Visit on Thanksgiving or Christmas?

I am getting holiday plans in order and cannot decide whether to come home for Thanksgiving or for Christmas. I am going home to Detroit in early October for a wedding in my partner's family. My brother & wife are expecting their 2nd child at the end of October and Uncle Dave is going to not be there for the big event!  ;(

So I am torn on Thanksgiving or Christmas for the trip home. It is going to be tough to afford both heading home for a holiday, especially since we have the October trip.

The benefits of Thanksgiving are that a lot of people do come home for it and it is a nice relaxed holiday. Being an expat, I think it means a lot more to me personally than it would if I was still living at home. The bad side: A lot of people will be working during the first half of the week.

The benefits of Christmas is that it is the BIG holiday event and you can piggyback New Year's eve there as well. The drawback is that it is the BIG HOLIDAY EVENT and it can sometimes be one planned obligation after another.

Anyone have any stories/experiences/advice? Obviously the arrival of my niece/nephew heavily tips the scale to November BUT I would love to hear others' experiences on holiday travel home.

I'd go with Thanksgiving every time. On a practical level, flights can be cheaper and it's far easier to book a big chunk of time off of work since no one needs to take that time off here and people are usually saving it for Christmas.

On a less practical level, I really like Thanksgiving as a holiday and I find it sort of depressing here as it goes completely unnoticed (more so even than the 4th of July or Halloween I think). I did a big dinner once here for friends but obviously it either can't be on the actual day or people have to come after work and work the next day which is a drag. And Christmas here is nice and dh and I make a big deal of it and have been developing our own little traditions so I don't mind being away from family. Plus you get Boxing Day.

Thanksgiving.  You can get Christmas here and I find the whole holiday week a lot more fun here.  But that may be because I love watching movies.

I'd go with Thanksgiving every time. On a practical level, flights can be cheaper and it's far easier to book a big chunk of time off of work since no one needs to take that time off here and people are usually saving it for Christmas.

Seconded.  My plans post-move actually include visits to PA at Thanksgiving and not Christmas because my family does a big get together for Thanksgiving where everyone comes, so I'd see more people. PLUS, you can get a head start on Christmas shopping on Black Friday, and even wrap and leave presents for the family in the US instead of shipping things .

And if you work at a place where time off is given out by seniority, you might not be able to get off Christmas time, anyway.

I vote Thanksgiving as well....we always go back to the US then and flights are much cheaper since it is a US only holiday (though if you have a domestic connection it can go up in price so try to get direct flights).

Thanksgiving would be my choice- we're going back for Christmas this year simply because I haven't been with my parents/siblings for Christmas in 4 years, but after this year if we're planning any sort of visit in the latter half of the year, it'll be thanksgiving if at all possible (especially since it's much, much easier to find someone to look after our cat for us in late November than at Christmastime!)

I'd also say Thanksgiving, though I'm going to try having a traditional dinner with my UK family this year and see how that goes.  But if I were going back to the US, I'd go for Thanksgiving.

wow great feedback all. i have been leaning towards thanksgiving all along. if my family has any issues with it then i will tell them that "the internet made me do it!" 

i agree that thanksgiving is easier, though what we plan to do (at least, initially) is trade off christmas every other year...this year, we'll go to the US to be with my family and the next year, we'll go to the US for thanksgiving and spend christmas with his family in the UK, and then switch back to christmas in the US the following year... i am hoping to celebrate thanksgiving in the UK on the years we are there, though.  we did that this past thanksgiving and had a bunch of family and friends around--it was fantastic. 

I am doing Christmas - while I love, love, love Thanksgiving - it's too big a deal around Christmas in our family to not be there.  Plus, my brother and his wife are expecting and she's due right around the holidays.

Can I be the voice of dissent and say Christmas?

• At Christmastime its so much easier to to get a larger chunk of time off in one go (for me, I get Christmas Day, Boxing Day, New Year's Day and January 2) and only need to use 3-4 holidays depending on where things fall in the week and then still get 1.5-2 weeks off. 
• Friends and family in the states tend to have the same time off for the full week so its easier to meet and spread things out
• If you fly on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day itself ,you can find awesome flight deals

That being said, I won't be able to afford Christmas this year (or Thanksgiving for that matter), so I'm looking forward to not flying during the Christmas season for the first time in 8 years... 

I vote for Thanksgiving. I love Christmas in England, and since Thanksgiving here is just another day (and my favourite holiday!) then it will be sooo nice to be there with my family this year. Plus, no pressure to bring many girfts, etc. (or food, since we will be houseguests!) I plan to see all of my family in one day, then spend the rest of the week hanging out with my parents and grandmother.

I would say Christmas.  I always wanted to maximize my vacation time and since we get none at Thanksgiving and at least two days at Christmas plus New Year's Day (and in Scotland, the day after as well, as phatbeetle said!), it always seemed sensible to go during December.  Plus things were usually quite slow during that time at the office, and no one thought it unusual if I was on holiday.

Last time we went to the US it was for Thanksgiving and as I have a large family it was nice seeing everyone but for me Christmas is even more special with my family and while my whole family fathers together, my husband's family doesn't do that here in the UK and I miss that so we booked flights to be there for Christmas this year and also I will be there for my oldest sister's birthday and my dad's birthday and New Year's Day and a couple of days later my birthday too. I just want my kids to experience how we do Christmas in the US and eventually we will go for other American holidays as well. 

We still haven't been able to go to the US for Thanksgiving since I moved to the UK, but we looked into it last year and the flights were MUCH cheaper than at Xmas.  My parents did come here one year, and it was a lot less for them, too.