Christmas at our house doesn’t happen exactly the way the calendar says it should.

It never really has.

For us, Christmas usually starts a little early. Sometimes on Christmas Eve. Sometimes even before that. Not because we’re rushing the season, but because our family has learned that love often means adjusting the schedule.

Ell’s birthday is on Christmas Day, and from the beginning we’ve tried to protect that. We don’t want her birthday swallowed up by wrapping paper and ornaments, so Christmas becomes something we celebrate around the 25th instead of directly on it.

This year, Christmas landed on the evening of the 23rd.

That wasn’t part of some big plan — it’s just where life landed. With older kids working different schedules and everyone juggling responsibilities, flexibility has quietly become one of our strongest traditions. So we adjusted. And it worked.

By the time everyone got home from work, the house filled up. Not in a perfectly coordinated way, but the real kind — people arriving at different times, conversations overlapping, jackets tossed over chairs. The good kind of full.

We keep Christmas simple. We still do the “names in a hat” gift exchange. Merriann and I make sure everyone has something to open, and if the older kids want to add extra gifts, that’s up to them. No pressure. Just thoughtfulness.

This year, Big O played Santa, handing out gifts one by one. It slows everything down in the best way. We watch reactions, laugh at bad wrapping jobs, and take pictures we’ll probably rediscover years from now.

And in the middle of it all, we pause.

For us, Christmas is anchored in Jesus Christ. That doesn’t always look polished or perfectly planned. Most years we attend a Christmas Eve service. This year, since we celebrated early, we talked about it at home — simply and honestly — reminding ourselves why the season matters.

Some traditions come straight from our childhoods. From Merriann’s side, there are chocolate oranges cracked open and passed around. From my side, there’s the odd tradition of peppermint sticks stuck into lemons. It’s impractical and definitely not dentist-approved, but it’s familiar. It connects us to family members who started these traditions long before our kids were born.

This year, Christmas also carried a little extra weight.

It’s our first Christmas without my dad — Grandpa T — who passed away just days ago. His absence shows up quietly. In moments where you expect a phone call. In pauses you didn’t plan for. We didn’t try to fix that or rush past it. We let it exist alongside the joy.

That’s what this season has become for us. It is a place where joy and grief can sit in the same room.

The Night before, after the house settled, Merriann and I stayed up wrapping the last gifts. Even though the younger kids are old enough to know how this works, we still sneak them under the tree once things go quiet.

It’s not about keeping secrets anymore. It’s about keeping it family centered.

And that’s what Christmas looks like for us.

It doesn’t follow the calendar. It isn’t perfect. It’s flexible, sometimes emotional, often loud, and deeply ours. It makes room for birthdays, work schedules, faith, loss, and laughter all at once.

We celebrate early. We hold onto traditions. We adjust when we need to.

And somehow, year after year, it still feels like Christmas.