covid Christmas 2020

Our plans just got completely thrown to the wind.

Back in June, one of our windows got stuck open. We called in a contractor. Given that another window won't open OR close, and another one is cracked, he rightfully said, "just replace them."

Well... then I miscarried, our summer was awful, and we didn't move on getting the windows until October.

They JUST arrived.

So, instead of getting a tree, we have to decamp to a rental apartment, pack up/cover all of our stuff, and let the contractor in for 5 days, in December, in the Northeast, to replace all our windows.

...We'll get a tree, late, and video chat our families, I assume, but, uh... yeah. Our Christmas gift from my parents/ourselves are new windows.

Whee!

*sob*

I love the virtual ginger bread house competition idea! My fiance and I put together a list of Christmas movies, and we plan to watch 1-2 per day starting next weekend until the day after Christmas. For Christmas, we usually put together a wine and cheese/charcuterie board to snack on throughout the day while watching Christmas movies, playing board games, baking Christmas cookies, etc.

Unfortunately, we won't get to see my family and I'll be spending it with my in-laws. Love them in general but something always goes wrong over there during Xmas.

It sounds like you have a great alternative plan in place! I feel lucky that I'll be able to spend the holidays with my FH's family instead of just us two on our own, but our original plan was to go to Chicago for Christmas. It was going to be the first time my extended family met him (and the second time my parents met him), but our flights were canceled two months ago because of Covid. I'm pretty disappointed because I haven't seen my extended family in five years, and was really looking forward to them meeting my fiancé at least once before the wedding.

I live in Spain, and Christmas is not a big thing here. The main winter holiday is Three Kings' Day on January 6th, which is when gifts are exchanged. It's nice, but it's not a tradition I ever participated in before moving to Spain so it doesn't have the same sentimental value for me. Christmas Day is just having lunch with family and nothing else. Honestly it's kind of depressing compared to the traditional American Christmases I'm used to, haha. I'll Skype my family back in the States though, and probably bake some cookies or some other Christmas-y treat to make it feel more special. This will be the second Christmas I'm spending without my family. Expat life is tough sometimes!

Starting even before kids with our first holidays, 2 years in 3 we are home, and one we have traveled to be near his family, but on days before or just after Christmas. Hubby comes from a Christian family. But we start our holidays getting ready for the turning of the year, and the longest night ( solstice), in the days leading to Dec 20/21. And usually see many from my family who live close y. This year we will see those in our everyday work/family/ childcare sharing and homeschooling pod: my parents, and one sister and family, and the people we own the house with, and 4 of my older relatives who usually live on their own but moved in with us, and 2 of our housemates' grandparents who have their own in law apt. Same as since March, this is our world. I am happy my parents officially retired this year in January. I have lots of family within a half hour, many here in town. We don't all hang out closely , never in the house together now. But since snow is on the ground we have a huge coasting hill, and we have the dog sled s out, and cross country ski all in groups, things you can do at a distance and feel like a group. Same with the skating rink, now staying frozen on warm days, because the nights are so cold. People come and go at hailing distance.
Our holiday gift from my parents this year, is they are swapping places with my husband and I . They will stay with our 5 kids, and 2 great aunties and grandmother and step-grandfather ( on my side) , and also pick up cooking for some older neighbor folks who lost health aid services, which we have been doing. And we will spend 4 days resting at their house, just us and their dogs. 9 months of both continuing our work, and not ever cooking a meal or doing anything for less than our household of 13 ( plus folks we cook for) with 5 kids schooling, we are tired. 4 days of nobody but us, that is a holiday gift ! Cooking for only 2! Having more than 1 drink, if we want. Happy holidays, married style.

We will have my parents and one other family member over, as we did for Thanksgiving. I have a small family so small holidays are the norm. We usually go to my in laws across the country, but we have two trips planned to their area in Q1 2021 and then our wedding in April, so it was just too much.

I am in engage with my fiance

We live across the country so only go back to visit our families every other Christmas. It just happened that this is the year we wouldn't be going back anyway so nothing has really changed for us!

We'll be staying at home with our sons and his mother. We're opening stockings on Christmas Eve, making cookies for Santa, and watching Christmas movies. This year is the start of a new family tradition as well: I'm making the breakfast strata recipe from The Family Stone (one of my favorite Christmas movies). Hopefully next year we can see more people for our first year as a married couple but we are very happy to be having a small Christmas at home.

We've decided that since it'll just be the two of us, we're going to do an "international" Christmas dinner - we're going to pick somewhere and make a traditional Christmas meal from that place. Other than that, we'll probably just hang out, watch movies, and play games.

We will be spending Christmas with my family since his parents and sister have moved to Canada for 5-6 years now. I wonder what present I'll be giving him this year though.