World Citizen Wednesdays #4: Keeping Holidays Stress-Free

Welcome to World Citizen Wednesdays, a new feature on All Done Monkey!

Each week we pose a question to members of the fabulous Multicultural Kid Blogs group and share their answers here.

You can find out more about these wonderful bloggers by visiting our Facebook page, subscribing to our Facebook feed, following us on Twitter, or following our group Pinterest board! On Twitter, you can also find us by using the hashtag #multiculturalkids

This week we continue to share the answers to our question:

How do you keep holidays and family get-togethers from being stressful?

In case you missed it, you can read other answers to this question in last week’s installment of World Citizen Wednesday!

Frances of Discovering The World Through My Son’s Eyes: Back home in Puerto Rico we start our holiday/family gatherings on December 24 “Noche Buena”. Christmas eve celebration is a big deal, food, music, party, and gift exchange. :)To make it less stressful, everyone would meet at Mom’s house, and bring a dish, dessert, and/or beverages. At midnight we would all exchange gifts, the kiddos will go back home to sleep (and wait for Santa). Same goes for New Year’s Eve except there is no gift exchange. For Three Kings Day it’s more low-key, kiddos get the grass for the camels on the eve of Three Kings Day then off to bed, and wake up to treats and gifts! The day is spent visiting family members.

Cordelia of Multilingual Mama: Copious amounts of red wine.

Jennifer of Spanish Playground: We try to be as flexible as possible and not worry too much about “the details” even when the detail is the date. Because of my husband’s work schedule, we have always had to move holidays (even Christmas). This year we are celebrating Thanksgiving on Friday. We keep the traditions simple – the food, favorite games, saying what we are thankful for at the table.

Varya of Little Artists:  We don’t have family get-togethers! haha  And holidays… well, we don’t have that many and we are just happy when we get some.

Jill of Moms Gone Global: Our family celebrates two birthdays between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day. So, with all of the other holiday festivities, it can be a bit hectic this time of year! For the past three years, we have hit the road to celebrate Thanksgiving in another city. It cuts down on the stress of having to juggle too many extended family gatherings. More importantly, kicking off the holiday season with this new family tradition allows us to make wonderful and peaceful memories with our boys. Then, for the rest of the season we are happy to jump into the chaos and celebrate with friends and extended family.

Leanna of All Done Monkey: One practical tip that has helped me is to create to-do lists that I can pull out each year.  That way when a holiday approaches, I can just refer to my checklist without having to reinvent the wheel every time.

I wanted to end on this response from Jennifer of The Good Long Road.  She says: I wrote about this recently and a fellow blogger pulled this quote out to from my post in her comment – “A gratitude focus engages me in the Holiday season in a different way — it helps me to be stress free as I focus on the reality that being together as a family is an abundant gift, the rest of it will sort itself out.”

Thanks to all the bloggers who shared their answers here! We will continue to share answers to this question next week. You can also read answers to earlier questions in our previous installments of World Citizen Wednesday!

To find out more about these amazing bloggers, check out the Multicultural Kid Blogs Facebook page!