Do the Kids Get Two Christmases? Splitting Gifts and Setting a Budget

Key Points

Your custody order sets the schedule. It says nothing about the money. That silence is whre the competition starts, and it is why gifts cause more December conflict than the schedule does.

The instinct to buy your way out of guilt has a documented cost. Research on 701 adults found that parents who gave gifts as a way to show affection raised children who were more materialistic as adults, and adult materialism is associated with financial debt and lower wellbeing.

Set your number before you look at a single wish list. Not a percentage of what your co-parent is spending. A dollar figure you can pay in cash in January without flinching.

One conversation, three questions, in writing. Total per child, who buys what, what is off the list. You are not negotiating your co-parent's budget and they are not negotiating yours.

"Buy experiences instead" is good advice that doesn't apply evenly. The research supporting it holds most reliably for people with money to spare. What is true for everyone is that traditions cost less than things.

I work mostly with women over forty-five who are coming out of a painful divorce. And I can tell you which appointment is the hardest to schedule: the one in January.

Not because of the holidays themselves. Because of the credit card statement. Every year I sit with women who spent money they did not have in December, and none of them did it carelessly. They did it because their child was going to wake up in a different house than last year, and buying things was the only lever they could find.

I want to give you a plan that works before that happens. This article is only about gifts and money. If you are still working out who has the children on which days, that is a separate problem and DivorcePlus covers it in what to do when you can't agree on a holiday schedule.

The Number Nobody Sets

Here is something worth noticing. Your parenting plan is detailed about time and silent about money.

In Louisiana, where I practice, a joint custody judgment comes with an implementation order under R.S. 9:335 that allocates the time each parent has physical custody and spells out decision-making authority. Every state has some version of this. Yours probably names Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, and who gets which in odd and even years.

What it does not say is how much either of you spends. That is not an oversight. Courts do not manage household budgets. But it means the one part of the holiday most likely to turn into a contest is the one part nobody wrote down.

So you write it down. That is the whole method.

Before the Budget, the Honest Part

I need to say something uncomfortable before we get to the practical section, because the practical section will not hold without it.

Researchers Marsha Richins and Lan Chaplin surveyed 701 adults and published the results in the Journal of Consumer Research. They looked at what they called material parenting: using goods to express love or shape behavior. Three practices predicted higher materialism in those children once grown. Rewarding a child with gifts for an achievement. Giving gifts as a way to show affection. And taking possessions away as punishment.

The researchers were careful to note that the parents doing this were warm and loving. That is what makes the finding matter. And separately, adults who define themselves by their possessions carry higher risk of financial debt and lower wellbeing.

Thank about that with a divorce in mind. "Giving gifts as a way to show affection" is precisely what a guilty parent does at the first Christmas. The impulse is love. The mechanism is the one the research warns about.

I am not telling you to buy your children less. I am telling you to notice which feeling is holding the credit card.

Step One: Set Your Number, Alone

I start every client with what I call getting the house in order, and this is the money version of it.

Before you open a wish list, before you text your co-parent, before you look at a single sale, decide what you are spending. Total, all children, everything including wrapping and shipping.

Three rules for the number:

It is a dollar figure, not a percentage of theirs. The moment your budget is defined relative to your co-parent's, you have entered a competition you cannot control and probably cannot win.

You can pay it in cash in January. Not "I'll pay it off by spring." If the number requires a plan to pay it off, the number is wrong. Set it lower.

It is written down where you will see it. A note on your phone. A line at the top of your list. Somewhere you have to look on December 22nd when you are tired and the store has one left.

The number is the decision. Everything after this is logistics.

Step Two: One Conversation, Three Questions

Now you talk to your co-parent, if it is safe and reasonable to do so. In writing, so you both have it.

Three questions and nothing else:

What is the total we are each comfortable spending per child?
Who is buying what from the list?
What is off the list entirely, meaning the things neither of us wants in the house?

Keep the tone the way you would write to a colleague. Something like: "I want to make sure we don't duplicate gifts this year. Can you send me what you're planning to get from her list by the 5th? I'll do the same. I'm also hoping we can agree that a phone is off the table for now."

Two boundaries to hold. You are not negotiating their budget, and they are not negotiating yours. If they say they are spending more than you, the answer is "okay, thanks for letting me know," not a counteroffer.

If this conversation is genuinely impossible, a parenting coordinator can handle exactly this kind of recurring logistics dispute so it does not go back to your attorney every year.

Four Ways to Split the List

Equal number, divided list. You each commit to the same dollar figure, price out the wish list together, and assign items. Works when your finances are roughly comparable. The friction point is that some gifts carry more emotional weight than dollar value, so decide the big one first and split the rest around it.

Each on your own budget. You review the list together to avoid duplicates, then each buy what you can afford. This is the most common arrangement and the most emotionally difficult, because the gap is visible. Two rules make it survivable: do not announce your budget to your children, and do not apologize for it either.

One big gift, split. For older children who want one substantial thing. You each contribute, and it comes from both of you. This requires a working relationship and a decision about where it gets opened, so settle that in advance rather than the week before.

Divide by category. One parent takes the wish-list items, the other takes the tradition or the outing. This is my favorite for parents with very different budgets or very different temperaments, because it stops the comparison entirely. Nobody is buying the same kind of thing, so there is nothing to measure.

