Coronavirus Christmas and Cars

With many restrictions from the Pandemic, we experienced a different type of Christmas season than in the past.  However, we were still able to feel the true meaning of Christmas, even with different circumstances.  We were able to adapt our Family Christmas party, individualize gift exchanges with our children and grandchildren and enjoy new and old Christmas traditions.   We certainly didn't let a pandemic interrupt our joy of the Christmas season.

Family Christmas Service Project

We always try to find a way for our family to serve others, especially during this time of the year.  This year we chose to sponsor some Christmas Angels through the Salvation Army.  We asked our adult children if we could eliminate the Christmas Gift Exchange for adults this year and replace it with donations to the Christmas Angel program.  The response was positive and generous.  All together we accumulated enough money to provide for 7 different children.  We asked several of our families to pick one of the children and do the shopping for that child.  This help them feel a stronger connection to that specific child.  As the presents started arriving at our home, it got a little complex.  We used our guest room as the staging area for these gifts. Then, Beckie and her kids came with the gifts that they had picked out and helped us to label and organize all of the gifts.  We then took them to the Salvation Army who delivered them to the children.  We really enjoyed this experience!

Seven different angels identified with ages, wants and needs

Presents in piles by each child as they arrived from the different families

Labeling and organizing the gifts with the help of Beckie and her kids

We finished up with 7 sacks of gifts, one for each child

We hauled the sacks for each child as if we were Santa Claus

Family Christmas Party

With restrictions on casual gatherings, we had to improvise our family Christmas Party to be on-line with Zoom.  We were still able to have participation from different children and grandchildren.  We then sang Christmas songs together and had all of the grandchildren exchange gifts with each other.  This proved to be the most difficult task to pull off, as the gifts needed to be shipped or delivered to the all of the children before the party.  Some of this did not get accomplished until the day before, but we made it.  We look forward to an in person this coming year.  It will be much easier.

Ellie played a piano solo for us

McKenzie performed a guitar solo and sang

Sam shared some Christmas memories from his mission

Melanie and her family shared a Christmas poem, with all of the children participating

All had fun in a different way, but most of our family members did participate.  This slide shows participants from 14 different Zoom connections.

Debbie prepared Christmas Carols with images and words for us to sing together

We participated in the family Christmas party from our living room, in front of our Christmas Tree

Individual Family Visits 

Because we could not all get together, we made individual visits to all of those that would not be coming to our home on Christmas.  We still had a few single sons come on Christmas Eve.  Overall, the visits went very well and our experience with each family was more individual and less rushed. This worked well with limited numbers.  For Camila, the visits needed to be outdoors at her care center and it was pretty cold.  But we all persevered and hopefully have special memories.  A few photos follow:

Christmas gifts were arriving from our on-line shopping continuously throughout the holidays.  This was a common sight as we tried to keep up.

The principal gift to each of our children and their families was a 72 hour supply of food.  We hope that they will all be ready for whatever comes in the future.

Enjoying Christmas with Dan and his family in his home

The same with Gina and her family in Provo

The day that we went to Cache Valley to visit Jared and Kari and their families was the day of the appearance of the Bethlehem Star.  This photo was taken outside Jared's home in Hyrum, Utah.

Jared's kids enjoying their presents

Gifts from Jared and his family to Oma and Opa

Katelyn will remember her high school graduation during this unique year

Caide with his gift as we had a very good visit with Caren and her niece and nephews

Asher and Aria opening their presents

Tiancom opening his present

We were only able to have two individuals visiting Camila at a time.  We started with two of her children, Caide and Cherish. 

Kaisha and Isake were in the second shift of the visit, Camila was getting colder

Christmas Eve with single sons and Tiare opening her presents from her dad

Ben was the only one to stay overnight this year, he slept in on Christmas morning

We celebrated with our Pennsylvania kids on Christmas morning, before others visited

Those who lived closer came over on Christmas. We spaced their visits out over the day:

Jamie and her kids enjoying our game of the year which came from China

Kaleb and his family at our home

Aria and Rick with Pollyanna's family also at our home

Even Jessica with little Tommy came to our home

We even enjoyed a visit from our great grandchild, Marcie

New Christmas Traditions:

With most concerts cancelled this year, we enjoyed music and performances differently.  The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints shared nightly concerts from performers from around the world.  This became part of our dinner hour.  It taught us about the tremendous talent from performers all over the world. As a new approach to Christmas concerts, it introduced a special international flavor.

