This post includes affiliate links. When you purchase through these links, we may receive a small commission at no extra cost to you. For full details, please see our affiliate disclosure page.
Happy Holidays and Merry Christmas 🎅 to you and your family. Whether you are celebrating alone, with extended family on a zoom call or just with your immediate family, I wish you all the best during this holiday season. During these trying times, it is good to be supportive to your family and consider a bit of self-care also. It is also a time to take a break from the usual and try and enjoy the holiday season.
It has been challenging for everyone in the world and we have faced unprecedented circumstances. It has made some of us stronger but challenged many in different ways. I have really struggled this holiday season and prayed for guidance, patience and forgiveness. Although answers to all those prayers are elusive, today, I celebrate with joy and love. It is my children, my husband and my mother that showed me the joy and love that I needed at this moment in time. It let me be in the moment, focusing on them and their happiness. As is the way of the world, their joy is my joy.
🏡 Where to Stay: Top Accommodations
🥾 Explore: Tours & Experiences
đźš™ Hit the Road: Car Rental Deals
🛫 Get Away: Find Flight Deals
🎒 Shop: Travel Essentials
For my mother’s sake, I called her siblings in Colombia and Montreal to wish them happy holidays. It provides a continued connection that is important for her mental health and piece of mind. It also builds up her memory banks which are so depleting these days.
Happy Holidays
I enjoyed catching up on the lives of my cousins, their children and my aunts and uncle. To hear of their challenges and triumphs is both a comfort as well as a frustration. This is a global problem. I was hoping to bring a level of joy that is fleeting these days for my mother as she too has struggled in this pandemic. Going out less, seeing fewer family members and friends.
The loss of my father eight years ago still pains her deeply. Two days ago we commemorated the 8th anniversary of my father’s passing. Always a bittersweet day leading up to Christmas 🎄. We toasted to a life we’ll lived and to the love of his life.
We celebrated with cocktails and delicious food (and I got to use my brand new charcuterie board). Our plans were different with no extended family yet the celebration is so much more authentic. Perhaps we will do this again just focus on us. Enjoy the day with people we love and love us unconditionally in return.
For now, we will hunker down and ride out the next 28 days as we enter another lockdown. We await the vaccine and pray for an end to this global pandemic. I will concentrate on my 31-Day Organizing Challenge and the new direction of DownshiftingPRO.com.
To all of you loyal readers, may you enjoy this holiday season. Stay healthy. Stay safe.
Xoxo
M.
 🥾 Explore: Tours & Experiences
🏡 Where to Stay: Top Accommodations
đźš™ Hit the Road: Car Rental Deals
🛫 Get Away: Find Flight Deals
🎒 Shop: Travel Essentials