Long time no write, friends. I’d say part of that is from sheer busyness, even when we still don’t go anywhere or do anything beyond the necessary, but also, it’s just been a strange end of fall/start of winter for me with a lot of emotional ups and downs, and as much as writing still helps me with that, I haven’t known what to say about it here. I don’t know if you’ve noticed but the Internet can be a shitty place to share your heart and I’ve felt myself shying away from doing so these last couple months.

That said, we are now on Christmas Break and I’m trying to store some bits and pieces of this crazy year in recorded fashion because I know that like everything else, this too will pass and fade over time and documenting will one day help me remember just what this Christmas was like.

This is the Christmas of staying home even though (knock on wood) no one is sick. The last two Christmases have brought us botched plans thanks to germs, and I guess this one is no different except that we feel so fortunate not to have actual COVID botching them for us. Again, knock on allll the wood, please and thank you now that I’ve just written that. We will still see my parents over the holiday because they’ve been in our COVID Bubble for months now, but the rest of our holiday interactions will be via video call of one kind or another. We did three different versions of that just today, actually, with a FaceTime, a Skype, and a Family Zoom, all before noon! We did get to do an early Christmas with Ben’s folks last weekend, too; it was our first real gathering with them since July.

This is the Christmas of having five kids ranging in ages 3-11.5 which is still a pretty intense place to be in terms of navigating everyone’s big feels and needs and the fact that is is still really hard to find an activity that they can all do together without mass chaos or fighting happening. Ben and I love board games and much as we try, we keep looking forward to the day when we can actually do that as a whole family unit and have it go smoothly. We know with perseverance and practice, we’ll get there. Eventually.

This is the Christmas of still being able to convince all five kids to watch a PBS Christmas special together and oh how happy it made my heart. Harrison is a legit tween now but bless his big brotherness, he was totally on board to watch A Very Monkey Christmas, the Curious George Christmas “movie” yesterday with the rest of his sibs all piled together on the couch with popcorn and M&Ms while a not-so-little blizzard whirled around outside. Honestly, how many more years do we get of him doing that? I’ll cherish each one, however many he’s willing to give us.

This is the Christmas of cooking and baking a few things here and there but also being really grateful that my mom is here and helps as much as she does, including from her kitchen and our family’s love language of food. We’re also going to try one of Ben’s favorites of his mom’s, homemade Mounds candy, next week once we’ve worked through some of the other Christmas goodies and meals.

This is the Christmas of three nights (so far) of driving to look at Christmas lights, including the less-than-successful Christmas start night. It sounds like that was pretty cool for folks with a telescope but for us it was a bit too much wandering on dark country roads with five over-excited children in the van with us.

This is the Christmas of buying myself a present that I love because a mom’s gotta do what a mom’s gotta do, you know?

This is the Christmas of being so thankful for the technology that has seen us through this year and this holiday, that has kept family and friends close even when we couldn’t gather in person. I get so sick of the screens sometimes but also, without them? We would not be OK.

This is the Christmas of Thank Goodness This Year is Almost Over and the Christmas of May We Never Forget All We Learned This Year. It’s been an insane ride and that won’t just change when the calendar flips next week, but for now, for today, which happens to be Christmas Eve, may we all just pause for a second and see it for the gift that it is, no matter how different it looks and feels.