This became our normal dinner entertainment

Performers from France

Including family singing groups

Including missionaries and individuals harmonizing together

One of many of the nightly programs of musical numbers shared from around the world.

Even our ward Christmas party was on-line.  Debbie and I provided the words and images for a sing a long.  The following photo is of our bishop and his wife as they gave a Christmas message to all of us.



We always loved going to the Forgotten Carols.  This year a new version was presented to limited audiences at the theater.  We were able to buy the DVD and enjoy it at home with my mother.  We have enjoyed attending together over the years.  We loved the new story that came along with this DVD.



As we continued with our sacrament service at home, we had the special privilege to share the space of our nativity set with our weekly sacrament.

One of the Light the World ideas this year was to decorate the door of someone.  Debbie chose to decorate my mother's door leading to the garage.

Even Christmas Carolers came from a distance.  This photo is of my brother David and his family who came to sing to my mother.

We still had a few of our grandchildren participating in Christmas cookie decorating.  They would not let this tradition be missed:

Jamie and her kids

Beckie's kids

New Cars for Us and a few sons:

A little before Christmas our son Abraham needed new transportation to be able to maintain his employment.  We felt it was time to sell him my mother's car which is older but very reliable.  Therefore we sold the car to Abraham on terms that worked well for him.  That left us down to just one car, so we decided it was time to get a new car for us.  We purchased our first new car in our married life and paid cash for it, using most of our emergency fund.  We finalized the deal on Christmas Eve and brought the new car home before the new year.  Later, Moroni had a need for a different car and we helped him get into a much better solution, with a lot of help from God.  All of this happened within just over a month.

Abe with his new car from his Grandma

Tom with a 2021 Toyota Prius, still on the lot of . . . 

Karl Malone Toyota

Only 16 miles on the odometer of the car

Tom and Debbie and the new car.  Debbie picked out the color, Supersonic Red

Moroni's old car (Brazil Colors) and new car, a 2013 Kia Optima. Moroni got an amazing $3,500 trade-in against a real fair market value on his new car.  God helped this to work out with many small miracles..

Home Owners Association (HOA) activities and changes:

We held our annual meeting of the Home Owners Association for Cornerstone Condominiums by Zoom.  We were able to get enough participants on-line to have a majority participation.  Enough votes were received to have a valid election.

Annual Homeowner's meeting via Zoom

The meeting was conducted by Sherm White, our outgoing president of the HOA

New officers were elected and new positions assigned.   I ended up being the President of the HOA for the year of 2021.

This began a whole new role.  With a new Treasurer elected, I assumed an advisory role to the new Treasurer.  We spent significant time, including Debbie's help, putting the financial records into order, including putting all homeowner accounts on-line to correspond to our financial records.  This required a complete audit of our homeowner accounts.  This required many adjustments and additional collections to get them all current.  With significant effort by our new treasurer, Colleen Eyre, we can now say that the accounts are totally in order and balanced.

January Birthdays:

Our 2021 birthday celebrations started with Debbie's 68th birthday. She got her own special birthday celebration, including home cooked breakfast and a special movie at the theater.  As we went to the theater, we found that we were the only ones in the theater.  This gave her the special attention that she deserved.

Home cooked breakfast

Alone in the theater for her birthday

All to ourselves, blessings of the Coronavirus

Finishing it off with a birthday carrot cake brought home from the restaurant 

Poppy on her 2nd birthday

Cherish on her 13th Birthday

Ariana at her 7th birthday party

Ariana with her half brother, Tommy

We also decided that this year we would tend grandchildren while their parents go on a date for their birthday, since most of our children have a hard time getting away alone.  Since Pollyanna was about to have a new baby, she asked if we could watch the children overnight while they celebrated Rick's birthday. We gladly agreed.  We also got to tend Dan and Amy's children while they celebrated Dan's birthday.

