Shannon's Christmas Plans

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
It's Mojo in the morning.

Speaker 2 (00:01):
I have asked this question numerous times of people Shannon
that are in blended families just like yours, you know,
where they either start dating after a breakup and you
know they got family or they are in your case married.
I'm like, how does the holidays change like and how
do you decide whose traditions you take or do you

(00:22):
kind of blend it together? You guys officially are kind
of doing that right now.

Speaker 3 (00:27):
We had to have a conversation about it over the
weekend because, believe it or not, this Christmas Eve and
Christmas Morning is the very first time that all six
of us will be together.

Speaker 1 (00:38):
Let's go.

Speaker 3 (00:39):
It's beautiful because last year, the way that Wes my
husband's schedule worked with his ex wife and my schedule
worked with my ex husband, we didn't have anybody on
Christmas Morning. Oh and remember it was no Anna. I
was so depressed. Although our listeners did make it so
much better because everybody sent me Christmas cards.

Speaker 1 (00:57):
Yes, the morning awesome.

Speaker 3 (01:03):
It may sound cheesy. That helped me so much. I
got hundreds of cards.

Speaker 4 (01:08):
You know.

Speaker 3 (01:08):
It was beautiful. Anyway, So this year we're having We're
gonna have everybody. We're gonna have all four kids, and
so Wes and I had to legitimately have a meeting
to talk about traditions and expectations for all of the
kids because we want it to work and be memorable
and comfortable for everybody.

Speaker 5 (01:25):
And I think it'll work.

Speaker 3 (01:27):
It's going to be interesting though, because so for example,
Smith is eight, he all the Christmas magic still exists
for him. Okay, my kids eight and eleven get a
whole bunch of gifts because they're still little. They want,
you know, the toys and and all of those things.
Wes's kids are just getting a few gifts because their

(01:50):
gifts are more expensive. So right off the bat, I'm like,
I feel like that might be weird that my kids
are going to be sitting their opening gifts and Samantha
and Kieran are just going to be like sitting watching
them after they open their couple of gifts.

Speaker 2 (02:05):
What is the tradition been in your place? And what
is the tradition bend in his As far as which
day did they open the gifts?

Speaker 3 (02:12):
Everybody did Christmas Morning, But like for example, his kids
like their gifts under the Christmas tree. My kids have
different spots in the house where they were Santa leaves
their gifts. My kids are accustomed to monkey bread and
hot chocolate for breakfast.

Speaker 5 (02:32):
Have you guys ever had monkey breads?

Speaker 1 (02:34):
Monkey bread great?

Speaker 5 (02:35):
It's so good. Wes makes a.

Speaker 3 (02:37):
Full Scottish breakfast for his kids. Is nasty black pudding
like sheep's blood.

Speaker 5 (02:47):
Something. It tastes like dirt and his kids love it.

Speaker 3 (02:54):
They love that's their tradition that his mom did, like
a full Scottish breakfast.

Speaker 5 (02:59):
I'm trying to think of, Like, my kids.

Speaker 3 (03:01):
Wake up super duper early, and I make them wait
at the top of the stairs until everything's ready and
then they can come down. His kids, thir teenagers, they
wake up at you know, ten o'clock. So I told him,
I'm like, they better set their alarm for six am,
because that's when we're waiting. We're gonna we just have
to meet in the middle with a lot of things.
Like I said, it'll work. It was just a lot,
like we have to do a lot of planning for

(03:23):
I'm making everybody wear matching pajamas. I thought Kieren, my
freshman at Michigan State, was gonna shoot me.

Speaker 5 (03:30):
He's like matching pajamas.

Speaker 3 (03:31):
I'm like, yes, everybody, including your sister's family, my mom,
everybody's wearing them for Christmas Eve dinner.

Speaker 6 (03:38):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (03:38):
If i'm is his girlfriend coming over? Is she going
to be a part of this whole thing?

Speaker 5 (03:42):
Is he is very single at the moment?

Speaker 1 (03:44):
Is he okay?

Speaker 2 (03:44):
Because I was gonna say, could you imagine it's like
all of a sudden, you're a college If I told Luke,
imagine you know Luke right like Karen, same age whatever.
If I said to Luke, hey, Luke, I met this
lady and she's making you where Luke would be like,
you're leaving her? That is so okay. So this is neat.
So you guys are gonna do a little bit of
each then.

