Holiday traditions — will they be different this year?

[Paul met Debbie]

We are heading for a normal Christmas. Since years we celebrate Christmas at home together. We used to have family diners, but when the family extended with little children of nieces and nephews, also the little runny noses entered the stage. So after having to cancel our presence for a couple of those diners in a row because of the little noses marathon, we decided to just take our loss and do it ourselves. We use the other safer seasons to catch up with family visits, although past year was a different story of course. Hopefully next summer we will be able to kiss & hug them again.

Our loss turned out to be a gain, because honestly we enjoy these Christmas days together enormously and savor the quality of the presence we share together.

This year will be not different for us. We have been stocking up on little presents for months now, and our memories are playing along fine by forgetting what we have packed. One of the shelves in the wardrobe has silently filled itself with colored gifts with now forgotten content and we are very curious what have bought ourselves for Christmas. And I tend to hide presents in other places too.

I can remember buying some books, but have no clue anymore what about. The only thing I can remember I can’t write down here, because Debbie doesn’t know about it and she reads the forum too – so, sorry.
But I can tell you that we both still remember ordering a new fountain pen for our small collection, that has not even yet arrived because it is only released half December. So maybe it will be in time for Christmas.

We have bought a little Christmas tree that hopefully will survive the festivities to be planted out later this winter, early spring. Debbie has decorated it beautifully and I am the battery charging master to keep the lights burning. We bought three little new decorations this year that fit very well with the rest because they are different: a Fabergé-egg (not the real stuff …), a little rocking horse and a pair of ballet shoes.
The gifts will be placed under the tree and our dog Buddha has endowed herself with the holy task of picking them up and bringing them to us, as we sit on the couch. We have to watch her carefully, otherwise she will proceed right away and open them too, although she is not in it for the content, only to shred the paper.

For dinner we will serve what we always love: prepare something healthy, simple and tasteful. Funny you should mention potatoes! We are planning something with Hasselback potatoes in the oven, with olive oil, garlic and rosemary. In the evening I will be playing some Christmas carols on the piano after which we will probably be looking at the movie The Little Prince that we saw in the cinema years ago, from which we now have bought the DVD. Ah yes, that is one of the presents we both know of, so there you are!

Now, where did I hide it? Oh dear!