One thing that has been really weird for me to accept is the idea that now that Mr. Cardigan and I are getting married, his family is my family, and vice versa.
That’s not to say that I don’t feel that he’s become a part of my family (I absolutely do!) or that I don’t feel welcome in his, but it’s just an odd idea to me that I will call his brother my brother and he will call my sister his sister. And the weirdest part of it all for me?
The holidays.
Mr. Cardigan and I have had many, many long discussions on how we plan to split up the holidays and it definitely isn’t an easy decision to make.
Mr. Cardigan originally wanted to alternate years with our families, but I am adamantly against that idea. I’m a sucker for tradition and I like things to stay the same from year to year. So, we decided that we’d do Thanksgiving with one side of the family and Christmas with the other.
Annnnd that’s where the hard part comes in. How do you choose which side of the family gets which holiday? We went back and forth a lot over this, and what it boiled down to was this: I have never not woken up in my home on Christmas morning (except last year when we spent Christmas with Mr. C’s family, but I’m not counting that). And I don’t want that to ever change. And I want my children to have that same experience. I want our little immediate family to be able to have traditions of our own that no one else is a part of. I want to wake up at home and make breakfast for my family and watch my kids open their presents in the comfort of our own home. After that, we can spent the rest of the holiday with other people, but it is absolutely vital to me that we at least wake up in our own home on Christmas.
Once Mr. Cardigan heard my reasoning and realized exactly how important it is to me to have Christmas at home, the decision was kind of made for us. We’ll do Thanksgiving with his family (who celebrates in a different city from where we live) and Christmas with mine, who celebrates in Austin. Mr. Cardy wasn’t too excited about the idea at first, but once he realized that we can still celebrate Christmas with his family in the weeks before or after Christmas, he felt much better about the arrangement.
So, this year is the first year we will be doing things this way. And to be honest, I’m kind of weirded out by it. I mean, I’ve never in my life spent Thanksgiving anywhere else but at my grandmother’s house. It’s the same every year, with entirely too many people crammed into her tiny little lake house, and it’s loud and rambunctious and there are dogs running all over the place. But, it’s just what Thanksgiving is to me. Mr. Cardigan, on the other hand, attends Thanksgiving at his grandfather’s house which is much, much larger and fancier. They have different food than we do, different traditions (as in, they don’t watch the A&M vs. TU game. What’s up with that?!) and just has a different feel altogether. But it’s officially my new tradition, so I guess I’d better get used to it.
Mr. Cardigan and I have felt like a family for quite some time now, but we’re actually putting that into action now. It’s been quite a journey for me thinking about the fact that in a few months, Mr. Cardigan will officially be my closest family member, and he’ll become a permanent fixture in my family’s Christmas celebrations, just as I will in his family’s Thanksgiving.
I’m so exited for all of the big changes on the horizon, and I’m trying to accept them without freaking out too much. I’m glad Mr. Cardigan and I have come to a holiday arrangement that we’re both happy with, and I can’t wait to see what our new holidays will look like!
How do/will you and your SO split holidays? Was it hard to come to a decision?
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