Jessica Biel Has This Trick for Making the Holidays Feel Less ‘Overwhelming’ for Her Kids

12/22/2022

When it comes to celebrating Christmas, Jessica Biel and husband Justin Timberlake are very laidback. This is an intentional strategy to avoid “overwhelming” their kids Silas, 7, and Phineas, 2.

“I find that Christmas is kind of overwhelming for kids,” Biel told PEOPLE in an interview today. “It’s a lot of pressure. There’s a lot of eyeballs on them, and they’ve got a lot of stuff to do. So, I like to slow-roll it.”

For them, this looks like taking the whole present-opening thing more casual. “Sure, open one thing,” she explained. “We don’t have to open anything else until tonight, and that sometimes happens for us.”

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To be clear, it doesn’t sound like she’s forcing her kids to wait until later to open their presents — like this super controlling mom does — but rather, like she’s encouraging them to see where the day takes them. That definitely sounds nice! Opening and playing with presents at your leisure, instead of rushing through everything to get to another holiday party — I can understand the appeal.

The Candy star also has a go-with-the-flow attitude about where she spends the holidays with her family.

“We spend Christmas all over the place,” Biel told PEOPLE. “We never know where we’re going to be. We have no tradition really around it. Sometimes we’re in snow, sometimes we’re by the ocean. We have no rhyme or reason currently as to where we should be or where we’re going to be.”