Speaker 5 (04:04):
Right, we're going to try to do all of each.

Speaker 1 (04:06):
Who's winning you or him?

Speaker 2 (04:08):
What do you mean, well, one of you guys obviously
gets a veto power right, usually the vagina.

Speaker 3 (04:13):
I mean, truly, we've we've figured out a way. I
think the only thing is I'm going to have my
kids es.

Speaker 5 (04:20):
Yeah, I really do.

Speaker 3 (04:21):
I think my kids are going to have to I'm
gonna have to try to keep them in bed a
little longer so that my step kids cannot wake up.

Speaker 1 (04:28):
But I do feel like you have like a little
priority because you still have somebody.

Speaker 5 (04:32):
Who's yes very much little yeah, yeah, yeah yeah.

Speaker 1 (04:36):
Can I tell you how I relate to this.

Speaker 2 (04:38):
I relate to this as a guy when I got married,
who married a woman who's there. In Chelsea's families, traditions
way different than ours. We got our gifts on Christmas
Eve night and then Christmas Day we would wake up
and we wouldn't do any toys at all or anything.
We went to church, we went to Mass, or we

(04:58):
went to midnight Mass, which was better and and we
got to sleep in the next day. So that was
kind of our thing that we did. We're in Chelsea's family,
it was completely different. And Chelsea's family was they you know,
were not Catholic, so they had non denominational like Christian
Mass or church, but they would have it during the
day on Christmas Eve, and then Christmas Day was we

(05:19):
were at home doing all of our stuff. And that's
the tradition that won because again the vagina wins absolutely well.
But it was interesting.

Speaker 3 (05:27):
So the one that isn't working out you mentioned church
is Christmas Eve Church because Wes and his kids have
gone to the same church since the kids were babies,
and my kids have gone to the same church and
me since they were babies. So we are splitting up
for churches, which kind of sucks, but we can't make
it at work with both with doing both at the

(05:49):
same time, like they're both at the same time.

Speaker 2 (05:51):
So you guys ever done and I know neither of
you guys are go to Catholic Mass, but have you
guys ever done midnight Mass at Saint Mary's which is
the school that's over in Orchard Like Michigan, we've done
midnight Mass before over at Saint Mary's and there's something
magical about afterwards going to the grotto that's there and

(06:12):
you got the lights and the beautiful decorations and stuff
like that. It almost kind of makes you feel like
you're in like the small town. But it's wild because
we had guests that came into town and that wasn't
that's not our parish that we go to or our
church that we go to, and we took our friends
there because we're gonna do it. And I said to Telsea,
it was like something out of like the bells of

(06:32):
Saint Mary's or you know, or like a Bing Crosby
type movie.

Speaker 1 (06:36):
It was something wild about it, magical about it.

Speaker 5 (06:38):
We used to do that growing up Cabrini and Allen Park.

Speaker 3 (06:41):
Yeah, we needed a midnight mass and so we would
always go with my grandmothers and aunts and uncles.

Speaker 5 (06:46):
I was so funny.

Speaker 2 (06:47):
Here's the thing that I'm really proud of you guys
that you guys are doing a good job of like
talking about this ahead of time instead of each kind
of because this could cause problems. Like that's honestly, tradition
changes could because your kids are like, wait a second, No,
this is not how we do.

Speaker 3 (07:02):
So I think that there's going to It's not going
to go off perfectly, you know what I mean, Like
my kids are going to have thoughts about how it goes,
and West's kids are going to have thoughts about how
it goes. It's not going to be perfect, but we're
trying to just make it comfortable as comfortable for everybody
speak traditions.

Speaker 1 (07:20):
Yeah, Hey Gina, what's up?

Speaker 6 (07:22):
Hey, Good morning guys. One thing that Shannon could do
for the older kids since they have left to open,
is do like a scavenger hunt. My mom did this
once before and she hid cards throughout the house, and
I had to wait to get each card, and she
hid the big gifts in like a certain place and
I had to keep finding the cards in order to
get the big gift.

