Keeping Holiday Traditions During Covid

The day after Thanksgiving I began packing away the turkeys and the pilgrims for another year and bringing out Santa and the Angels.  Covid cases had been lessening, and I hoped maybe we could share the holidays with friends in our home this year.  Unfortunately, between the new varient, more people traveling at Thanksgiving, cold weather bringing people together inside, and other reasons, we will probably not be inviting guests again this year.

Nevertheless, the calendar says it is Christmas, and even though Mother Nature delivered the worst wind we have ever seen at the farm instead of snow, we are doing our best to maintain the Christmas spirit with decorations in every room.

It took us a while for just the two of us to finish off the Thanksgiving turkey, so we aren't doing turkey again for Christmas, although that was the family tradition in this house when I was a child because our crowded holiday tables contained so many guests that there were few leftovers.  We finally have managed to collect all of the ingredients we need for our recipes, although the now familiar challenge of not always finding ingredients on the shelves meant it required shopping early and visiting more than one store.  

I confess, over the years I acquired far too many Christmas decorations.  When we lived in cities, I did my holiday decoration buying the day after Christmas, when prices were drastically reduced and beautiful marked down treasures were far too tempting to resist.  That is why we always have at least two trees.

This year that required some negotiating with our cat Emerson.  We try to keep him off the furniture, without complete success I must admit, although we have negotiated a few rules.  This summer we brought in a wicker porch chair during a rainstorm, and Emerson laid claim to it for himself.  When we were putting the lawn furniture away for winter, it occurred to us that we might just leave the wicker chair in the house for him.  We even put it at a window so he could see out to the south.  That worked well to keep him off the other furniture at south windows.

The problem is that the south window where the second Christmas tree is usually placed is where Emerson's chair sits.  The negotiations were challenging, and the results are not entirely satisfactory for either us or Emerson, but he does have his chair and we do have a tree in the south window.  And best of all, it still keeps him off the other furniture.

Happy Holidays to everyone!  Stay safe and healthy, and perhaps our visits for the holidays in 2022 will not have to be virtual.