We opened gifts on Christmas Eve and had stockings for the kids on Christmas day.
One year, when I was a child, there was a small gift left under the tree when everyone was done opening gifts that had no "To" or "From" name on it. My great-grandmother opened it and it was a rotary nose/ear hair clipper. The next Christmas, she placed it under the tree with someone's name on it, but no "From" name. For the next 20 years, those clippers went from one person to another Christmas after Christmas. We never did figure out how it got there originally!
My mom, dad, and I spend alternate Christmases in Tulsa with my mother's family and in Kansas City with my father's family clear into my adulthood.
When I was a kid we got to open one gift on Christmas Eve--we most usually chose the gift from our granny----and we always left cookies out for Santa. Now that I live alone my Christmas is very quiet--but I make it an enjoyable day for myself---by the time I deliver grandbaby Christmas gifts on Christmas Eve the tree is pretty bare underneath==but I've found ways to make Christmas alone work.
As a child I went to bed early on Christmas eve to be up early on ChristmasDay and we went all day. When I had my own children , they went to bed early and I went to bed late to make sure Santa came.
Now with the kids gone we exchange gifts on Christmas eve because I sleep till 9:00 or 10:00 AM and have a stress free Day.
As a child, we opened just one gift on Christmas Eve. Christmas morning we got up early and opened the rest and played with everything the rest of the day. When my kids were little, I tried to follow that same tradition. Now, I live with my daughter and her family and we follow a different pattern. For the past several years, we attend a Christmas Eve repast at our neighbor's home with her family and other friends. We open our gifts at home on Christmas morning. And later we enjoy a lovely dinner at our own home. One of my favorite childhood memories is the apples, oranges, tangerines, and whole nuts we received in our Christmas socks on Christmas morning. These items were so special to us. I still have my childhood Christmas sock with my glittered name on it, though my daughter hangs a different one for me---one she made several years back.
Kids these days want so many things and get so many, that most likely to them(my grandkids included) being thrilled with a tangerine and an orange might seem odd, but to me it was sooooooo special!
