Remembering Last Year - The Holidays

Just as we'd done all year, we had to make some adjustments to our traditional celebrations for the 2020 holidays, but they were still wonderfully memorable. To start with, we put up the Christmas trees and started playing Christmas music even before Thanksgiving. To make it extra unique, whenever we had the opportunity, we watched a Hallmark Christmas movie, checking them off on the list the network posted. I promise that has never been done before, and will probably never happen again in the future, but it was fun to do once. (This was a "first year of retirement" adjustment; I often would watch a movie while addressing Christmas cards or wrapping gifts when Wayne was at work, and I wasn't ready to give up that activity. Fortunately, Wayne was willing to join me in watching the sappy movies.)

Because of the pandemic, we had to cancel our traditional Thanksgiving trip to Virginia, which was terribly disappointing for my parents (and us), but fortunately Weston's family lives close and we were all healthy, so we did have a nice Thanksgiving dinner with them at our house. And it gave us the opportunity to try another fancy roast - Herb and Butter Roasted Turkey!

Can't forget the pies! They included the traditional frozen pumpkin pie, a marbled pumpkin pie, and even a gluten-free apple crisp (instead of apple pie) and a chocolate pumpkin torte!

After dinner, the boys stayed for a couple of days so their parents could have a little mini vacation. 

In addition to making gingerbread houses, we made Christmas cookies and played lots of games!  We all had a great time.

Between Thanksgiving and Christmas, we did make a quick trip to Utah. (The concern over visiting young people was not as great as visiting older family members.) While there, we definitely got into the Christmas spirit by having a spontaneous Christmas music recital, making new decorations and visiting Luminaria. Read all about it here.

The original plan was to have Weston's family come over for Christmas Eve dinner; however, the boys weren't feeling well, so we cancelled those plans. We went ahead with our fancy dinner (and then had leftovers all week!), followed by our traditional Christmas Eve sing-a-long. (See here and here for examples of past years' festivities.)

Christmas Day was nice and peaceful, with more of our favorite traditions, and even time to put a couple of puzzles together.

Weston's kids were healthy, and Brad's kids arrived into town; New Year's was not exactly peaceful, but it was a lot of fun! We have wonderful memories of the 2020 Christmas holiday season!