My Christmas Holiday Journal - Days 6 & 7

January 3, 2025

December 29 - Our Christmas Day

It’s the warmest day we’ve had since our big snow fall 8 days ago.

Today is our family’s Christmas Day celebration with a traditional turkey dinner and gift exchange.

I’m back to Christmas music with Sufjan Stevens’ Songs for Christmas, one of my favorites. I started listening to this box set back when we lived in Maine and the kids were in those golden years (as far as parenting), ages 8 to 12. The kids are now 22, 23 & 25 and this album takes me back to that time and every Christmas in between. So nostalgic for me.

I originally thought with all the activity of Christmas Dinner I wouldn’t cook breakfast for everyone but I change my mind at around 9:30am when I realize I would like to have French toast for breakfast and I have enough bread to feed the whole gang. So I do.

I use the LaHave Bakery Challah Bread I bought and froze a couple weeks ago for this exact purpose.

Damien makes espresso coffees, I brew the French press.

Sitting around the table with my grown kids eating breakfast together is such a treat.

I discuss with and assign kids their supper meal contributions - Roasted Green Beans, Glazed Carrots, and Kale Salad - the same dishes and recipes used in past years.

I am very open to adjusting the menu plan and choosing different recipes, but so far everyone is content with the way things are. Or, they aren’t interested/willing to exert the effort to make a change. So repeat recipes it is.

Today is pretty much a kitchen day for me. My own supper contributions are mashed potatoes (plus a lactose-free version) and gravy (plus a vegetarian version). Technically not a lot of cooking but I am hosting and have to prepare the space, feed my own crew midday, oversee food prep and kitchen management throughout the day.

Mom has already baked the apple pies and is roasting the turkey. My parents are also bringing white wine and Mom’s Norwegian flatbread. (I didn’t realize how many of our traditional Christmas foods are Norwegian before writing these journal entries.) Brad is making stuffing. Our fridge and bar shelf are stocked for beverages.

Ian, Brie and Laurent go for a run late morning and there’s a football game on the big screen at Mom & Dad’s in the afternoon.

I put out a spread of snacking foods for a late lunch to simplify the kitchen coming and goings. Crackers, tortillas, cheese, sausage, hummus, queso, salsa, pickles, and cut-up fresh veggies.

There’s a half hour where I go join the football watching but kitchen duty always calls.

By 4pm things are heating up. Salad is being made, the table is being set, potatoes are boiling, the turkey is in transit and juices are delivered for making gravy. My brother didn’t realize we were eating at 5pm so his stuffing will be for second helpings.

As the turkey is being cut it’s determined some of it is not quite done and needs to go back in the oven. My stress is peaking at this this point and as can sometimes happen during such times, especially if I can’t get away from the situation and gain perspective, I grow impatient with Damien (mostly because I don’t want to direct my impatience, frustration, or stress in any other relational direction). Some words are exchanged between Damien and I. The kitchen is a whirl and things are too busy to amend in the moment.

We’ve extended the table with a small plastic table on the window end and my small wooden bistro table at the kitchen counter end. More wooden folding chairs are grabbed from the linen closet. We are now 11 at the table.

We get the supper laid out and there is enough. Phew.

It seems to me I enjoyed holiday food more when I was a child. What a privilege to just show up and eat. I certainly ate more in my youth. Even though I was a petite child and teenager I would easily eat two plates of holiday feast food. I don't know how I did that.

The feeling for me of Christmas Day dinner is relief. We did it. I did it. We got it all together.

The people who didn’t cook do the clean up, while a group of us play some rowdy and aggressive rounds of Dutch Blitz.

By 8pm we’re ready for part two of the evening: gift opening. Brienne is always eager to be Santa’s elf, delivering gifts from under the tree to each person.

I’m not a big gift giver. I’m not the kind of person who regularly buys thoughtful gifts for people’s birthdays, etc.

I find expected gifts (the expectation that you will give someone a gift on a particular occasion) stressful. I like unexpected gift giving, both giving and receiving. But the expectation of gifts for every birthday and Christmas is not enjoyable for me.

As a mother I extended myself for the years of our children’s upbringing to meet these cultural and individual expectations (some people really love gifts, both giving and receiving). Damien took over the gift giving - the planning and shopping - for many years because of my aversion to it.

This year it strikes me that in this ritualized exchange of gifts each of us had to think about another family member in advance and make an effort for that person. Every gift is like saying “I thought about you and I care about you”.

Opening gifts, one by one around the room, feeling the joy and appreciation of both giver and receiver, feels like one giant expression of this sentiment.

This is probably obvious to most people but I haven’t always viewed Christmas gifts like this. When there are too many to give it’s just too much for me. It becomes a burden, financially and energetically.

