Once married...How do you deal with holidays?

So now i dont get to be with my FH this Thanksgiving as well since he will have to go to his mom's house. I just dont understand why we have gone to her house the past 4 years for thanksgiving but she will not come to ours so we can all be together. Am i going to have to deal with this every year? How do the rest of you deal with holidays and seeing both families?

Hm, sounds like a power issue to me. We used to spend most larger holidays with my MIL, but that was only while my DH's grandmother was alive. And it's because my family lives very far away.

What do you mean by "he will have to go to his mom's house"? Why would he have to do that?

Hi Krista - why is your FH not staying with you? He would rather spend the holiday w/ his mom than you and get the opportunity to visit with your family that you guys don't see on a regular basis?

And yes hon you will have to deal with this every year until you guys create a master plan for the holidays. The 1st few holidays are always difficult when you make executive decision on where you're going to spend them but it does get easier. I've been there :-) The alterative is spend them on rollerskates zooming between families - and that gets old particularly when you have kids. It's like quick open your present - isn't it great - now go get your coat we gotta go to your other grandma's, hurry - then repeat.

We're not married yet, but do have experience with this issue(sort of). My family pretty much disowned me, but we do have holidays with his mom's side of the family and his dad's side of the family. The way we deal with it is one of them is a day later than the other one.

I know it's important to you to have time with your family too, but you have to remember that she is your FH's mother. You don't want to start a my family should be prioritized over your family argument. Which is going to happen if no compromises are made. I also understand that a lot of people are really particular about being together on the actual day of the holiday, but you may have to compromise on that. See if your MIL is willing to do it the day before or after. If not than see if your family is willing to do it the day before or after. I know you don't want two thanksgivings, but you may have to suck it up and do that. It's not fair of her to expect you to not be with your family, or give in on the location

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but you are stuck with her since she is your FH's mom, and it doesn't sound like she's going to give in.

We already agreed and compromised on this. Some years it will be with his family and sometimes it will be with mine. Though, normally I would rather just spend it with his. I don't feel like driving on Thanksgiving really. So unless something is wrong with my grandfather I will be here this year.

Since FH and I have been together we have pretty much always spent Thanksgiving with my family since my aunt is a caterer and makes amazing food && my FH LOVES her Thanksgiving dinner. Then we do Easter with his family since they are the more religious out of our parents. Its an easy compromise and neither side gets offended by us not spending that particular holiday with them.

For Christmas we usually have a huge family party on my mom's side on Christmas Eve and then we go to Christmas Mass with my FH's family and they open gifts. I spend Christmas morning with my parents and then we head out to his grandmother's house for the later part of the day.

Maybe you can start a little tradition like we have so that your FMIL knows that that particular holiday will be spent with her?

I moved away from my family to live near DH and his family. His family does not associate with extended family so it's just his 2 siblings, their spouses and kids and his parents. We do every holiday with them but Christmas. My entire family comes together for Xmas which is rare so I'm not going to miss it. Especially to spend it sitting at his parents house with the same people I see every day that I don't even care for. It's beyond boring so luckily DH agrees and we do the major holiday with my family.

If your families live close by can you not have Thanksgiving dinner at one person's house and dessert at the other? My FH typically works on Thursday nights so Thanksgiving is usually with mine but last year he was off and we did early lunch with my family and went to his for dinner. It worked out well. For Christmas we do Christmas eve with his family and Christmas morning and are at my parents house for the afternoon and night.

We will have Thanksgiving at one of his family's house and Christmas at one of mine. Next year we switch off unless we host.

FH and I have been switching. Last year, we spent thanksgiving with my parents and christmas with FILs. This year, we are spending thanksgiving with the FILs and Christmas with my family.

It's just part of life.

My mom is sort of the same way, she feels like she traveled for 20 years with my dad, my sister and I during holidays and doesn't want to drive ANYWHERE on Christmas. Which is fine and dandy, but it becomes a problem when your house is the smallest between all of us. A little frustrating sometime but it's 1 day of the year.

