Every year we have the privilege of celebrating Christmas with Trevor’s family. This year his sister, Sarah, and their family came at Thanksgiving and spent Christmas with her husband, Jon’s family, so we had a smaller group.

We are so blessed to get to have dinner together with Trevor’s Nana (Helen, 94) and Papa (Carl, 96) and Mom (Judy). We decided to celebrate our usual Christmas Eve a day early and started at 3/3:30. It was so nice to have just a little more time together than a later dinner and having to head back home for homework.

I requested, this year, that we use their beautiful blue and white China dishes for the meal and that I’d gladly wash them if we could. I have memories of using them before kids and admire them in their cabinet which is in my line of sight every week as we eat together. Not only did we get to use the China, but they also pulled out the silverware for us to use. Judy shared how back in the 70s she helped her mom complete the set by buying one more utensil for birthdays or Christmases, at about $75 a piece! That must have been a huge sacrifice! Glad we can still enjoy them together.

In addition to the 10 of us, Judy invited a friend , Barbara, to join our time together. She is part of the Precepts Bible Study group Judy and I go to monthly. It was really nice to have her join us.

We had chicken, stuffing, red potatoes, carrots, salad, bread, sparking apple pomegranate cider, and wassail for dinner. Then Judy brought a lemon mousse birthday cake for Jesus as well as the cookies we brought to share.

After dinner and dessert, we sat by the fire as the kids prepared a nativity play for us. It was special to watch Papa work hard to tend the fire, even though it’s not as easy for him as it used to be. And to hear him and Nana checking in on each other to be sure each was warm enough.

The kids did the play: Amabella was the narrator and angel, Adeliza was Mary, Avalina was a shepherd, Azrelius was Joseph, and Abeletham was a shepherd and toddler Jesus.

At the end we opened some presents together and took a family picture. We were all wiped out early, so we didn’t stay long after doing up the dishes, but it was so nice being together.