The other part was going to have to be on high alert.
When he arrived at Noelle’s parents’ house, Noelle seemed genuinely sad that Aiden couldn’t come. The two of them appeared to have bonded more strongly than he would’ve guessed.
“Okay,” Noelle’s dad said, holding a Santa hat by the white fur trim and shaking its contents, “we’ve got six teams and six papers inside. Two for the dinner, two for the entertainment, and two for the decorations. Are you all ready for this?”
Everyone cheered, and Jack looked around. Noelle and her four sisters were each standing with their spouses—a date for Katie—and had their kids with them. It seemed that each sister was a team with her own family, so the sixth team must be her parents and Captain, who was sitting upright at their feet, clearly thinking he was on the team to beat. Jack was glad he hadn’t skipped coming—it would’ve left Noelle in a team by herself.
Noelle rubbed her hands together, eyes on the Santa hat, seeming full of anticipation at what they would draw out. It made him smile. Her dad took the hat to Hope, and she drew out a paper and then said out loud, “Dinner.”
“Let’s hope that Katie doesn’t get the other ‘Dinner’ paper,” Noelle said, apparently kicking off the smack-talk portion of the evening.
“Hey, I heard that,” Katie said. Then, after a pause, she added, “But really, even I’m hoping for that.”
Noelle leaned in close to him, and he tried to ignore the way it kicked his heart rate up a notch. “If we get dinner, we have thirty minutes from the time we leave the house to the time we get back to shop for food. We’ll have twenty dollars, and we’ll have to buy ingredients that theotherteam will use to make a meal. The challenge is to buy things that in no way will go together. We’d have thirty minutes to cook once we get back.”
His eyebrows rose. “Let’s hope we don’t get that one, then.”
Her dad took the hat to Becca next, and she drew out one and said, “Entertainment!” and her three older kids pumped their fists.
He leaned in and whispered, “What’s that one?”
She kept her eyes on the Santa hat but whispered, “Each team will have fifteen minutes to gather props and costumes from anywhere in the house. Then they give what they collected to the other team. Then each team has forty-five minutes to come up with a skit using those props and costumes and practice it.”
Wow. Her family really did the high-pressure activities here. He felt completely out of his league.
Then her dad brought the hat to Noelle, and she drew out a paper. “Yes! We got decorations!”
She was so excited that it made him smile.
She leaned in and said, “Okay, they’ll have a list of things we need to get, and we’ll have forty-five minutes to get them. Then, when we get back, we’ll have fifteen minutes to decorate a small tree with what we collected.”
That didn’t seem too hard. He could do this.
Katie and her date drew out the other “Skit” paper; Julianne, her husband, and her two kids were going to decorate the second tree; and Noelle’s parents drew the other “Dinner” paper.
“Okay,” her mom called out, “you’ve got five minutes to huddle and come up with a game plan. When you hear the horn, your timer for the games starts!”
Noelle grabbed one of the papers her dad held out, then grabbed Jack’s hand and pulled him into the living room that was right next to the front door as the rest of the family scattered to different locations. A tree that was probably two and a half or three feet high and already had lights on it sat on a table in the middle of the room.
She put her hand on it. “Our challenge is basically a scavenger hunt for items to decorate this tree. We have to get something that fits each of the items on this list. The more creative, the better, since everyone votes on which team wins.”
“What’s at stake?”
“Bragging rights and a trophy. Whoever wins it keeps it for a year and proudly displays it. The next year, they have to give it up to whoever won that category. And Jack? We really want to win.”
He smiled, loving this competitive side of her. He glanced at the list of five items. “We can probably go to that craft store on Main Street and get all of this.”
She shook her head. “We can’t get more than one thing at any one place, and we can’t spend more than ten dollars total. So it has to mostly be things that are free or that we can ask someone for.” She gestured to a little table. “We have a hot glue gun, scissors, tape, markers, um, it looks like a couple of hole punches—one a circle and one a square—but we don’t have time to get too crafty. We need to keep it simple. And come up with a theme.”
Okay, maybe they didn’t get the easy one. He wasdefinitelyout of his league.
Noelle tapped a finger on the list. “Something edible... What kind of food would make a good decoration? Gumdrops are too small... Oh! I saw holiday pretzels at the convenience store just right out on Center. They were shaped like stars. Maybe we can do a theme around that.”
Jack nodded. Okay, some direction. He had no idea what to do with the direction, but it sounded good.
“Something sparkly or shiny... Hmm. And something red or blue. That one’s easy enough—we could always get a roll of ribbon at the craft store to glue to the back of the pretzels to hangthem with. Then we need something found outside and some kind of garland.”
Yep. Totally out of his depth.