Reading the Paisley and Aria book to Paisley and Aria for bedtime

#GiveThanks

I continue to be amazed at the many blessings that we, collectively, are receiving during this quarantine year.  I am thankful that our prophet has reminded us how to improve our perspective on life and increase our peace with the following prescription:

"Over my nine and a half decades of life, I have concluded that counting our blessings is far better than recounting our problems. No matter our situation, showing gratitude for our privileges is a fast-acting and long-lasting spiritual prescription. 

Does gratitude spare us from sorrow, sadness, grief and pain? No, but it does soothe our feelings. It provides us with a greater perspective on the very purpose and joy of life."

After months of negative messages on social media, overnight my Facebook feed became a source of joy and comfort. This is because of the invitation from the Lord through our prophet to #GiveThanks.  Who would have thought that this change could have impacted so many so quickly.  Of course, the answer is Our Heavenly Father who directed President Nelson to offer this invitation to the world.

President Nelson invited us to post our gratitude on Facebook for 7 days.  I have enjoyed this so much, that I do not want to quit.  I have much more than 7 things to be grateful for.  It certainly has changed my perspective.

This was one of the many blessings that we received in the past two months.  Once again, we found that the restrictions of the continuing pandemic of Coronavirus continue to have silver linings.  When we see them, we also see the hand of God in our lives.

Our Socially Distant Primary Thanksgiving Table

Thanksgiving Day

Early this year, we scheduled our Condominium Clubhouse to hold our Thanksgiving Dinner.  This was the year that we expected to have nearly 40 family members for Thanksgiving.  As we navigated through October, the count of Coronavirus Cases in Utah kept climbing.  Temporary restrictions were put on social gatherings outside of your household.  It became clear that we would not be able to hold our dinner at the Clubhouse.

The governor rescinded his restriction of gatherings in our homes for Thanksgiving but gave great caution.  We tried to respond accordingly.   With the growing concerns, several of our family members decided against coming to the Thanksgiving Dinner.  Others in fact contracted the Coronavirus, making their participation impossible.  Fortunately, none of them had any significant complications from this illness.  In the end, our participant list was reduced to 17 individuals and we decided to make it work in the safest way possible.

We planned three tables seating a maximum of 6 individuals in three different rooms and kept all foods on a common serving area. The meal was served by a few individuals with gloves and necessary precautions.

Debbie's Thanksgiving favors for this year, prepared with Beckie and her children

Children's Table from two households

7 at this table, including little Emily

Five at this table, including Tom

Separate Serving Area, bottled water, separated sides

Masks being worn except when eating

Paisley came over for pie and then violated social distancing with her cousin Olivia.  We tried!

When we were all done, we felt that the adjusted plans went well and were safe for all involved.  The side benefit was being able to spend more quality time with the fewer number of individuals that participated.  We missed the others, but enjoyed very much those who were with us.  As much as we enjoy the concept of having much of our family together, there are blessings in smaller gatherings.

Halloween and Birthdays

Our Halloween included a birthday celebration for our grandson Asher.  We celebrated with his family in a safe and enjoyable way.

River and his family on Halloween

Asher enjoying his birthday books

When we came home we enjoyed our only Halloween visitors, Pollyanna and her family.  Again, quantity was replaced with quality visits.

Aria and Paisley on Halloween

Pollyanna with a pumpkin in her womb

Debbie carved a Jack-O-Lantern for us

It looked really good at night

McKenzie contracted Coronavirus in October and ended up losing her birthday party. We were able to celebrate her birthday in our new traditional way, by Zoom.

Birthday book

We did managed to get back out after Thanksgiving to a few family birthdays:

Joseph turning 16

Hudson turning 4

Other Adjusted Activities:

Other activities have been also impacted over the past months. We have been able to still continue with opportunities to serve others and associate with our family.  Debbie held her second monthly DUP meeting over Zoom, with additional sisters able to participate.  The treat that was hand delivered to the door of each sister inspired Debbie for a similar treat to share with our ministering families.

We have still been able to attend live plays at Hale Centre Theater.  Arriving early made it look like we were alone, but the theater filled up after we arrived.

