Christmas Plans and Celebrations

We have been gearing up for Christmas pretty much since Halloween. Thanksgiving weekend got us into high gear and we enjoyed making gingerbread houses with Aunt Terry and family, decorating our Christmas tree and hanging lights on our house and bushes. Ben was very good at inspecting the lights and was a great helper outside. He also caked millions of candy treats onto his gingerbread houses and hung many ornaments. Elizabeth was more interested in the ladder that Dad used to hang lights, but did enjoy decorating with the “pretties”. She also loves to see Christmas lights and looks completely amazed by their beauty.

Part of unpacking the Christmas decorations included discussion of the advent countdown calendar. Ben remembered the “treats” from last year and could not wait to open the first door. We discussed how we needed to wait a few days until December 1. The night before he told us that at school he learned that it would be a new month tomorrow. Did we know what that meant? Time to open the first door! It was as if the first day of advent was actually Christmas morning. He got up extra early and proceeded to ask us for about 30 minutes while we were getting ready if he could open the first door yet. Mom was not prepared for this and had thought that the activity would take place in the evening. Not willing to disappoint, we let him open the first door and have a chocolate treat for breakfast. We did decide that we would delay the activity for the day until after school, so we could look forward to having time to enjoy the reading of the Christmas story together.

Some of our activities in the countdown will include crafts, writing a letter to Santa and visiting the Christmas Train. We are looking forward to making this month special for both of the kids as we look forward to celebrating together.

The kids have a program at school and Ben has already learned the song they are performing. He will also get to be a wise man in the program at church this month. Pictures and details to come. We just wanted to share how we were preparing for the holidays and getting excited about the upcoming events.