There’s No Place Like Home …

I’m sure you are familiar with the above holiday favorite, Home For The Holidays. This year, however, many won’t be going home for the holidays, they will be staying home. As I mentioned in my last blog, our Governor is already begging folks in Michigan to limit Thanksgiving gatherings to 2 families to prevent the spread of Covid-19. Sam and I have already decided that we are staying home this year for turkey day.

If the Covid numbers don’t start to taper off, and the curve doesn’t flatten, I fear that the Christmas holidays may be the same way. I really hope that this is not the case, but I understand the precautions that we need to take if we have to.

Since March we’ve all altered our normal way of doing things. Come on, if it weren’t for Covid, would you really let someone else shop for you and pick it up?! I can tell you I wouldn’t (this is based on the vegetables that were chosen by our designated shopper – YUCK!). My dad has already ordered Christmas gifts for Ella and the boys and he said “Now I hope they get here on time!” Isn’t that the truth?!

You can bet that deliveries of gifts and such will be delayed with more and more people shopping online. I’ve never been one to do online shopping. I have mentioned in the past how much I love just walking through a store to get ideas for gifts. Many of the best gifts I ever bought for people were things that jumped at me off a shelf at a store! It’s hardly the same scrolling a store website.

At any rate, I’m hopeful that by Christmas, life will be such that we can at least have a visitor or two. I would hate to think that I’d have to send my sons their presents via mail, or even drop it off on their porch. I really hope the holidays can be semi-normal. If not, I’m gonna try to brainstorm some things that we can do some family bonding over the holidays.

Speaking of bonding, I had the opportunity to do just that with my son, Dimitri, this weekend. On Sunday, while he was still sleeping and the baby was napping, I watched a really good message from a pastor friend of mine. It was a study on Satan. (When I taught the Sunday School message at my old church, I spent about 12-15 weeks on the subject. The subject is fascinating and I taught it because of a conversation I had with a fellow church member.) My son and I talked briefly on the subject a few weeks ago and I thought he might want to watch it with me.

After Sam left for work and the baby went to sleep for the night, he and I opened up our Bibles and watched the message together. What was nice about watching the recorded version was that I was able to pause it every time he had a question. The message was about 50 minutes, but with his questions, we were on the couch studying for about 90 minutes. He really enjoyed it and he said he learned a lot. He is with his mom this coming weekend, so he and I are already planning on watching two weeks worth of messages when he comes back in two weeks. What a blessing for me to be able to share that time with him!