We all have holiday traditions from our childhood. For the most part, they are some of our most treasured memories especially if grandma or grandpa or maybe even a parent has since passed. As young single adults, heading home for the holidays is its own tradition.

When you finally settle down and start a family, everything changes. The cost and convenience of traveling hundreds of miles to be with your (or his/her) family becomes less important than putting food on the table or buying presents for the kids.

Instead of being out-of-sorts or sorry for yourself for not being able to be where you are used to being for the holidays, embrace your new situation. The beauty of doing your own thing as a new family is that you get to pick and choose which traditions you want to keep from your families of origin and which traditions you want to adopt as your own. There's no law that says you must do everything the same as your parents or siblings.

It's never too early to start with your children because you want to establish what makes a normal holiday for them as early as possible. Here are four things children really want for the holidays:

1. A relaxed and loving time with the family.
2. Realistic expectations about gifts.
3. An evenly paced holiday season.
4. Reliable family traditions.

That's it. If your "normal" holiday with your family-of-origin was filled with stress and general unpleasantness, you have the ability to discard those things that made it stressful and start fresh. Just keep in mind that your children are very aware of your emotional state and they will get as stressed out as you are. The holidays do not have to be stressful.