The Christmas that Still Was

Christmas in the time of COVID....

It wasn't actually a whole lot different. 

The girls still made a birthday cake for Jesus.

And we still had our lazy-mom-make-your-own-darn-sandwich Christmas Eve dinner.

Jane's sweater put us all in a festive mood. 

The girls got new pajamas and then we went out to go see Christmas lights, stopping at a convenience store along the way for hot chocolate. 

And then made the girls go to bed so we could make the magic of Christmas happen. 

Every year our Christmas tree has one special ornament that represents our travels. For awhile, we thought there wouldn't be a travel ornament for 2020. And, yet, here it is.

Seeing this ornament, instead of the stupid toilet paper and mask one that everybody has, makes me so grateful. I can't express how incredible it was to have a week of magic in the middle of the misery. 

Something else new this year....

I was talking to Chris about how parents don't get stockings and how that kind of makes me sad. We've never had stockings before. So... on Christmas Eve, while I was busy with baking and the like, he went out and saw what Menards had left on the shelf. Because Menards is where you go for Everything. 

Below is the Masterpiece that he found...

right next to Jane and Emily's homemade stockings. They look like medical devices. 

Thanks, Chris, for the very, very sweet thought. 

Christmas morning proceeded as usual.

Emily got a Nintendo Switch and not much else. Because those things are pricey. 

Jane got a million little things and showed disproportionate excitement about every single one. Every hair clip, every backpack pin, every book was met with Joy. 

We rounded out the morning nicely with some cinnamon rolls

and a great deal of Animal Crossing. Christmas ended with a screening of the movie "Soul", which was lovely and fun and sweet. 

It was a delightful day. 

 

20 Years

20 years ago, Chris and I were 21 years old. We didn't know much about life but we knew a few things:

We loved each other.

We wanted to be together forever.

We would, respectively, never be able to find another human being who shared our senses of humor with the notable exception of each other.

So we made it official. 

20 years later, we still know all those things to be true. We've seen more, good and bad, than our 21 year old selves ever dreamed of. But we still love each other unreservedly. 

2020 was supposed to be a huge year for us... 5 years cancer free and 20 years of marriage. Both of those celebrations look wildly different than anticipated. I guess that's fitting with the rest of our marriage. Not as planned, but beautiful nonetheless. 

Next year we can have a blowout anniversary date or trip or, really anything that involves leaving our house for more than a couple hours. This year it's enough to know that we're alive, we're together and we're in love.

Happy 20 years Chris!

A Dozen Years of Jane

12 years ago I was so worried that having a baby two weeks before Christmas would make it so Jane's birthday would be swallowed up in Christmas.

Luckily I ended up with a kid who loves Christmas so much that she wanted an Elf birthday party a couple years ago.

This year, there were no birthday parties due to The Great Unpleasantness, but she desperately wanted to open her presents under the tree... just to make things seem a little more festive. So glad she embraces the proximity of her birthday and Christmas.

 

Jane's really into unicorns right now, so there were many unicorn themed items at her celebration.

When you're twelve in our house, there are a couple rites of passage.

The first is ear piercing. 

I figure 12 is old enough to be responsible for your holes. Both to make sure they don't get infected and to keep earrings in often enough so they don't close up. Jane is thrilled to finally be able to wear real earrings. 

When you're a little sister, it's tough watching your big sister get to have all the rights and privileges that come with age while you wait your turn. In no other way was this more transparent than in the cell phone issue. 

Anyone who knows Jane knows that she craves the company of other humans. Lockdown has been hard on her and it's been especially hard because she wasn't old enough for a phone. 

When the phone was finally in her hands, she took to it like a fish to water. 

It's not a smartphone. We're not there yet. But she has enjoyed several marathon phone calls with her friends and sent us random texts such as "Chicken nugget" and "I am JANE". Right now, her favorite thing is to put her phone on speaker with her friends and then just go about her life for hours at a time. If they feel like talking, they talk. Not my cup of tea, but whatever makes Jane feel more connected during social distancing is okay with me. 

I'm grateful that I get to have Jane in my life. I'm not sure what I did right to get such a funny, creative, charismatic little creature in my family, but I can't imagine life without her.