Speaker 2 (07:44):
That's that's kind of cool. Yeah, I like that. What
if your kids are lazy like my kids scavengers? Yeah,
I think. You know, it's funny is you talk about
the difference in in holidays and stuff. In ours is
going to be different because you know, we're not going
to have all the boys on Christmas Day. We're going
to actually do a Christmas a week ahead of time

(08:05):
with every one of the boys there.

Speaker 1 (08:07):
And here's the deal.

Speaker 2 (08:09):
The day of Christmas is wonderful and it's gonna be
different for everybody, right, you know the thing, it's how
you make it, you know. And I think that the
awesome part of the holidays is the blessing that you
get to actually spend time with those that you love,
because there are those families that their loved ones either
are gone, you know, they passed, or they're like serving

(08:32):
our country in another country, you know, or another place
around the world. So I mean, I don't know, I
think this is a this is cool. I'm trying to
basically give you things to say to your kids when
kids are like when Smith goes, he didn't do it.

Speaker 5 (08:46):
It's seven am, and I want he is going to
be clamoring.

Speaker 2 (08:50):
Have him just go into Karen in Samantha's rooms and
jump on their beds.

Speaker 3 (08:53):
Yeah, because Kiaren's in the basement, so that means he'd
have to pass through.

Speaker 5 (08:57):
Santa's Santa's stuff.

Speaker 6 (08:58):
What's up, Kim, Good morning, Shannon.

Speaker 7 (09:02):
I have the same age gap with my kids. We
have an eight year old, a sixteen year old, and
a nineteen year old, and we say that the elves
have a budget, and my eight year old straight up
looked at her brother and goes, you would get more
presents if you didn't ask for a new baseball glove
and gat and then walk away and trust her hair.
So it does work. But on the sleeping in thing,

(09:24):
we told her eight am. Because my nineteen year old
looked at me and I was like, I'm not getting
up at six. We said the am everybody. I feel
like that's a fear fear compromise.

Speaker 1 (09:36):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (09:36):
There was nothing better though than when the kids were
so little and they would come and jump on your bed.

Speaker 1 (09:42):
We gotta wake up. We gotta wake up. I love that, Evelyn.
What's up?

Speaker 6 (09:47):
Good morning guys.

Speaker 1 (09:48):
At the holidays Christmas?

Speaker 8 (09:51):
Hey.

Speaker 9 (09:51):
So one thing you can do, Shannon, is like take
the gifts and repigs.

Speaker 5 (09:54):
A bunch of times and a budget.

Speaker 9 (09:56):
In the rebit paper and make it hard for them
to get do it and they.

Speaker 4 (10:00):
Take their last caller.

Speaker 9 (10:02):
I heard say that she had a nineteen year old,
and you know, and I heard you say that, you
know they got to wait until everybody wake up. No,
I have a nineteen year old and I have three
little onests. Once they get up, the nineteen year old
have to get up as will ye.

Speaker 4 (10:15):
Everybody got to get up once the kids get.

Speaker 1 (10:17):
Up to Santa Ga, this is our house. Yeah, I agree.

Speaker 9 (10:21):
There's no get up from that.

Speaker 8 (10:23):
Get up, everybody.

Speaker 1 (10:26):
Thank you for the call. What's up, Courtney?

Speaker 4 (10:28):
Hi?

Speaker 5 (10:30):
Hey, good morning?

Speaker 3 (10:30):
How are you?

Speaker 1 (10:31):
We're good? What's going on? Not much?

Speaker 9 (10:34):
Hey?

Speaker 8 (10:35):
So I was just gonna let Shannon know maybe instead
of changing things crazily, we can wake the younger kids up,
want them get up early as they are used to,
and then the older let them start opening gifts when
they wake up, and maybe do like a breakfast intermission.
Keep a few gifts for when.

Speaker 7 (10:53):
The older kids wake up.

Speaker 8 (10:54):
Maybe not let them sleep into like ten or eleven,
but maybe like an eight or nine is fair, and
then they can finish opening their gifts altogether.

Speaker 5 (11:02):
That's not.

Speaker 1 (11:06):
I really enjoy thank you for the call.

Speaker 4 (11:08):
I really enjoy I really enjoyed the fact that you
all are starting something new. This is the first time
everybody's going to be together, and everybody should experience everything
at the same time. Like, that's why everybody's there is
to be together. They can wake up a couple of
hours early, they'll be okay, I agree.

