A neighbor told us she saw us through the window as we sat at the Thanksgiving table and that it looked like a Norman Rockwell painting. Well, the food was very traditional, tasty in the main, and everyone enjoyed each other, so maybe?

(We’ll definitely be skipping the TikTok method of peeling potatoes in future!)

For some reason, I’ve been mildly obsessed with tree lightings. Faneuil Hall! Tuesday at 5! There’ll be hot cocoa! No one else was interested. Not even in the Festival of Trees at Elm Bank? No, not even that (at $20 per person, it was easy to let go of).

For that reason, I was hyped during a jaunt to the North End to see the lights at Christopher Columbus Park. I believe it’s still called Christopher Columbus Park even though his statue is gone. Photographing the bare monument-pedestal on Native American Heritage Day offered poetic justice, while a nearly full moon rising over the harbor gave us a kiss of beauty.

Four of us had rushed to the North End to tour the Paul Revere House (closing at 4:15) which come to find out consisted of two rooms and a diorama (a very cool, very detailed miniature silversmith shop of a diorama, but still). We were back on the street in no time and freezing in spite of walking at a good clip between sheltering buildings. There’s the statue of Paul Revere! Hustle, hustle. There’s the Old North Church! Copp Hill Cemetery was somewhere but we never made it because by then K and I decided to head home. The kiddos had to withstand the cold, however, for something like two more hours to make their dinner reservation (there might’ve been a birthday involved).

A Bruins game made getting back onto the Pike hellish, but the sky was beautiful and the heated seat was on high (aaaahhhh).

Having the boys back is the most natural thing in the world, familiar and lovely, but having them gone and far away is now also familiar, comfortable. It’s a weird mix. I’ll tell you this though — Finn is visibly relieved to be the only child again!