MY FH and I have been together for nearly 4 years now and have a pretty good system going with holidays and will most likely continue it.

We see both families (his parents live in Maryland and mine live in North Carolina now) around Christmas time, however it rotates each year who gets Christmas and who gets New Years. We work on the same schedule as his brother and his wife. So that both us and his brother's family are with his parents at the same time each year. Then we are with my parents and they are with his sister-in-laws parents at the same time.

Example this year will be...

Christmas: My parents

New Years: His parents (along with his brother's family)

Next year it will switch.

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We have been rotating Thanksgiving seemingly as well. It has worked out that whoever gets New Years gets Thanksgiving also. We never did that on purpose but it has always worked out that way.

This year will be a little different as we will be doing Thanksgiving at his parent's but my parents will also be joining because our parents had never had a chance to meet before and we thought that they finally should since ya know, we're engaged and all.

All of my FH family lives out of our state, and my family always comes to my house since my mom passed, because I love to do all of the cooking. I don't understand why your FH HAS to go to his mom and not be with you and your side of the family. Couldn't he just drop by later or just let her know that now that he is married things have changed.

Hmm...I wouldn't go for this. My parents have to deal with the fact that I'll be with my new hubby's family this year. DH has spent a few away from his family, too, but we - DH and I - are a family now, and we go together. Not that we wouldn't make exceptions, but that's the rule.

When both our families are local (they are nearby to each other), we often split, have the meal one place, the dessert at the other.

Haha once married? We've been doing the holdiay shuffle for 7 years =). My parents are border line transients so we don't generally run into problems with them b/c they aren't generally around for the holidays, but my grandparents still want to see us too. We spend Thanksgiving at his dad's house b/c it's close, then we drive to my gram's house in NY for the weekend for leftovers. Then Christmas gets tricky, generally we do Christmas Eve dinner and Christmas morning at his dad's then drive to NY for my familys Christmas Day dinner, but his family runs SO late that we don't have Christmas "morning" until like noon and by then my sis and BIL (who carpool with us to NY) have to wait around for us. So last year we declared no Christmas "morning" and we left late Christmas Eve which worked out great =) and will probably be the standard going forward. Next year I'm proposing that we get to host Thanksgiving and I'll drag my relatives and his relatives to our house, hope I get my way!

One year that my parents were in the area for Thanksgiving we tried to do 2 dinners in one day, huge fail, I think my FH step mom is still irked that we missed her dinner.

Why does your FH HAVE to spend Thanksgiving with his mom? He's marrying you. He should spend Thanksgiving with you. What do you think is going to happen after you get married? Will FMIL still expect him to spend Thanksgiving with her if you want to spend it with your family? You may one day soon have your own family. Would she expect you to celebrate the holidays seperately when you have kids? Start your own traditions now. Maybe you spend Thanksgiving with his family one year and with yours the next. Maybe the year after that, you two can host Thanksgiving.

We got to my moms one year for thanksgiving and the next to his family. It was too much to go to both every year. Christmas eve we go to my grandmothers. Christmas morning we stay home so our daughter can open her gifts then race to his grandmothers which is an hour away, then after that we run to my moms house for dinner. Then home. My mom lives 15 min away so that is not bad. By the time we get home it is around 9. We are talking about running for Christmas Eve and go nowhere Christmas Day.

Oh this can be a touchy subject for inlaws...both sides! since we live in NC and his fam is in Oregon, its mainly my family. we would love to have more holidays with his fam but a fam of 5 flying across the countryduring the holidays isnt cheap and we dont have the money.... NO, they havent come to us for a holiday in the 7 yrs we lived here... NOW.. that being said if they were close we would switch off, but since we have kids we make sure that we dont SLEEP anywhere.....cause Santa comes to US and US only... but this year my sister and i are swiiching off and making our families come to us! lol