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2020 Holiday Season

Thoughts and ideas for this holiday season

By Diana DoubravaPublished 3 years ago 9 min read
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2020 Holiday Season
Photo by Natalie Pedigo on Unsplash

Well, it looks like Covid-19 is going to take another holiday hostage and our kids will be cheated yet again this Halloween. In our house; Halloween is one of our most favorite holidays. My husband and I grew up a block away from one another and as kids are neighborhood was flooded with kids, I’m talking a small neighborhood with over a thousand kids frolicking. My mom, her friends, their kids, and I would all go trick or treating together. We would then go back to our house, my mom would lay a sheet down on our living room floor and we would all dump our candy on the floor while my moms and her friends were probably getting drunk somewhere in our house. One of the best parts was we all would trade candy with each other. I would literally trade everything I had for Reece’s peanut butter cups. My mom also decorated the house amazingly. Every kid had to see the “good witches house” a name she accumulated over the years. I can vividly remember Halloween in our neighborhood like it was yesterday.

I tried my best to pass the tradition of Halloween fun down to my kids which I must say I did a pretty dam good job. Costumes were humorous, delightful, and most important original not trendy (until they got older and started wanting to pick out their own costumes). I took my kids trick or treating at my parent’s house every year until they moved. We would have parties with friends and go trick or treating in groups. Nothing stopped us; even when Hurrican Sandy came, we went out with no power, walked over down trees, and had a blast. And last year it poured on Halloween night but we still went out with umbrellas and embraced the rain and heavy wind with an umbrella and a smile. And all through my two older kids ditched us for their friends (I’ll remember that next time you need a ride somewhere kids) we still had fun with our little one and two dogs. The point is over the years nothing has stopped the holidays for us. Well until Covid-19 came along and became the hemorrhoid of the world.

This past Easter was spent home with my husband, kids, and dogs which was sad considering it’s usually spent with my big loud Italian family. We did however make plans to go on zoom together which took 2 hours to get everyone on at the same time and not everyone understood the concept of the camera nor the mute button. It was ok, it was like we were all together at a dinner table talking over each other like usual. We made the best of it and I had hoped these past few months that the holiday season would be back to normal although it doesn’t look as though it will happen. Unfortunately, this is the reality we live in, and must make the best of an uncontrollable situation.

Our town made it’s best efforts to give the kids a great Halloween that abided by Covid’s protocols. On Friday night, there is a lighted Pumpkin walk where candy would be pasted out and families can walk amongst themselves. On Saturday, a local farm is planning on hosting a free event for the town’s constituents to include passing out candy to the kids, a corn maze, and donuts for me. Well, now the weather doesn’t look like it plans on cooperating as if Covid-19 didn’t take enough from these poor kids. As I write am this, I just received an alert on my phone stating we should receive our first snowfall Friday into Saturday. This weather's obstreperous behavior also affects my two older kids as they hoped they could hang out in their friends back yards to maintain social distancing protocols. Maybe they could have a snowball fight and drink hot cocoa. Or perhaps, they can just stay home and hang out with their family. Wishful thinking, won't happen.

I started to think of activities to do with my kids if everything gets canceled. I thought of doing a scavenger hunt in the house. I bought a bunch of pumpkins to use as decorations for our front walkway. I was thinking we could each decorate one pumpkin and have a pumpkin carving contest. Then I was thinking of ending the night by watching a Halloween movie. My youngest is 5 so we're not able to watch anything too scary so I was thinking of Adam Sandler’s new movie on Netflix, Hubie Halloween. I watched it already and found it hysterical as I do with most Adam Sandler movies. People either love him or hate him and I absolutely love him. I’m hoping we can make the best of Halloween, embrace the bad weather if it rears its ugly head, and enjoy our family's company even though we’ve had more family time this year than we have in the past 5 years combined due to Covid-19. My teenage kids will complain but they love me. At the end of the day, it is what it is and it could be a lot worse so were gonna suck it up and make the best of it.

