Spending Christmas Away From Home...

[ThreeMusketeers]

So, this year we have decided it would be nice to go over and spend xmas with my parents who would otherwise be alone xmas morning. (They live about 3 hours away) We have a 5 year old daughter. We would invite them here, but they are hosting a family party this year at their house christmas afternoon.

Here is my question...
we have already commited to this, so we are going. But we are only going to share xmas eve and xmas morning with them, and head home around noon. It's a 3 hour drive home on Christmas...so I am a little weird about this, it's really important to dh that we go (even though they are my parents) as he really thinks that if we do this for them, dd will someday come spend xmas morning with us and her kids. Any insight or advice on how to make the car drive home a bit more holiday friendly?? I was thinking we could brew some hot coaco at my parents house, pack it up and pop in a xmas cd sing carols for a while. We got dd a couple of xmas toys she can play with in the car. And we were thinking that once we got home we could surprise her with something *extra* under the tree. Any suggestions?

*Also, is it rude to leave before all these "extended family members" come over for the holiday party? We kind of wanted the best of both worlds..in that we would have fun with my parents xmas morning, enjoy them, and then head home and salvage our own personal xmas that day as well. But I don't want to be rude.*

ETA: a huge part of me is not wanting to give up our own personal the 3 of us family xmas. Is it wrong to just visit for xmas eve? Save us the traveling on xmas day????

 

[seashoreCM]

>>> ... rude to leave early ...

I would say leave early on Christmas Day only if both of the following conditions are true:
1. Just before the other guests arrive you still feel you want to leave,
2. You have the feeling you would be crashing the other family members' party.

Disney hints: http://members.aol.com/ajaynejr/disney.htm