….the holiday season is always busy

Now that my children have all grown up and moved out Christmas has become more complicated. This year we had three separate Christmas gatherings.

Christmas Eve is usually the day that we celebrate with the immediate family. Every other year our oldest daughter and her wife join the Italian side of the family and come to our place on Christmas Day. This was one of those years.

Our son didn’t join us this year. We were very fortunate to see him twice in the same year. The first time was in the summer when he was able to combine business with pleasure and in October we went to London where he lives. This Christmas they decided to visit Azadeh’s family in Iran in early December and then they were invited to join her uncle and his family in South America.

On Christmas Eve our daughter, Gaelan and her husband, daughter and mother-in-law joined us for our traditional German Christmas. Platters of cookies, plates of cheese and meat, crackers and bread and a variety of nibbles were set out to graze on. My husband also made a pot of meatballs and a tourtière.

We always open our presents on Christmas Eve. My husband has always liked this German tradition and adopted it as soon as we were married. Having a three year at the party made this year’s

evening extra special. Winnie loved opening presents and helped hand out the Christmas stockings. When all the presents were opened she carefully packed all her gifts into a very large bag that I had purchased to wrap her art tray. The other kid at the party was my 92 year old father. He really got a kick out of his stocking this year.

Day 2 to be continued ………