Ho, ho, ho – and don’t forget the dough! Why charging your family to spend Christmas with you isn’t as crackers an idea as it sounds

We share the burden ... Jamie and Andy might be with their wives or training in the heat abroad Murray Christmas! Judy’s two mischievous elves Jamie and Andy

Amum who revealed she charged her family £30 a head for Christmas dinner took pelters this week.

When she appeared on ITV’s This Morning it’s fair to say she divided viewers – but I’m definitely not jumping on the bandwagon of criticism.

The mum of four has been hosting it for 10 years and says she wants to do it as her son has food allergies and she can ensure he doesn’t eat anything he shouldn’t.

I totally understand that and I’m sure it takes the worry away from other members of the family, too.

OK, I wouldn’t have charged like she has and it doesn’t seem like the Christmas spirit, but then it is such a crazily-expensive time of the year.

So sharing the burden is good, which is a bit like the bride’s father having been expected to pay for the whole wedding. These days that’s too much to ask and I think everybody understands there has to be some contributing.

The way we tend to do it at Christmas is that whoever is having the dinner creates the main course and between us all we do the starters, the desserts, the wine and even the crackers.

It’s not as clinical as that mum who has made the headlines, but it means no one is footing the whole bill. The last thing you want is someone feeling uneasy.

We share it round as far as homes are concerned, too, depending on how many of us will be there as Jamie and Andy might be with their wives or abroad training in the heat.

This year we’ll have quite a big number.

My mum loves to do Christmas. She was a domestic science teacher and she loves nothing more than having the whole family round to cook – it’s a granny thing to do. And my dad loves falling asleep in his own chair in front of the fire after dinner.

I’m usually a last-minute kind of person when it comes to Christmas.

That’s because I work well under pressure. If I’ve got a day to do something or an hour to do the same thing, I’ll do it much better in the hour.

When I’ve got too much time I tend to just faff about.

The last couple of years I’ve hated those late queues at the shops, but I made an early start by accident.

I saw cards of a Highland cow with little tartan bobbles several weeks back and thought they were absolutely perfect.

I bought about 60 of them and addressed and stamped the lot so they were all ready to go. I’ve never done that before. It was a great start and now I’m absolutely determined to be more organised with the rest.