Author’s Note: I stopped blogging regularly in 2020, but now in 2023, I am using Google Photos and Google Maps timeline to recreate a post about what we were up to each month!
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When December 2020 started we were no longer in lockdown, but we were still being very careful about masks and social distancing. We managed to have some in-person events, though!
Monmouth Methodist Church usually does a lunch every other Wednesday that is open to the community. During Covid, when we were allowed to do anything, we did just coffee and cake to keep things a bit more simple. On the first Wednesday in December, we added Christmas crackers to make it festive!
Our neighborhood, Ostabston, decided to create some Advent fun for the season as well. For each day leading up to Christmas, one house would add a window display to the “Festive Trail” that would lead around the neighbourhood. Since I love all things holiday, I immediately signed up to be on day 2. Then day 2 arrived, and I didn’t really have a plan for my window display! I pulled it together with my Willow Tree nativity set, strung some paper cranes I had lying around, and Joel helped me put up the fairy lights.
It didn’t look nearly as nice from the inside, this was our view all season!
But it was worth it to have it look good from the outside - and my window even ended up in the local newspaper!
On the 3rd of December, I reached a goal I’d been working towards for 10 years - I paid off the last of my student loans! I graduated with my MDiv in May 2010 and about $45,000 in student loan debt. It was such a huge relief to get that off my shoulders. (P.S. I still believe in student loan forgiveness! I worked hard to pay mine off, but I had a lot of help along the way, too. And my interest wasn’t criminal like many of them are.)
A large part of our December was spent walking around the neighborhood in the evenings, looking for the Advent windows and any other Christmas decorations people had up. It was a good motivator to go on a walk! This beautiful nativity was displayed outside a church members house.
On Saturday the 5th of December, I woke up and scrolled Facebook in bed as is my (bad) habit. I’m glad I did this day because I saw reports of snow in the area! There wasn’t any at the house but there was some just up the Kymin, the big hill not too far from our house. So I dragged Joel out of bed to go see the snow.
The views from up here are incredible normally, so you can imagine just how much better it was with snow! Wait, you don’t have to imagine, here’s a photo!
And then we went home and I made biscuits and gravy and we ate it out of our Christmas dishes with the Christmas tree lit in the background…and I’m guessing that’s a Christmas movie on the TV though I don’t remember anymore.
Years ago I was inspired by Pinterest to decorate my kitchen for Christmas in a particular way. I take ribbon and wrap it around the cabinets, then, when I receive Christmas cards, they get clipped onto the ribbon. I love it because it not only looks cute, it makes those cards decor rather than something that gets read then thrown away! I love doing this every year.
At church, we couldn’t do any of the normal Christmas traditions/events because of continued restrictions from Covid. So, we got creative! We decided to advertise that the church would be open if people wanted to come for hot chocolate, to see the Christmas decorations, and have a chat. We mostly stayed outside and kept the door open for good circulation inside. We had quite a few people come!
We also turned our outdoor tree into a “prayer tree.” People could write their prayers on a piece of paper, stick them inside a clear bauble, and then hang them on the tree. It ended up being very beautiful and meaningful.
One weekend I was inspired to try some baking, I can’t remember where I got the idea but I attempted to make an angel food cake with cherry frosting. The cake completely overflowed the pan in the oven - I have no idea why!
I remember the recipe very specifically said not to grease the pan…which turned out to be a mistake. It stuck like crazy when I tried to remove it!
Here’s the finished product - nailed it! (It did actually taste really good, even though it looks like trash!)
Apparently, Steve was also with us that day and we took him up to see the Kymin. I’m not sure what’s happening in this photo!
Joel and I don’t really do Christmas presents - we prefer to give each other things throughout the year instead. Also, Christmas is one of my busiest times of year, so it takes the pressure off not to do gifts. My family and I stopped doing gifts before I met Joel - because again, we are adults and mostly buy what we want. We prefer to spend time together! All that said, I still couldn’t resist buying some Christmas wrapping paper that had dinosaurs on it. I didn’t have any actual gifts to wrap, so I wrapped empty boxes and put them under the tree for decor!
Another activity we did at church, to try and stay connected with people when we couldn’t meet in person, was to give out Christmas boxes to some of our homebound members. They contained biscuits and homemade jam and clementines. It was also a great excuse for me to do some doorstep visits with members I didn’t get to see much!
On the 17th we did something a bit sneaky. The cinemas in Wales were closed, but we were only a 25-minute drive from a cinema in England that was open and showing the new Wonder Woman movie! So we snuck over the border to see the film. It was a cool old-school style theater and I very much enjoyed the movie (though Joel didn’t like it as much.) We also basically had the place to ourselves (I think there were 2 other people) so it was pretty Covid safe.
And then suddenly, it was Christmas Eve! We had planned to do services in person…but at the last minute the government pleaded with people to reconsider - it was technically allowed but not encouraged. So I spent the afternoon calling around to my stewards and we agreed that we would move our Christmas Eve and Day services online. Joel helped me set up a filming station in the living room so I could use the tree as my background.
On Christmas Day, we had worship online at 10am - worship on Christmas Day itself is a big thing here! Then I went to help out front at the church for a bit as we were giving away food from the community fridge.
In the afternoon we had to watch the Queen’s speech. I never miss it!
Then we entered that hazy week of time between Christmas and New Year’s…I never quite know what day it is and we didn’t have any real plans. And apparently, we didn’t do much! I have almost no photos except some random ones around the house as I tried to finish out my paper crane project for the year. This is the only photo I took on New Year’s Eve!
I did have sparkly nails, a sparkly shirt, and I’m pretty sure we spent the evening just hanging out and watching movies together. All in all, not a bad way to end a year that never went the way anyone expected!
XOXO, Bethany