Getting Ready

This year I finally pulled out all the garland I have been storing for several years. I had no idea I had this incredibly long piece. It worked perfect in our main living room.
I always decorate our mantle. It's pretty much the only useful thing about our fireplace.
I always decorate around our big mirror, too. It's in our front living room. And, of course, we decorate the buffet; it's one of my only spaces to decorate. [I love nativity sets. We have six sets right now. I love having them all around the house. Unfortunately, I don't have many places to put them, so three were on our buffet this year. I never got around to finding places to put them. One was on our dining room table. I LOVE how the sets start great conversations. I think having a nativity set (especially one your kids can touch and play with) is very, very important if you want to emphasize Christ's birth at Christmas.]
In order to maintain some sanity, we put our tree in front of a window in our front living room this year. We keep that room gated off sometimes, so it was easier than trying to keep Jett away from the tree in our main living space.
I also have these cute snowmen my sister-in-law gave me nine years ago. I love them. You can see the presents from our "What God Wants for Christmas" set.
No picture of our outside lights this year. I kept forgetting to take one and Joel just took them all down today. The weather is gorgeous today, but it's turning overnight and will get cold. So, this was the perfect day to get everything done outside. So, that's how we prepared our home for Christmas in the physical sense.
To prepare spiritually, we counted down the days until Christmas. I have a neat book that talks about the history of Advent and why we count down the days. I like the reminder for myself and think that as the kids get older they will begin to understand the significance of the arrival of the long-awaited Savior more and more. I'm also hoping it will lead us to more conversations about His second coming, as well.
We forgot to light the Advent candles. We might have lit them once. Oops. But, we have a tiny little booklet that has daily readings. We would read it during dinner and catch up on any days we missed.
We also read Christmas books. Some talked about Jesus' birth from different perspectives (from an angel, from the animals, a traditional telling, etc). Some books were about generosity and giving. We read about St. Nicholas.
The other snapshots interspersed here are from the kids' school Christmas parties. Asa needed a serious haircut! Rylee's class was so "mature" in their celebrating....sipping cocoa while playing Christmas bingo when I first arrived. It was so grown-up compared with the wild kinder classes I had just visited.
We also hosted the Web Department party for GFA this year. Joel's Web Marketing Team is part of the bigger Web Department, so it was a full house. We enjoyed a taco bar, desserts, and a hot cocoa bar. Some friends we haven't seen in a while stayed late and we loved every minute of it!
So, that's a little more of our Christmas prep. I know it's

Some decorating

We've had this baby a while. We bought it right after our first Christmas as a married couple. That first year we had a real tree. Ha! They are for the birds. (haha! no pun intended, but I'm leaving it.)
That year when my mom came to visit, she told me about my great aunt's tree. It was slender, had lights already on it, and collapsed into a wreath. I bought one. It's now in its 9th Christmas.I love that it's slender.
After we decorated, this little guy came out and wanted to check it out. Surprisingly, he really doesn't go over to it that much. But, I put a gate around it just in case.The big kids put all the ornaments on. Then, I rearranged some. I'm happy to report that I was not overly crazy and did not move them all. I also didn't insist on doing things a certain way. I was kind of not so much into the whole decorating thing this year.
And, is that not the cutest thing ever?

I ended up getting into a decorating mode and hung bunches of garland. I should take some pictures. It's pretty.

Maybe tomorrow.

Christmas Traditions - The Main Man

Which Man did you think I was referring to?

What to do with Santa?

Apparently, some people get really upset about the issue!

Grown adults get more irritated than kids, if you ask me.

One adult got so mad about it she had to leave the room. Another was so passionate about "agreeing" with me that she stuffed words in my mouth.

Two years ago I had the best discussion on this blog because I dared blog about our decision to tell our children the truth about Santa when they asked. I loved all the great points people brought up on both sides of the issue. In fact, lots of those reasons (both ways) trickled into my head and heart and shaped how Joel and I feel about the issue today.

The bottom line for us is that once our kids asked us the question, we had to tell the truth. We could not lie to them; the same way we don't lie to them when they ask us where Cinderella and Prince Charming live. We explain that it's a fairy tale. Except, the neat thing about Santa is that we get to tell our kids a great story about a man who loved the poor and discovered the great blessing of being generous.

Let me clarify where we're at right now: We {heart} St. Nicholas around here. We don't ban Santa. Some people do, but we don't. However, we don't really talk about it that often. If he comes up in conversation, we listen. I ask a question or two, like "what do you think about that?" I spend most of my time emphasizing Jesus' birth, generosity, joy, peace, hope, and love. I want to major on the Main Man and why "Santa" exists at all.

The last two years have been interesting. Our kids have talked about Santa at the weirdest times, usually when it's not the Christmas season. This summer, Rylee had a full week of bringing up the topic at random moments. I think she was struggling with the issue of truthfulness and the whole issue of Santa stuck out in her mind.

[The fact that Rylee struggles with not exaggerating and being truthful is reason enough for me to be glad we told her the truth when she asked us two years ago. I've struggled with being a deceiver myself and know the sly ways half-truths slip in and swallow you up. I see amazing beauty in talking to my daughter about the Truth of Christmas.]

Several years ago I did a Christmas book countdown. I came across The Legend of St. Nicholas: A Story of Christmas Giving and we added it to our collection. We read it the other night and the kids and I all enjoyed it. I think good books are great tools for helping kids understand things.


If every Santa pointed back to Jesus, he wouldn't be such a controversial figure. Unfortunately, Santa has become the main man for many during this season with getting gifts as a major focus. It's easy to forget that God gave and wants us to do the same.