First Come the Wedding…Then Comes the Marriage: Holidays

For all my newly-wives (and wives-to-be), I’ve created this series (original post) for the After Wedding aka Marriage. If you have a fear that once you put your Wedding Planning Binder away, you will feel naked and without a sense of direction, never fear, your to-do list still awaits you.

Over the past ten years, DigitalPharaoh and I have always had difficult decisions to make when the holidays came around.

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I come from a very large family who ALWAYS spent the holidays (Thanksgiving & Christmas) together. Throughout my childhood, these were some of my fondest memories. Gathered with my grandparenst, aunts, uncles and cousins celebrating family, love and FOOD. Yum! There were always at least 20-30 of us together in my “immediate” family.

DigitalPharaoh, on the other hand, spent his childhood holidays with his nuclear family unit consisting of his father, mother and sister. Occasionally, after celebrating at home, they’d take a ride to an aunt’s house, or a grandparent’s house for a quick visit. But no huge gatherings or celebrations.

Naturally, when we got married, I assumed we’d celebrate with my family because my family assumed we’d be celebrating with them anyway. And since his family didn’t make such a big deal out of the holidays, no problem, right? WRONG.

#1, it is not a good thing to assume anything, and I think we all know why. Secondly, is that really fair? To ask one’s spouse to forgo celebrating the holidays with their family for yours.

The “fun” of my family gatherings began to diminish by the time DP and I were married, so he couldn’t see why I “had” to be there. DP also never really blended well into my family (a post that I will not even post) so he wanted to spend the holidays with his family, especially after we had children.

If each of your families have long standing traditional celebrations, this subject, for some, will take a lot of sensitivity, compromise and standing your ground ALL AT ONCE.

Some couples will opt to spend the holidays with one family over another for practical reasons, such as distance, accomodations, or work schedules. Others will split the major days between the two families, Thanksgiving with his, Christmas with hers. Then reverse the next year.

However, you decide to do it make sure you talk about it ahead of time and come up with a plan. This plan should be based on a merging of both of your desires for the holiday season.

Needless to say, with all these years behind us, it still isn’t really fun to think about the holidays and what we’ll be doing or not doing. We’ve spent holidays with my family, we’ve spent it with his, we’ve spent it with both and we’ve spent it apart, we’ve spent it with neither. I fault this to our not talking about it, communicating it and following through on our desires in the beginning.

So, take some time to communicate about the upcoming holiday celebrations for your newly formed families. And if you need some tips, check out Marriage 101’s or Wedding Bee’s posts.

Want to know a big secret????

I’d like to spend the holidays all inclusive of those that we love and that love us. And to at least spend time with our families equally to let them know how equally important they are to us.

If I can plan a wedding, I should be able to plan the holiday season right? Well, wish me luck.

Ok, ok…maybe I’m not owning up to the fact that it would probably be like Four Christmases coming to movies theatres soon. HA! (I love Vince Vaughn in disfunctional relationships).

And Happy Holidays

Next up in our series: Your 1st Anniversary

Complete Series

Sunday: Kick Off

Monday: Post Wedding-Wrap Up

Tuesday: To Change or Not to Change Your Name & How

Wednesday: Holidays

Thursday: Your 1^st Anniversary

Friday: Awkward Questions, Awesome Answers

Saturday: It’s Different

Be sure to leave a comment letting us know what Post-Wedding topics interest YOU.