Nov
30
2011
30
2011
Awaiting a King
Filed under: Advent, Christmas, Unschooling
We are in full preparation mode around here…cutting, creating, lighting it up. Christmas is coming! We spent an entire day covered in paint and mod podge…creating handmade ornaments for our tree.
We had big plans to get a permit to go cut down a tree in one of the nearby forests, but after a big wind storm a few weeks ago, we found this sweet little tree laying behind the house. It turned out to be the perfect size, it has “character”, and we just love it! The girls had such a great time hanging their ornaments…it’s been so special to have our own tree this year!
All of these preparations are not just to “decorate” or make things pretty for the holidays. We are awaiting a King! Jesus’ birth is the single cause for celebration. And this year, we are turning our eyes toward Him every night after supper as we read together from Ann Voskamp’s Jesse Tree devotional.
With Bella and Lucy snuggled up with Daddy, we light a candle and learn more about His love for us and the grace He extends. So excited to walk through this amazing Advent time with my loves and to create new rituals and traditions together as a family.
What are some of your favorite rituals and traditions during the holiday season?
Posted by Sara @ 5:47 am | Leave a Comment
30
2011
I love it!!!! And your house looks amazing! So much fun!
30
2011
We always put our tree up Thanksgiving weekend. This year we did it a week early due to tons of travels. We count down Advent and bake up a storm. We love to watch Christmas movies by the light of the tree. This year we have already had snow. Crazy for west Tn. We spend Christmas Eve with in laws and make cookies for Santa and reindeer food for the yard. I hope y’all have a very Merry Christmas!! I love your tree;)
30
2011
LOVE your pics and love the decorating. I’m sorry to say, it makes me a bit jealous I have to work all day. Maybe your girls could send a string of Christmas flags my way.
30
2011
Not too many traditions remaining now that the kids are grown. I love Advent though. I always take part in the December Photo Project and try to focus the camera on the truth of this season. We are still waiting for a good snowfall. We spend time together putting up the decor usually, but this year it may be me doing everything but the tree. I love watching you and the girls, thanks for sharing the child’s side of Christmas with me. Love you!
30
2011
I love your tree!! I think year we will be starting some Advent garland, and work on a picture together everyday to hang from it.
We are also going to do Christmas cards together and make our own recycled wrapping paper out of paper bags for the gift we will either be sending or giving away to extending family.
Christmas “elving” has started around here, too! i’m making and making away, every quiet chance I get. Happy season to you!
30
2011
The first year we could have a tree after my divorce the kids and I did not have any ornaments but my work had given us a tree. We had the best time finding household items and toys and pictures to place in the tree to decorate it. We now use some ornaments but it’s our little family tradition to use non traditional ornaments to make our tree special. It reminds me how far we have come and how much God has blessed us and helped us along.
30
2011
We did that devotional last year. Enjoy your trip through Advent!
30
2011
How wonderful: God sent you a tree! We’re loving Advent in our home, too. We’re stringing lights and garland and strings of flags. And we’re reading Christmas stories: our older daughter’s current favourite is one we borrowed from our church library, A Tree for Christmas.
Every night we do a scripture reading (a very short one to keep our 3yo’s attention) and add to our Advent display. We’re all really enjoying it. And our older daughter now knows precisely who Zechariah and Elizabeth were.
30
2011
Oooh, thanks for linking to Voskamp’s Jesse Tree devotionals. We’ll definitely do the Jesse Tree this year, but I’m looking forward to a devo with a little more meat. I also like the advent wreath, however we can only sustain so many advent activities on a daily basis.
I love this season. Awaiting the King indeed.
30
2011
That may possibly be the greatest tree ever!
30
2011
The crafting looks great, what a cheery bit of colour in the house. A rescued tree just lovely!
We are also “doing” a Jesse Tree, we are following a story from Evlogia, she’s a friend of Ann.
Hope you are doing OK.
