Christmas Eve Is Still Magical When You're Grown Up

If there are fresh things I still need for our Christmas meals, I'll usually collect them on the morning of 24 December.

That's intentional. I've already bought the things that keep. Anything I could order ahead has ideally been ordered. I've made my lists and done most of the planning.

The last fresh groceries come home. And then I don't really want to go anywhere anymore.

There is something lovely about closing the front door on Christmas Eve knowing that the outside part of Christmas is finished.

Everything I need is already here.

Our Christmas Eve doesn't suddenly begin at 7pm.

By the afternoon, we're already there. We might put a film on. We relax. There isn't a long list of things we need to achieve before the official festivities are allowed to start.

Christmas can become strangely scheduled. Be here at this time. Eat then. Leave at this time. Dress for this. Cook that.

Christmas Eve doesn't need any of it.

Let the afternoon become part of the evening.

We don't dress up for Christmas Eve. Comfy wins.

Christmas pyjamas or something equally cosy. Thick socks. The sort of clothes that make it very clear you have no intention of unexpectedly going to a restaurant.

Some Christmas moments can be elegant. Some can involve champagne and a beautifully laid table.

And some should involve thick socks.

Our Christmas Eve dinner is picky bits: good bread, cheese, hot little snacks, things I've made, things I've bought, whatever interesting bits I've discovered that year.

There are candles everywhere. The Christmas lights are on. There's no formal three-course structure and no reason for me to disappear into the kitchen every twenty minutes.

The food should support the evening rather than become the evening.

We exchange our presents on Christmas Eve.

When I was very young, presents were Christmas morning. Somewhere along the way, while I was still living with my parents, that changed to Christmas Eve. And it stayed.

Bas and I take turns. Usually he starts and gives me my first present. Then I give him one.

Sometimes we're still eating our picky bits while we exchange them. Sometimes we've moved on to coffee.

Each present gets its own little moment.

Because I often start buying Bas's presents as early as September, there's something especially satisfying about finally watching him open something I've been hiding for months.

Giving the present is part of getting the present.

We often talk about traditions as though they require some important family history.

But sometimes you've simply done something often enough that one year you realise: Oh. This is what we do.

That's a tradition too.

If Christmas would feel slightly wrong without it, it probably already is a tradition.

Once the presents and food are finished, we end up properly settled on the sofa.

Coffee. Christmas lights. Something comfortable. And a Christmas film.

There are plenty of evenings earlier in December for trying a new release. Christmas Eve deserves something that has already earned its place.

Home Alone. The Santa Clause. Something familiar.

There are endless lists of things to do on Christmas Eve. Do all of those things if they genuinely make you happy.

But please don't turn Christmas Eve into a checklist.

Our day works because we deliberately don't put too much into it.

You don't need to fill every hour to make a day feel full.

When you're little, Christmas Eve is mostly anticipation. As an adult, you're often the person making it happen.

You bought the presents. You put the lights up. You chose the food. You made the house feel like Christmas.

Now you get to choose which parts stay.

The magic isn't gone. You're just the person holding the matches now.