<p>How did, do, you open presents at this holiday time? When there are many presents to open, and there are several people opening, what do you do?</p>
<p>We observed many years ago that if we did not pace it, all present were opened very fast and it was all over very quickly .</p>
<p>So we started a system where one person opened a present at a time. We all saw what each person got. The present opening lasted more than 20 minutes and each person enjoyed what others got.</p>
<p>Now, my adult children with fewer presents and far fewer suprise gifts, still want to follow the same practice. One at a time!</p>
<p>My parents established a ritual as we got older and we tended to have fewer, more (relatively) expensive presents. All gifts were opened one at a time, and before opening a gift, we had to make an honest guess as to what was inside. Mom also played Santa and deliberated over which gift to give us. All in all, despite receiving what I would say is a reasonable haul of gifts, my parents stretched gift-giving for two teenage children over about an hour. </p>
<p>This year was my first year with my fiance’s family at Christmas and I was surprised by how anarchistic it was. Gifts were divided into piles for each person and everyone opened at the same time. It was all over in minutes and we didn’t get to appreciate what everyone had given and received. I didn’t like that nearly as much!</p>
<p>We have always done one person at a time, and we usually rotate through. This year it was me->sister->mom->dad. (Brother, sister-in-law and nephew are in Alaska with SIL’s family.) It’s definitely nice to be able to enjoy one another’s gifts and reactions. Especially now that we’re all older and get fewer (usually more expensive) gifts.</p>
<p>My Dad plays Santa, passing out the gifts and paces it so that there are only a few opening presents at the same time. If we did one at a time it would take all night, but it’s much better and more meaningful if each gift gets some group attention - oooooh, ahhhhh, nice, beautiful!!! :)</p>
<p>Fun idea, morrismm.<br>
We take turns around the room, youngest to oldest or oldest to youngest, depending on the year. We usually take a break in the middle of opening to have brunch. S is the youngest and we always make sure he has one extra gift so he is the last one to open because when he was little, he used to hide a gift and then when everyone was done he would pull it out and say, “Oh, look! Another gift for me!” He thought it was so clever…</p>
<p>We’ve always taken turns opening gifts. For many years, my mom would number each present in the order she wanted them opened! That worked fine with a family of four, but by the time I had kids, it got to be nuts. I do miss those days, though!</p>
<p>We have no particular rules about opening gifts. The ones people have listed sound fun. When the kids were younger & we exchanged gifts with a lot more people, we would have tthem stop and write down who gave the gift and what it was before they could proceed. Now that we exchange with so few people, most of the gifts are from H & I. We do pay special attention to things our kids purchased for us and are often surprised and touched at their gift selections. They do pay attention when the gift they purchased is opened by each other or by us. We’re not TOO strict with Christmas–this year we gave D a big gift just after she landed, since she wanted to use it for an application (it’s an electronic tablet she can draw on which is a big upgrade to the tablet she left behind at school). Also gave the kids clothing, but it turns out that they are the best judge of their own clothing instead of us (sizing is too tough to gauge).</p>
<p>Since there are only four of us most of the time, it’s not THAT chaotic. The past few years when we had my BIL & niece visiting over Christmas, I tried to give niece & BIL quite a few gifts & also filled the stockings for them or they would not have had anything to open when the rest of us were opening presents–they’re not much into gifting or exchanging. S is much more leisurely about opening gifts than D, which sometimes irritates D, but how long the opening lasts depends on whether I bought LOTS of smaller gifts or just a few bigger ones.</p>
<p>I did plan to just get a few large gifts, but D begged me to get lots of smaller (some silly) gifts because she loves seeing LOTS under the tree (the tree was indeed dwarfed by gifts). ;)</p>
<p>When we were kids we opened everything at once and that was how we liked it. We spend the hours following opening gifts admiring what everybody got. When we went to Grandma’s on Christmas day to open presents from dad’s side of the family, they went around the room and had one person open one at a time and everyone, including my parents, thought that was painfully dry. This year we still did things the same way we usually do at the huge Christmas eve celebration with all my sister’s kids and the cousins and everybody, but by the time I got to my parents Christmas day my younger sister had already opened her presents and me, BF, and my parents opened our gifts one by one. In such a small group it was nice.</p>
<p>We spend Christmas Eve with my side of the family and we used to just sit around opening gifts and having the little kids pass them out. But then as there were more and more of us it got ridiculous. So now, we eat first, then the kids sing and then the cousins exchange gifts by “secret santa”. It turned out wonderful. They pull a name at Thanksgiving. The amount of thought and effort that has been put into these gifts is awesome. The littlest gets to choose whether she wants to give her gift or get her gift first and she always choose to give. They go to the front, name their secret cousin and then exchange. There are fifteen of them so it does take awhile but it is just wonderful.</p>
<p>Our own family opens the gifts Christmas morning. We couldn’t possible do the one at a time thing. We have piles for people and it still takes almost an hour or two since a lot of the time we’ve stopped opening to see what people have gotten. There were eight of us this year.</p>
<p>We open our stocking gifts all together ( with no taking turns ) When it comes to the gifts , we take turns so that we can all see what the others got. I like to see people opening them because I put a lot of time and energy into it all and wouldn’t enjoy it if everyone just tore thru it in a matter of minutes
