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Dale missed all his favorite New Years Eve traditions this year.  He was unable to participate in the creation of collapsing gingerbread houses and didn’t stand outside on the porch at midnight banging pots and pans and throwing confetti.  He claims that being unable to participate in these traditions wasn’t too upsetting to him, but I missed him none the less.  I had no one to argue with about gingerbread house structure and no one to convince that banging pots and pans really is a lot of fun.  Every year for Christmas, I buy Dale a puzzle.  It is one of those gifts that I really buy for myself.  Sometime after Christmas, we usually start working on it.  We had a puzzle from last year that we had never done, so I brought it up from the basement.  When making a puzzle, I sort the pieces and Dale puts most of the pieces in place.  This year, for the first time in years, I actually did the edge.  The puzzle is a photomosaic of a hot air balloon.  Abby has been a good trouper working on the balloon’s green stripe.  However, I find myself looking at all my sorted pieces thinking:  “It’s just not as much fun when he isn’t here to complete it or, for that matter, to complete us.”