Little did we know that Christmas 2019 would begin a string of holidays where Theo and I would not be together with all the kid. For the first time Sean and Carlie were not able to come to Oregon for Christmas so on Christmas Day we had to settle for a FaceTime gathering. Ryan and Hillary were here for which unknowingly would be there last trip to Oregon for an extended period of time (more on that in later posts). Regardless we had a wonderful Christmas holiday!
A tradition we started a year of two back was doing a puzzle as a family over Christmas. This year it was a puzzle of the Sydney Opera House. Ryan and Hillary were so intent on getting this puzzle done before their Uber arrived to take them to the airport for their flight home that Hillary was literally putting the last piece in place as she was walking out the door. Over the next couple years (as you can tell I am writing this post well after the fact) puzzles would become an important way for me to relax.
This year Theo decided we all needed matching lounge/pajama pants. She even sent them to Sean and Carlie wo they could wear them Christmas morning while we FaceTimed.Beyond the puzzle we all did a little wine tasting (heck, we live in the Willamette Valley) and saw our traditional Christmas Day movie! This year it was the final installment of the most recent Star Wars trilogy “The Rise of Skywalker.” Theo cooked her traditional Christmas dinner, which for us is lasagna (including my homemade pasta noodles). Hillary cannot eat dairy so Theo always makes her a small personal casserole of non-dairy lasagna. Good wine always flows and we had a great time and a happy way to end the year.
