“All you can take with you is that which you’ve given away.”
Pa Bailey, It’s A Wonderful Life
It is not something we discuss often in public forums. Not because we are ashamed, we just do not see it as much of a conversation. Yet, truth is truth. Our beautiful family of seven is blended. Not quite Brady Bunch, but I brought three kids to the party. Rachael delivered two bundles of life to our household. In all we have five pretty incredible kids in our blended house who love Christmas.
This year will usher in the third trip around the sun together and the third time we hang stockings by the chimney with care. Blending lives has come with an entirely different set of challenges when you begin to blend Christmas. So from our limited set of data of a few navidads here is what we have learned about being a blended family at Christmas:
The ”F” Word
My wonderful wife is the one with list who is checking it twice. In fact, accompanying the list is spreadsheet. I realize for some I am stealing the joy of the gift giving. For others, you are grinning like Santa’s little helper at the thought of spreadsheets. We strive to keep all things “fair”, ugh. Fair always looks different. Fair looks like same expense within a few dollars. Fair looks like similar number of gifts. Fair can constitute creative wrapping. Yet the primary thing behind fair is that we find a gift for each of them that will make them smile. Maybe it is one gift or set of gifts.
With five, all of which are teens or tweens, you cannot pull one over on them. So we simply pull from their wishlist.
Sibling Santa
Secret Santa just for siblings, bonus and biological. All five names are put in a bowl, you buy for the person whose name you draw. Our hope in this exercise is that no one brother or sister is different than the other. We are all family. Our hope was to blur the lines of biological and bonus. As well, we wanted our kids to experience the joy of giving.
Something Old, Something New
We have worked hard to have both. There are traditions, ornaments, decorations, and elements of the holiday that we have both brought and kept in our blended life. There are also new decorations, trees, and traditions we are making. There are some that just overlapped.
Prior to our two houses becoming one, we both would take our kids to buy a memory ornament, typically from Hobby Lobby. This is a tradition we kept, we just now load up all seven of us in the Honda Pilot and invade the tree trimming aisle altogether.
This year we are christening a new tradition. Ala The Christmas Story, we will embark on a Christmas Day movie and Chinese food for dinner. Going forward as our family continues to expand in the years to come, I am sure others will be added.
Decide what to keep.
We kept Christmas morning Cinnamon Rolls that Rachael had as a tradition. And who is going to say no to homemade cinnamon rolls. We kept the reading of the Gospel, because we both were already doing it and felt it was valuable. Some of the hand me down decorations, well they found the Goodwill last year.
If you live in the space of a blended family, you will agree “the most wonderful time of the year” is also filled with challenges being a blended family at Christmas. Shared time, alternating holidays, no two years the same. It is hard. So above the hustle and bustle, beyond the gifts and get togethers, the greatest present you can give is to simply be present. The greatest gift you can give your kids is your love. It does not wrap well under a tree, but neatly wraps in hugs and kind words. Bonus or biological, each of our kids we know they are loved by both of us.
So from our house to yours,
Merry Blended Christmas