Speaker 2 (11:24):
With that the collor prior, they said, and then they
go back to bed. What's up page, Good morning morning?

Speaker 9 (11:34):
Okay, sorry, I'm calling you from Windsor first time.

Speaker 2 (11:39):
Do you guys celebrate Christmas and windsor what do you
guys celebrate over there?

Speaker 6 (11:43):
Yeah?

Speaker 9 (11:44):
Okay the other day because I saw someone thinks we
don't speak English over here.

Speaker 1 (11:49):
Whatever.

Speaker 9 (11:50):
I was born in California.

Speaker 1 (11:53):
You know what's interesting about that.

Speaker 2 (11:55):
I remember as a little kid, I used to follow
where Santa was around the country. Does Santa come to
Canada or and he states first? Where does he go first?

Speaker 1 (12:02):
YouTube? And starts funny, what's that page?

Speaker 9 (12:07):
Shannon, I have a suggestion for you. So I have
a rule in my house, and my kids trust me.
The older there get the more. I got this gaming
chair that cost me an armoral.

Speaker 1 (12:17):
Leg for my son.

Speaker 9 (12:18):
But I have a rule. If my son has my
daughter has ten gifts. My son has ten gifts, okay,
but his gaming chair nine hundred dollars. He ain't getting
nothing else. But I will be going to like the
dollar store and finding his favorite candy and that will
be wrapped because we all open one gift at a time.

(12:40):
I didn't spend all that time rapping and figuring out.

Speaker 4 (12:42):
What to buy.

Speaker 9 (12:43):
So your older kids, if your younger kids have ten
gifts and the daughter has ten gifts, and I understand
that the older ones are more money, they might only
have three, you need to make it equal. Everybody gets ten.
So you need to go to the dollar store. You
need to go get the kids.

Speaker 8 (12:59):
You do they first.

Speaker 9 (13:05):
They can get up first and organize. He's going to
organize all the presidents in order.

Speaker 1 (13:10):
He actually count him.

Speaker 9 (13:13):
He counts him yet because we open one.

Speaker 1 (13:14):
Out of time page.

Speaker 3 (13:15):
Okay, who told me that they did that? I was like,
that isn't that is not happening. We will be here
till five o'clock.

Speaker 9 (13:22):
Because I want to see what they got. They're like,
oh my gosh, she opened the most expensive presents first,
and I didn't even see you opening. I begin to
see your reactions. So we stopped letting them open them
all together. We do one at a time. You only
have four, I know, and then the parents were lost
page one. We do one at a time because I
want to see page What.

Speaker 1 (13:40):
We do in our house.

Speaker 2 (13:42):
We give the kids that we like the most the
most gifts, and then the kid that we really didn't want,
that we should have given up for adoption.

Speaker 1 (13:50):
What's wrong with We call him?

Speaker 4 (13:52):
We call him family.

Speaker 1 (13:55):
We give him.

Speaker 9 (13:56):
Got it blended. Her family's blended.

Speaker 1 (13:59):
Now, you know what I think.

Speaker 2 (14:03):
I think the thing that's cool got to be cool,
and it's got to be a pain in the ass sometimes,
but it's got to also be cool. I would think
that there's a lot of things that Karen and Samantha
have to deal with that they're probably like, God, you
know what I don't deal is Christmas, though, is about
young kids and the idea that they get to experience
a little bit of Smith's.

Speaker 1 (14:23):
Magic that he has I think would be kind of cool.

Speaker 5 (14:25):
Again, I am soaking up this magic.

Speaker 2 (14:28):
I think it's great because you never know when it's gone.
So I would bet that they would be you know
and if you and if they were part of it,
you know what I mean, where you could say to them, hey,
I want you to help me with this or whatever
the deal is and make it part. That would be
such a cool, you know, sibling thing to do, you know,
be great. This year, I remember my brother telling me

(14:50):
that my dad told him Christmas stops for you when
it stops for Tommy. And so my brother was the
greatest at keeping things nice and magical.

Speaker 1 (15:05):
Yeah, because he knew it was all over. He was
probably kicked out of the house.