Christmas in Lyre/Animalia went on about the same as it normally did. Some of it carried some worries over the latest Covid variant, and this made a lot of it smaller than other years, but it was larger than the previous year. The new variant did have some worried and a few people that had had business outside Lyre/Animalia to attend to ultimately did catch it, but unlike many others where major Covid surges had occurred, things like the Animalian and Human vaccines weren't rejected and there were also attempts to make sure that businesses in Lyre and Animalia maintained rules that were intended to maintain mitigation and lower contact issues. There were some malcontents, but most of them had proved to be tourists coming in over the summer. Late December was a different issue.
And while some adults often went to the Meat Market's more "adult" party, even if they didn't do any actual "stripping" on religious holidays like Christmas, there were things that were pleasantly available for all. From ten AM to eleven AM, the "Great Snow War" would reach its conclusion while marking eleven AM to mark the starting point as to when the "Christmas truce" went into effect. The timing was more in line with the end of WWI, but it was still something that worked set up something that would allow for people get a reminder on how things that were good could survive things that were otherwise bad. The truce at eleven would then include a mock treaty where everyone wished the others a Merry Christmas and hoped everyone had fun with the December snowball fight.
The evening was then something for the Kat's Klub. It was to be open from six PM to nine PM on Christmas eve for a standard dance and party and would provide the same for Christmas Day, though for reduced hours, six thirty PM to eight thirty PM. Both nights had a set of long tables along an edge with food on them and there were even a couple of small round tables that were set up for guests to have a dinner if they wished. While neither Ella nor Simone expected a lot of business on the night, as Lyre and Animalia didn't have any large homeless numbers and the community did often prefer more private family gatherings during that time of year, they did have it as an option for those that wanted some form of "adventure" and weren't going too far away. And having a place that was open for gatherings which was something that would allow friends to share experiences and potentially ease some of their cooking or other gathering worries.
And the family friendly party showed a lot of that. There weren't many that came in, and most were even Human who came in more to socialize with neighbors that also lived in the area. It allowed Ella and Simone to pick up some things as they floated around the main room to check the serving tables and make sure that those that sat down to eat at one of the few round tables that were set up for those that were also dining. They also heard other things when the CDs that were being played over the club's speakers. They mostly played through various Christmas carols from various groups. Some were classics, some were more by old rock or country artists and so on. They provided something to dance to and something that also kept the theme for the evening. Which often included friends and neighbors discussing things from either Christmas Eve or Christmas Morning.
"Things seem to be going well," Ella said to Simone as she approached her bond-mate and business partner.
"Yes," Simone agreed, "not too many... and we'll probably have some leftovers, but most of them appear to have friends that live in town and wanted to be in touch with them over the holiday."
"Seemed nice," Ella smiled, "anyone tell you any good stories?"
"One had a kid talking about Skype call down to Dino City where a friend had gone down there for the holidays," Simone answered, "it was complete with some really deep chirps in the background... or at least that is what I was told."
"Any that might have sired eggs in the spring probably had those eggs hatch by now," Ella commented, "that was probably the "chirping" that they said they heard."
Simone nodded in agreement, "and you? Anyone tell you anything interesting?"
"Well... nothing super special," Ella admitted, "a lot of it was sharing thoughts on gifts and things like that. It let me share some of our precious moments and things like that. They seemed to take well to that."
Simone smiled and moved to hug and nuzzle her mate. A lot of things that would be heard wouldn't be that special or exciting, particularly when Animalia wasn't having too much going on that was going to create a lot of drama. There were moments where drama did arise, they could be big, but so far as Simone knew, nothing quite like that had been there for Animalia's Christmas.