Christmas: it’s on. No matter your festive family traditions, here are eight things that happen to every girl at Christmas – pass us the mince pies, stat.
1. Going out for Christmas Eve drinks with the girls
From overdue catch-ups to school reunions, there’s no better way to spend Christmas Eve than down the pub with our home-grown BFFs. Plus there’s something quite hilarious about trying to sneak back into our parents’ house afterwards – especially when the dog starts freaking out about our choice of light-up knitwear and barks everyone awake. Oops.
2. Waking up super early on Christmas morning
Because it doesn’t matter how old we get or how late we got in the night before (see above), we will always wake up super-early on Christmas morning and beg our parents to let us open our presents. Fact.
3. Getting our gracious gift face on
Now don’t get us wrong – we love getting presents from our fam but there’s usually one relative (we’re looking at you, Great-Aunt Shirley) that gets it, well, a bit wrong. Luckily, our acting prowess always bowls her over – even if no-one else is quite convinced that we’re really THAT thrilled over receiving yet another dodgy hand-knitted jumper.
4. Eating our entire body weight in food
Chocolate, cheese on crackers, pigs in blankets – give us the lot. After all, Christmas wouldn’t be Christmas if we didn’t eat and drink the entire contents of the fridge, right?
5. Binge-watching all the festive TV
There’s nothing better than snuggling up on the sofa to watch a bit of festive TV – but planning the schedule is no easy feat. After we’ve circled everything in the TV guide (an age-old tradition, FYI), we then have to contend with our siblings/cousins/dad for ownership of the remote control. And if that wasn’t enough, our gran always makes us switch over to the Queen’s speech right in the middle of Love Actually. EVERY YEAR.
6. Having a games’ night with the family
Monopoly, charades or Pictionary? Whatever we end up playing, a festive games’ night with our next of kin always ends up in major LOLs at the confusion, competitiveness and chaos from around the table. Nope, we can’t quite believe we’re related to this lot either.
7. Tucking into a turkey sandwich (or three)
If there’s anything better than Christmas lunch with all the trimmings (paper hats = compulsory) then turkey sandwiches are it. All that stuffing! The bacon! That brie! Move over Ross, our sandwich will definitely blow yours out of the water.
8. Dancing our socks off at the Boxing Day night out
The only way we’re leaving the sofa (and that chocolate selection box that our brother is totes going to demolish as soon as we’re out of sight) is for the big night out on Boxing Day. Cue the battle of the cheesy playlists, selfie sprees and the leftover festive nibbles that your mate’s mum has laid out for you. Win!