I’m so excited for Christmas, is it too early to start a countdown?

He said

This week, all of my biking may have caught up with me. A few weeks ago, I mentioned that I had a spill on my bicycle that caused rib/chest pain alongside some scrapes on my knuckles. But, the lingering effects of that caught up with me one night this week when I had a really bad sleep and managed to somehow jar something in my neck to the point of causing a pinched nerve. By Thursday I was in quite a bit of pain to the point that I was moving around quite slow. Friday morning, I lasted 5 minutes on the ice before I packed it in and gave up on my beloved Friday morning hockey. That was that I was off to Andrea my physiotherapist.

 It was obvious very quickly into my assessment with Andrea that something was off and she confirmed I had a pinched nerve and that it was really affecting my mobility—which clearly I could feel. We did some acupuncture, she tried some stretches and chiropractic adjustment—I left wall-to-wall taped up in KT tape (not really, but you get the idea). We agreed that she would try to squeeze me in again this week in her already booked-solid schedule if there happened to be a cancellation. The rest of the weekend was a pain chased by off-brand Robax™ and ice packs kind of ordeal. Here’s to hoping we can get this nerve un-pinched soon! Gettin’ old sucks!

For us, this week was really about starting to get ready for Christmas. A week ago when the weather was unseasonably warm, I got up on the ladder and got all the outside lights up on the house on a day off at Danielle’s suggestion so that I didn’t need to do it in the cold and snow. After last night and today’s blast of snow am I ever glad I listened to her! We have Emelia working on fine-tuning her Christmas Wish list so that we could start picking away at it. With her being a teenager and wise to the magic of the season it makes it a lot more easier to plan the season and talk about more realistic ($) wants from “Santa”. True to form, as Danielle’s daughter her Christmas List is a budgetary Tetris of trying to maximize the most bang for her buck.

This year more than any other, I find Christmas is creeping up on us fast. The entire year has been this mashup of time flying and standing still at the same in this crappy time warp of COVID-19. While it has sucked and this year Christmas will be very low-key – likely just the three of us spending the time together – I am also oddly enough really looking forward to it. We will make the most out of FaceTime and enjoy time with the family online. Sure, I’d much rather things go back to how it used to be sooner than later, but if I had to be stuck in more quarantine, there isn’t two other people I’d rather be stuck with at this time of year!

She said

Things are starting to feel more and more like Christmas—well whatever Christmas is going to look like this year. We know that we won’t see most family this year. With COVID we won’t be able to see family outside of FaceTime so we are trying to make it as special as we can for Emelia. We are working through her wish list and hoping that we can get her everything on her wish list. We are cutting back everywhere we can so we can make this year special. This whole year has been all about sacrifice and loss and we wanted to make sure that for one day things can feel as normal as possible.

This week we started picking away at the Christmas wish list, between the Christmas lights outside and the holiday lights all over the city it is starting to feel more and more like Christmas. The blanket of white snow this morning certainly made it feel more festive. Emelia spent much of today outside sledding with her best friends, listening to them laugh and be normal Canadian kids made things pretty perfect today.

The other focus for us has been more and more about fitness as a family. I was able to find a new strength training machine so we could add to our home gym. Fitness has become a real family affair. Emelia and I get up every morning together and work out, its our special time together. Family time is even more and more important now more than ever. Emelia is growing up so fast so having something we can connect together means more than words can express.