Christmas Day dinner

I know of one ma in law who served up a ham salad for Christmas dinner one year. After that, the grown up kids realised they had to step up to the mark. So maybe serve something basic, blame your age! She will then have to realise she is now the one who has to do it, if she wants it.good luck!

Hi Greciangirl,

Invite your daughter out for lunch next week. When your in a busy cafe she won’t want to cause a scene,( hopefully).
Give your reasons for not wanting a Christmas lunch at yours, if she tries to cut in with her bulling just say stop I’m taking, you can have your say after me. If she still refuses to see your side of this, just say ok we aren’t going to agree so let’s just have Christmas in our own homes the way we both want our Christmas to be. We spend our Christmas’s in the way we want to and I have four grown up children who in turn have nine children giving us nine grandchildren and one great grandson I’m in my 70s and buy a lot of ready prepared Veg and meat thous making cooking a breeze.christmas meal will be done the same way.have a Merry Christmas and a happy new year

The crux of your problem is that you plan to spend Christmas together but neither one of you wants to do the cooking....fair enough!

After all these years, you have earned the right to retire from the holiday kitchen. Let your daughter know that you are 'passing on' the virtual baton, but that you still look forward to spending Christmas together. Let her know (in no uncertain terms) that this means you won't be cooking this year or any other year, going forward.

As others here have suggested, a traditional, homemade style holiday dinner can be ordered in advance from a local caterer or food store. In fairness, perhaps you can offer to share the cost. There.....problem solved. Happy Christmas!

Truddles

you sound as though you might be quite young?
you certainly do not understand that a woman of 74 who has done all the cooking for over half a century jsut doesn't want to anymore.
It is not loving to force her into it.
In fact you sound rather smug.

I'm much younger than 74 and I've no intention of cooking dinner for anyone.
Why?
Because I don't want to.

you're missing quite a lot Truddles, not least that nothing you have said answers the question asked, addresses the issues raised or gives any help or comfort to the OP

"If you can't think of anything nice to say, don't say anything at all"

as said by Thumper in "Bambi"

I am just staggered that you all think 74 is old. I have a horse, still ride, am unable to drive owing to poor sight, so bike 3 miles twice a day to see to her and granddaughters pony, in all weathers, my choice. Cooking Christmas dinner is a doddle, just can't see what all the fuss is about. Just say NO if you don't want to do it.

For reasons I won't go in to I won't invite my mother to ours. This year I nearly crumbled because she had no invites and her partner wasn't being asked to his son's house. I just felt so guilty. Occasionally I have to talk to my estranged sister about my mother's care and health so I mentioned to her that it was beginning to get to me. I was astonished to find that my sister has asked her on at least 5 occasions but my mother just side steps the issue. Needless to say, I put my hard head on again!

Yes, you are missing something, Truddles.
The op doesn't want to cook.
She doesn't feel up to it.

I’m with Tangerine frozen roast potatoes and Yorkshire puddings. I hate it also, I cook every day and do not wish to do it Christmas Day. For 35 years I have never done what I wanted to do had to follow everyone’s tradition so next year I have said to my other half it’s dinner out, away cycling with turkey sandwiches for dinner or abroad. I would love the feeling that I don’t have to buy everything for it and that it would be a lovely change.

I think your daughter to help it’s not you who should be expected to do it,

I wouldn't give in if I really didn't want to cook. I was happy last year when my daughter and I both agreed that they would visit me and hubby in the morning with the Grandchildren, then they would go home and cook their own dinner and spend the day with the kids. Alternatively why not all go out for dinner then nobody has to cook?

Under your circumstances ALANaV, also having done it for years I have stopped catering for Christmas Day.

We pop up to see GDs x 2 in the morning then return home to whatever Waitrose/M&S have decided what’s easiest to bung in the oven then both DH and I do what suits us for the rest of the day.

Don’t know how you would feel about faking a flu but recovered enough to have visitors, just too weak to stand cooking a three course meal.

Must add, only pushy selfish people bring out this naughty streak in me?

That’s very harsh Truddles, Greciangirl doesn’t want to do it again, her daughter makes her feel guilty! And to say we are a bunch of old misery guts and don’t deserve to have a loving family to be with this time of year, what’s that all about!!!

What most people have said!

Nobody can make us fell guilty but ourselves.
Put your foot down kindly but firmly and say that as neither of you want to cook a large Christmas lunch neither of you should.
She can have hers and you will pop in the morning to see them before lunch.
You and your partner can have yours alone.
No one can make you do anything so be strong. Merry Christmas x

Loved, not lived.