Alone in the Theatre

A few more arrived, but all in masks

Able to enjoy with necessary precautions

We went to the viewing and watched the funeral on-line for our dear friend Elwin Burke.  His wife had passed away just a few months before.  His love for her was so strong that he lost his will to live.  Less than 3 months later they were reunited on the other side of the veil.  A special ending to an amazing love story.

Other Service Opportunities

I continued to help moving others.  We finished up the move of Michael and Kari as they finally moved into their new home in Nibley, Utah. 

We are now in the process of helping our ministering family, the Russons, to move into an assisted living facility.  This is the time to call in the big guns to help.  The full-time missionaries have called us a few times to find ways to help us.  I asked for their help and they were just what we needed.  The photo below shows them after giving their help.

Strength to help those too old to do it themselves

Ben asked me to help him with transportation to redeem the coins that he had saved this year, which was quite a haul.  It seemed a little different to see a masked man giving coins rather than taking them.

Ben cashing in his coins at the store

As the Coronavirus count escalated, we have been asked to only attend our sacrament meetings by Zoom from our homes.  So, once again, we are blessing the sacrament in our homes.  Although we miss the association with our ward members, we also love administering this special ordinance in our home setting.  The photo below shows our new sacrament table setting, sharing it with the nativity scene.  We feel that these are compatible neighbors that brings additional meaning to remembering "Him".

Remembering His Birth is part of remembering Him

Finally, we continue to have the privilege to serve my dear mother.  As she is in her 91st year, she is having more problems with her balance and sore knees.  She has found a wonderful companion with her new walker.

Increased mobility for a special lady

For me personally, one of the greatest blessings of this year has been to complete the second draft of my personal history, all input into my publishing software.  It is now in review by my sweet mother and wife before finalizing the third draft.  This work has caused much reflection on my life and reminded me of so many blessings from my Heavenly Father. It has made it easier for me to Give Thanks. 

At the same time, Debbie has finished some of her personal history projects. We hope to include these as Christmas gifts. We give thanks to the blessings of the slowdown caused by the Coronavirus.  We find that all things have a purpose and once we discover the blessings that come, our perspective in life changes.    This occurs especially when we #GiveThanks.

A list of those things that I have been able to give thanks for on social media so far:

1- Our prophet, who invited us to share our gratitude

2- My sweet wife, who is the love of my life

3- My Savior, Jesus Christ and His infinite atonement

4- Our 17 wonderful and diverse children and all that they teach me

5- The Book of Mormon and the fullness of the gospel that it contains

6- My good health that allows me to serve others

7- All of our posterity, including our son and daughter in laws and our grandchildren

8- My dear mother, who we are privileged to be with each and every day

9- My two missions, in Brazil (as a young missionary) and in Europe and Germany (Sr. mission)

10- The privilege to participate in Family History, one of the great passions of my life

11- Temples and eternal covenants

12- The example of my brothers and their spouses

13- The international scope of the Church and my privilege to be part of so much of it

14- The amazing leaders and associates that I had during my career and their influence on me

15- The example of Joseph, husband of Mary, and men everywhere who love their wives and children

16- Musical talent that is shared with others, especially available during the Pandemic

17- The Sabbath Day which was given to us from a loving Heavenly Father, a delight! Blessings from my Heavenly Father are everywhere.  My acknowledgement of them blesses me! 

18- Technology that has blessed us in unimaginable ways, including individuals that otherwise would not be able to participate with us in family gatherings and Church meetings.

19- The blessing of the ministering focus of the Church, allowing us to serve as the Savior serves those who are numbered and named in the Church and all others that we feel prompted to serve.

20- The Holy Ghost, who reveals to me, not only truth, but the direction that I should follow in my life. This resulting personal revelation is one of the greatest of my blessings.

21- Our ancestors who embraced the gospel so that we could have the privilege to be raised in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

22- The stewardship that I have received on this earth. I have been given sufficient temporal resources, health, time and testimony to be able to serve God's children on this earth. This allows me to consecrate my life to my Heavenly Father. 

23- My father, who was born 104 years ago on December 12, 1916. His faithfulness in the gospel and dedication as a missionary provided an example for me and all of his posterity.

Blessings from my Heavenly Father are everywhere.  My acknowledgement of them blesses me!