Also , one of my daughters has taken on the task of making things funny by either wrapping up things that are not gifts from around the house. She also wrote on her older sister’s presents with comical guesses of what was inside. At the end, two of them came down with a large box that contained one of my cats. He was a good sport about the antics :)</p>
<p>My husband has this charming little habit of seeking out the PERFECT wrapping paper for each member of the family. Each person then gets his or her pile of gifts in front of him and then we each open one present at a time unless there is a serious imbalance in the number of presents. This year, one D received one particularly expensive gift, so she got fewer packages than others, so she didn’t take as many turns. The girls teasingly count and measure each other’s piles so they can torment each other and their parents!</p>
<p>We open stockings before breakfast once everyone is awake and my mom is back from mass. There is no order, but we do try to pace ourselves and appreciate what everyone gets. </p>
<p>After stockings, we have breakfast, then open wrapped gifts. (while breakfast is being prepared we do the scratch off lottery cards that everyone gets in their stockings). </p>
<p>After a few years of the flurry of rampant ripping and no time to ohh and ahh, we started the tradition of the youngest that was capable (reading was a consideration) played Santa and delivered presents. We then open oldest to youngest one at a time. When you run out, you are skipped.</p>
<p>PS - my kids still count packages, so this year a few large stocking stuffers (packs of socks) were added to the present pile to even things out and provided entertainment when S1 guessed something better than socks…</p>
<p>Everyone gets a gift, and we all open at once… then everyone gets another gift, and we all open at once. Otherwise… we would STILL be sitting in there opening gifts!</p>
<p>My brother’s family opens one present a day until Jan 6. If you pick badly and open a sweater on Christmas Day you are out of luck. We hated the system so much we stopped visiting them for Christmas.</p>
<p>Our family opens stockings at once, but we try to have everyone up. When the kids were little this meant getting up far too early, now we are the ones up “too early”. Presents get passed out at a moderate rate, sometimes by someone wearing a Santa Hat (we have two), but not one at a time.</p>
<p>Wonderful traditions all…nice to read how everyone celebrates. Sounds like so much fun. I admit to being a little jealous. Not a good Christmas for the Packfamily.</p>
<p>My MIL opts for this, one at a time, youngest to oldest. The problem with this method is that they open gifts on Christmas Eve after a long traditional meal, many toasts, clean up, so you are starting about 9pm. We have 14 people at least opening gifts, and those are just the ones in the room. We also exchange gifts with our family overseas. Not just draw a name exchange, but individual gifts for my DHs aunts, uncles, cousins, their spouses, and cousins children. So there are a lot of freaking gifts to be opened one at a time starting at 9pm. Add to this we live over a hour away, have a dog to get home to, and I have a full day of entertaining as Christmas Day - the American celebration is at our home. Did I mention that opening gifts on Christmas Eve is just DHs families tradition. Our kids open their gifts from the American side of the family (ie my side) on Christmas Day (which I had to fight tooth and nail for…I hate opening gifts on Christmas Eve, really I do), but continue to sit through the round the circle opening of gifts to the bloody end. This goes on until at least 1 am. There’s usually a break for coffee and cake about 11pm. I. am. not. kidding. This means by the time we pack up and drive home it’s about 2:30am at the earliest.</p>
<p>In theory it’s a lovely idea. Taken to this extreme it is an exhaustive exercise. The only one who gets away with going out of turn is Nonie who is 89 and pretends she doesn’t get it anymore. She’s as sharp as a tack and just wants to mess with MIL. My niece moved this year halfway across the country wasn’t even excused. She had to skype in for the entire exercise.</p>
<p>Open one at a time youngest to oldest or oldest to youngest. One of the kids typically passes out gifts to everyone to open. Sometimes I have to tell the kids to wait to open a gift but usually it doesn’t matter. We usually open gifts on Christmas morning with the kids being able to open one gift on Christmas Eve. This year we opened the gifts from us and the kids to each other on Christmas Eve because the some of the kids went to SO’s family Christmas morning. We still opened Santa’s gifts on Christmas morning before everyone left.</p>
<p>We also open one at a time. H eyeballs the individual piles and redirects based on quantity (or lack of) My Mom makes her gifts so we make sure to spread out the opening of those since each one comes with a 1/2 hour explanation :p</p>
<p>It takes a long time and we divide it over Christmas eve for family gifts. The 4-5 grand kids open one at a time youngest to oldest. This involves any gift that isn’t from Santa.</p>
<p>We take a break and the little kids go to bed. The grown-ups then open and any teen is welcome to hang out. The language and jokes get naughty. For example my sister teaching my dad how to “wind” his no battery watch. (Picture a motion used in private) </p>
<p>Now there is space under the tree so Santa can come. We want the family gifts to be appreciated and real life people to be thanked without the distraction of Santa. </p>
<p>Christmas morning kids open Santa one at a time, youngest to oldest always. It takes time and explanations are often needed. My parents don’t know what a mine craft t- shirt is or why ds got Big Bang socks. </p>
<p>We spread it out and take our time. Planning, shopping and wrapping is a lot of work. And we drove 9 hours to be there so we celebrate big.</p>
<p>There were only three of us this year. There were not a lot of gifts. We opened them one at a time.</p>
<p>We have always allowed stockings to be opened when the person wakes up. Our kids loved that…they knew they could immediately open those…not having to wait for others to wake up.</p>
<p>When our kids were little, they opened their gifts all at once. No fun waiting when you are a little kid.</p>
<p>My inlaws did the one present at a time, and you passed it around the group. With well over 20 people, this was just too long.</p>