Christmas 2020 - One for the Record Books

Oh Christmas Tree

With Covid-19 running rampant around the country, Christmas 2020 - like Rudolph - will certainly go down in history. And not in a good way. In a normal year, we would have gathered with friends for parties and with family members to celebrate Christ's birth. This year has been anything but normal. We are still grieving our family members who died in 2020, so it was especially difficult not to be able to get together with even our immediate family this year. 

In the blessing category, our daughter has been staying with us since the middle of November as she has been working remotely since February anyway. But for the first time in his 35 years on this earth our son was not with us to open presents. He and his wife traveled to Indiana to be with her family, and we just didn't feel like it was safe for them to then come directly from there to our house. We are hoping that once they quarantine following their trip they will be able to come here for a weekend so we can exchange gifts. It is really hard not to be with them right now, but I have always said it's not about the date but that we are able to be together as a family. So it will happen when it can happen. 

We did not step foot in any stores, instead doing all of our shopping online. I know this was very bad for the small businesses, but it just is not safe inside the stores. There are still too many people who don't believe that they should have to wear a mask. I've also seen where they are continuing to go out in public even knowing that they are sick. It's ridiculous, so we are doing whatever we can to protect ourselves. Our own little community has had 13 Covid cases that I know of, and one death from the virus. It is scary!

We did some baking, including our first try at my mother-in-law's homemade cinnamon rolls. She sort of passed the recipe on to our daughter. I say sort of because, like those of many women of her generation, recipes were not written down. So the measurements of key ingredients are left to interpretation. We thought our rolls turned out well, but agreed that we would add more cinnamon in the future. Lorraine must have been smiling from heaven as all three of her kids made the rolls from their respective states this year in her honor.

cinnamon rolls

As we opened our presents this Christmas, while enjoying our signature Cranberry Cosmopolitan drink, we reflected on those who were missing from our gathering. But we also appreciated the fact that even the three of us were able to be together. I don't think we are alone in looking forward to bidding 2020 adieu. Cheers!

Cranberry Cosmopolitan