In the spirit of “I thought about you and I care about you”, with the addition of “here’s something to help you think of us”, we gifted each of the kids a scented candle that smells like Christmas balsam fir trees. I wanted each of our kids to return to Montreal with the smell of Lunenburg County, Balsam Fir Christmas Tree Capital of the World. They each love this unexpected gift, which brings even more delight in the giving.

My brother gifts me 2 gorgeous pottery mugs from Westcote Bell Pottery across the river, the same studio where I commissioned Damien’s still-in-the-making cappuccino mug.

Wallets, books (lots of books), slippers, socks and other cozy layers are themes in this years’ gifts.

After the gift exchange we disperse for the rest of the evening. World Junior Hockey is on the big screen at Mom & Dad’s. A few of us watch Shaun the Sheep: The Flight Before Christmas in our loft. At 30 minutes it’s the perfect length for my tanking energy levels.

I fall into bed, exhausted, at 10pm.

December 30 - A recovery day & Our family of 7

I’m awake from 3:30 to 5:00am. My brain needs to process after the busyness and stress of the day before.

I feel dread, not joy when contemplating hosting another meal for 11 at my house tonight and tomorrow night. I think we need to change the meal schedule but that will wait for daylight.

I don’t hear Pippin waking us up 6:30am but I do hear Damien feeding him. I fall back asleep again and get up at 8:30am.

I am grateful that Damien is already cleaning the kitchen from last night’s dessert dishes.

new mug from my brother and slippers from Damien

The house is quiet and the kids are all still in bed.

It’s time to process our experience from supper-prep last night. Damien is upset that I treated him like he was incompetent. I was unkind to him and I recognize that. I am upset that he needs instructions at all, that I have to ask for help. I want a partner. He also wants a partner (that treats him kindly).

We talk about the work of organizing, planning, and executing projects. He reminds me he’s a project manager at work and I can trust him to do stuff. I am grieved that I caused him pain in my frustration and stress.

We talk about it. We work through it. We make up.

28 years into this and we know each other and we also know that each day brings fresh opportunities to work in the direction of our relationship goals, which include close friendship. Yesterday’s stresses are already water under the bridge and we’re ready to face this day together.

I open the laptop and we discuss the next two night’s meal schedule/plan together. We mutually decide that we need to scale back tonight to “just” our family of 7.

The meal contributions of the other households are easy to adjust and I send a text to my mom and brother saying I need a break tonight and that we’ll reconvene at our house for shared extended family New Year’s Eve supper. They are gracious and understanding about the change in plans.

Having cleared the schedule a bit and knowing there will only be 7 people at my table tonight I can now relax into the day and recover from yesterday’s busyness.

Laurent's digital painting of Ciel in their Christmas-gifted new blanket-sweater

Our last shopping trip was a week ago. I check my menu plan and recipes and make a grocery list for what we’re missing. Damien, Laurent, Brienne and Ian go to Mahone Bay to buy matcha at The Tea Brewery for Brienne’s new matcha set, and then to Bridgewater for the groceries.

I’m home relaxing. The day is grey and foggy. I nap for over an hour in the loft. I don’t think I sleep but I definitely rest.

Iris makes the coleslaw and Damien and I cook the rest of the supper together. I make a haddock chowder, my first chowder since moving to the Maritimes. Damien makes vegetarian baked beans. We’re doing a New England/Maritimes themed meal. We add Weagles’ Bakery biscuits and molasses brown bread.

After our morning talk the day goes well with Damien and I. We’ve both been heard, we’ve responded to each others’ needs and we’re at ease. A few difficult hours will not cast too long of a shadow on this special family time.

This little blip reminds me of the many other instances of working to resolve our tensions and miscommunications during the sometimes pressure-cooker atmosphere of family holidays. We have worked through many things together.

Dusk is so blue tonight. I admire the deep blue from my spot at the kitchen counter and feel a bit envious (but mostly happy) that Laurent is skulking around outdoors taking photos.

Photo by Laurent

Supper is cleaned up and it’s time for a Christmas movie classic - Die Hard, the original. The kids have never watched it. I can’t remember having ever watched it, though I’m guessing I must have at some point in the 90s.

We have a three-seater love seat in our loft TV area, which is perfect for just the two of us that normally share this space, but there are 7 of us tonight. So we drag the camping mat, from under the slanted roof, where Damien and I are sleeping these nights and tuck it up against the base of the loveseat. The seven of us get cozy on couch, office chair, and our thick Thermarest pad.

It’s a stormy night and while we’re watching the rain is pelting the metal roof and strong winds are buffeting the house. The fire is going in the wood stove. It does not get cosier than this.