Am I missing something here? Christmas dinner is not only dead easy, but you are spending precious time with your loved ones. I flipping love cooking for my children and grandchildren. I think you are a bunch of old misery guts and don’t deserve to have a loving family to be with at this time of year. I will pick my husband up from the airport on Christmas morning, then I will be swilling Prosecco and cooking (with my daughter helping out if she feels like) in the kitchen with Donny Hathaway singing loud in the background. We will play with my grandchildren’s presents after dinner, then when the babies are bathed and in bed, we’ll watch a movie with Bailey’s and mince pies. And we will all feel fat and warm and lived, and we don’t give a monkey’s who does what.

It’s amazing how many grans are desperate to spend Christmas with their grown up children and grandchildren, and some would much rather be on their own. I think this proves that you can’t please all of the people all of the time!

Any good place will now be booked for Xmas lunch but Boxing day won't be. Why not do that it will also be a lot cheaper.
Don't give in!

I'm one of four siblings, our parents are in their late eighties. We've each asked them to come to us for this year's Christmas Day dinner. My DM's reply was "Ears open, mouths closed. We're spending the day alone with our M&S food, thank you."
Be honest with your daughter.

Do not give in. You have done your bit for all of the years and this needs to be made clear.
We don’t do a traditional Christmas anymore as it’s just a glorified roast . One year we all had bangers and mash with peas. One year we had sandwiches at lunch then had a curry at our local curry house. This year it is prawn cocktail or prawn ring from Iceland, steak, ( supplied by daughter) gratin dauphinois from Aldi, asparagus wrapped in Palma ham, chocolate mousse or M&S lemon tart. Plenty of wine and our company . Keep it simple is what I say.
Tell your daughter what to bring and tell her what you are prepared to provide.
Christmas is stressful enough without her being selfish

@Greciangirl There comes a time where you have to say NO to your children! You are enabling her to be selfish and disrespectful. My own mum never babysat her grandchildren, never child-minded, never stayed over, never did a big family Christmas dinner once we’d left home. Did I love her any the less? No, we all loved her to bits and respected her wishes.

Unreasonable of your DD to expect you to cook Christmas dinner at 74 years old. You’ve done your bit, time for others to take the strain.

This is emotional blackmail and bullying and it's definitely in on. Sorry to sound harsh but she is being selfish and uncaring and you need to find a way to say no. It also sounds as though she's perhaps putting the financial burden on you as well, though you don't say that.

You have to put yourself first as she clearly won't unless you force her to.

If she wants a big meal then she should prepare it. If she wants to have it with you and your partner (and you want to be with them), then she has a choice of preparing it in her kitchen or yours if you are willing.

I honestly think it's time your daughter became an adult and treated you with the consideration you deserve. If she doesn't like to do the cooking but still wants the big meal, then she can source ready prepared ingredients to simplify the task (you could help her with that, perhaps), but she really should be pulling her weight. If she's the one who wants it, she should be the one to make it happen. A compromise would be great, but it needs to be one where you feel fully happy with what you are agreeing to.

You could offer a contribution to an extent by offering to provide a starter or the pudding - and get it from M&S.

Going out is an alternative but expensive, impersonal and probably tricky to find space in anywhere half-decent by now.

I'm fortunate that my three sons have come to us and cooked our Christmas meal for years and still do now they have partners (and finally the first grandchild) who come with them; they work as a team, don't like us anywhere near them so we go down the road for drinks with the neighbours and return in time to set the table and help serve. We compromise on what we eat - they are cooking so it's their choice but they take our preferences into account. I don't get stressed (they might but I don't see it) and we all enjoy the day.

However it works out I hope you find a way for all of you to enjoy your own Christmas.

This year is not our turn to have the family, when they all got married I insisted we took it in turns with in laws, alternating the years because I spent 30 years having to go to my MIL and I had enough. Told them all that now they have their own homes, they should start their own traditions at Christmas and cook they own dinners. Being saying it for years mind but as it turns out this the first year we are actually going to be on our own but everyone is worried we will be sad. Little do they know we are looking forward to having the day to ourselves.
Just to show them that we are happy about the arrangements I put up the trimmings etc made some mince pies and Christmas puddings for them all and I am enjoying each GC separately as they come over before Christmas. Feel like Santa giving out the present to open on the big day.

My plan for CD is; in the kitchen we are having steak and chips because DH likes to cook, so have chosen something quick and easy without too much washing up. So for me it will be a glass of sherry to start, open present, eat dinner and watch all the programmes we like. Yes, it will be quiet without running a hotel/restaurant for 10 people, screaming children, but oh what bliss.

Tell your DD that if she wants the full works, dinner etc now is the time to start a tradition of her own. If she comes to you it will be a take away because you can get them on CD with no cooking as the cook has retired.