About "Just Give Them Experiences"

You will hear this advice everywhere in December, and it is partly right, so let me give you how I see it.

The research does support what psychologists call the experiential advantage. Van Boven and Gilovich's work found people report more happiness from experiences than from possessions, partly because we adapt to objects faster and because experiences get shared and retold.

Here is the caveat nobody includes. A 2018 study in Psychological Science found that the experiential advantage showed up for people of higher social class and did not hold for people of lower social class. When resources are tight, a material purchase that solves a real problem can land better than an outing.

So do not let anyone make you feel that a zoo membership is automatically more enlightened than the thing your daughter actually asked for. What is reliably true, and what I lean on with clients, is narrower: traditions cost less than objects. A December of baking one specific thing, a movie night with the same movie every year, a drive to look at lights with hot chocolate. Those become the memory whether or not they cost anything, and they are yours to build without your co-parent's agreement.

If You Are the Parent With Less

This is most of my practice, so let me be direct.

Do not explain the finances to your children. Not the details, not the reason, not who is responsible. A child who understands that Mom has less money now has been given a worry they cannot act on, and they will often try to fix it by wanting less, which will break your heart in ten years when they tell you about it.

Do not apologize for the smaller pile. Children take their cue on whether something is a problem almost entirely from your face.

Do not compete with debt. The month is thirty-one days. The interest lasts longer than the toy.

And if your child says the other house had more, receive it flatly. "Sounds like you had a good time over there." Then change the subject. That response costs you something. It also protects the one thing you can control, which is that your house is not where the tension lives.

If You Are the Parent With More

Briefly, because it matters. Spending significantly more than your co-parent is not generosity when it is visible to the children. It reads to them as a comparison and it puts them in the middle, which is the thing that actually harms kids in a divorce.

If you have more, the most useful place to put it is the shared expense: the activity fees, the winter coat, the thing that reduces pressure on the other household. Nobody unwraps it and it does more good.

January Is the Test

My training is in behavior change, and the thing I have learned is that plans do not fail on paper. They fail on a specific Tuesday when you are tired.

So build the guardrails now.

Use cash or one dedicated card so the number is physically visible. Lock your list by a date, write that date down, and stop browsing after it. Delete the shopping apps for two weeks if you have to. Tell one friend your number, because saying it out loud to another adult makes it strangely harder to abandon.

And plan one thing for January that is not a bill. A day, a walk, something small on the calendar. The month after the first holiday is the hardest stretch of the year for the women I work with, and having a single good thing waiting on the other side of it does more than people expect.

Your children will not remember the totals. They will remember whether the house felt calm. That one is free, and it is entirely yours to give.

Frequently Asked Questions

Do kids get two Christmases after divorce? Usually two celebrations, yes, because the custody schedule splits the holiday. Two full sets of gifts is a choice, not a requirement. Many co-parents split one wish list across two households so the child gets one holiday's worth of gifts across two mornings.

How should divorced parents split Christmas gifts? Four common approaches: match a dollar figure and divide the list, each buy on your own budget after reviewing the list together, split one large gift, or divide by category so one parent handles wish-list items and the other handles an experience or tradition. Pick before December and put it in writing.

How much should I spend on Christmas gifts after a divorce? An amount you can pay in cash in January. Set that figure before you look at any wish list, and set it independently rather than as a percentage of what your co-parent is spending. If the number requires a repayment plan, it is too high.

What if my ex spends way more than I can? Review the list together to avoid duplicates, buy what fits your budget, and do not explain the gap to your children or apologize for it. If your child mentions the difference, respond flatly and move on. Competing with debt costs you far more than it buys.

Should I give experiences instead of gifts? Sometimes. Research does find people report more happiness from experiences than possessions, though a 2018 study found that advantage held for higher-income participants and not for lower-income ones. What holds across the board is that repeated traditions cost very little and become the thing children actually remember.

Is it bad to buy my kids a lot after a divorce? The concern in the research is not quantity but function. Richins and Chaplin's study of 701 adults found that using gifts to express affection predicted higher materialism in those children as adults. Buying because you want to see their face is fine. Buying because you feel guilty is the pattern worth watching.

Who decides the holiday schedule? Your parenting plan or custody order. In Louisiana that is the joint custody implementation order under R.S. 9:335. Every state has an equivalent. If yours is vague about holidays, that is worth fixing with your attorney before next December rather than renegotiating every year.

About the Author

Jenny Pastor, Certified Divorce Coach and Life Coach New Orleans, Louisiana

Jenny Pastor is a divorce, life, and health coach who works primarily with women over forty-five rebuilding after a painful divorce. She holds an Integrative Nutrition Health Coach certification from the Institute for Integrative Nutrition and a Level 4 Diploma in Health Coach Practitioner, and is certified through Robbins Research International in Creating Lasting Change and Ultimate Edge. Her practice starts with what she calls getting the house in order, a structured approach to clearing mental and practical clutter before building what comes next. She works with clients nationally.

This article is general information and is not financial, legal, or tax advice. I am a coach, not a financial advisor or an attorney. For decisions about debt, credit, or your custody order, speak with a qualified professional in your state.