before Christmas morning was sacrilegious. We finally settled on one or two on the Eve and most on the real morning. I’m still not happy about it, but I do like remaining married.