Thinking ahead to the upcoming holidays such as Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year's Eve I wonder if once again we won’t be able to celebrate as we do every year. Holidays are a big deal in my family. Christmas Eve is my favorite and we host it at our house. I make a fish feast, drink like there’s no tomorrow, and someone always dresses up as Santa Clause and hands out one gift to each person in the family. If as expected Covid pervicacity remains the same it looks as our whole family won’t be able to see one another and we’ll have to resort to zoom meetings. There are worse things that can happen than me celebrating the holidays with my husband, 3 kids, 2 dogs, and a bottle of Tito’s but I do wish I could see my family. I also don’t want my kids to miss out on quality time with their grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins. Our family is loud and inappropriate but funny as hell. Thinking about us missing out this year and who knows how much longer this will last. Will it last another year where Easter we’re alone again? Dammit, Covid you suck!

Odds are there will be a damper on our holiday fun which we will have to make the best of in hopes of keeping everyone healthy. I already started thinking of ways of making this season delightful for my kids should their view this holiday season be looking at my husband and me. Obviously, cooking together but teaching them to make some of my grandmother’s dishes like stuffed artichokes and manicotti. My grandparents owned a luncheonette and my grandmother did all the cooking. She was the best cook, even something so simple as her cheeseburgers were the best. I could also teach them some of her Christmas cookie recipes. I also thought we could deliver food to families in need. Many people are worse off than us and we should do our best to brighten someone's holiday.

We could also do a scavenger hunt on Christmas eve but I’ll make it difficult for my older kids like some sort of escape room. They won’t want to play but I’ll tell them the prize is $100 and they’ll be ready as ever. I leave out the fact that the $100 bill will come from our monopoly game which they won’t find funny but I’ll think it’s funny as well as my fellow Snapchat followers will think so. One thing I know for sure is that I will not be watching that yule log burn on TV no matter how bored I get.

If we do have to see our extended family virtually, we could also make it fun by having a Gingerbread house contest, ugly sweaters contest, and who made the best turkey hat contest. The list of contests is endless when most of us are drinking. And if we’re really drunk, we could all sing holiday songs together via zoom. This would be the prime moment the mute button saves the day.

Another activity I thought of that is Covid-19 friendly and nostalgic to me is driving around looking at Christmas lights. We always took my grandmother around to look at people’s lights when she was alive. I can still picture the smile on her face and the excitement it brought to her driving around looking at people's Christmas decorations. If you live in New York or surrounding areas, one neighborhood you wouldn’t want to miss is Dyker Heights in Brooklyn. Trust me; it's worth the drive and what else are you doing? The neighborhood is professionally decorated and they have the most beautiful decorations. Google it if you don’t believe me or don’t live in the area, Dyker Heights is beautiful. And the best is, it’s an entire neighborhood that participates so you can spend hours driving around.

Another humorous idea came to mind when my 15-year-old daughter told me all she wanted this Christmas was money. I thought of wrapping a bunch of small bills in gift boxes than wrapping those boxes. Also, use some money to do some sort of origami shape or $100 in small coins. As for the boxes and paper, please note I recycle them every year for as long as I can. For my son who hates eating fruits and vegetables, I thought of stuffing his stockings with a bunch of fruits and greens.

New Year’s Eve is another big holiday with my family. We all get together, make a feast, and bring in the New Year together. Something we’ve done every year is a tradition once again passed down from my grandmother; instead of sparklers or any fancy objects, she would give us a pot and a spatula to bring outside and bang on once the New Year arose. Neighbors loved us for this. We will never stop doing this and I plan on doing so with my grandchildren. We could obviously see one another on-line I was thinking of emailing each family member a word search, questionnaire form, and a New Year’s bingo game customized to our family which I think would provide holiday cheer.

I’m sure more ideas will come along and no matter what as we always do; we will make the best of it. Right now as I write this Hurricane Zeta is overwhelmingly hitting the southern states so, me complaining about having to see my family virtually this holiday season seems much less important. I do hope everyone makes it out safely with little to no damage. And as every storm brings a rainbow, I hope Zeta diminishes quickly and a rainbow arises in her place marking the end of the storm. Just as we all will one day see a rainbow after Covid-19 is no longer a threat. We will get through this. Happy Halloween, stay safe.

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About the Creator

Diana Doubrava

Mom of three kids, wife to a wonderful man and father, rescue mom to two dogs whom I love more than most humans.

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