San and co xx
30
2011
This is our first year living in an RV, so i’m pretty sure we’ll skip the tree. I have a 4 and a 1 year old and my oldest wants a tree, so we might do a small one, but i’m still not sure where to put it. A friend of mine recommended Jesse Tree devotionals, but i haven’t gotten it yet. Our tradition is what we call “kelchmas festivus” and we do it the week before Christmas. We open our few gifts to each other – one of those gifts are always a new pair of pajamas – and then we put on our new jammies, drink hot chocolate and drive around looking at lights and decorations all night until someone falls asleep then we come home. Christmas eve and Christmas day are spent with our family and friends and at church. So, our kelchmas festivus is the only time we have alone with no one else’s schedules to work with. I also have to say that i LOVE your tree! if we do get one we’ll just make one from something we find. we are living in the middle of a forested area so it shouldn’t be too hard to come up with something. We always made most of our own ornaments, too, so even if we don’t get a tree we will decorate our home. its still pretty warm here, so we probably won’t start decorating and tree hunting until tomorrow when December starts.
30
2011
Usually is my mum who is in charge of the tree and now my 2 year-old girl joined to help her grandmother. Last year my mother had a brilliant idea: to decorate the tree with Dolores plastic bracelets of thousands of colors. Sara if you saw it … you would love it I know! So, I can say that the ritual is that one,every year my mom is the one in charge of the tree and decorates it originally and funny and it is always a surprise. This year I think the motif will be butterflies.
30
2011
we have been making a bunch of ornaments as well this year. I had a bunch of fun doing dried oranges for the tree. Simple and pretty.
Love your tree! Everything is better with character
30
2011
Love the tree! We don’t really have any traditions, I’m too much of a scatterbrain to remember anything we have done in the past! ha. I’m nuts. But, I like learning about other’s ideas on how to cultivate traditions in their kids lives. I wish I was better at that!
30
2011
Such a great tradition! We are also going to start our Jesse Tree devotional
30
2011
I love your tree
And I think I’m going to make ornaments with Ellery now, what a good idea.
We are still trying to figure out what our traditions will be, but we definitely stole the idea of only doing 3 gifts for Christmas from your blog!
30
2011
For the past few years as our nest has emptied, I’ve grumbled a lot about decorating at Christmas and figured I had to do it because everyone else does and it’s expected. I honestly have never linked decorating to awaiting our King…thank you for the beautiful new perspective!
30
2011
My family always listens to Mannheim Steamroller when we open gifts…it is the perfect mood music with the tree providing the only light. Last year I started wrapping gifts in brown paper packages tied up with string, and I love the personal touch that it gives them.
Your house looks so lovely and cozy! What kind of banner do you have hanging in the doorway by the tree?
30
2011
Your house looks amazing! So full of joy and love and character.
And I love your tree. It’s special because you rescued it when it was ‘down’ and out and saw the beauty in it!
1
2011
Such a cute tree!
Every Christmas my grandmother makes wassail and we drink it on Christmas day. Also, I like to watch Elf at least 5 million times.
1
2011
Hey Sara,
How’d you print out your devotional…. I have it too and am having a heck of a time getting it printed with the images… Did you just do it on your photo printer or did you send it and get it bound at a Kinko’s…
Thanks! You home looks so beautiful!
1
2011
Hi Sarah! I printed it at home (minus the black heavy first page) and then had it bound at a local copy shop.
1
2011
ooh look at your yummy house! the tree cracked me up. LOVE IT! quirky and perfect.
2
2011
Oh my goodness… where are you living now? (I guess I’m way out of date on your blog!) Your new house looks amazing – so medieval in character! I LOVE IT!
And what fun tree ornaments – gives me inspiration for our upcoming weekend of decorating!
2
2011
I also do love your tree …
I am German so we do not have a tree until christmas eve (we celebrate christmas at the evening not in the morning afterwards). So we have something called “Adventskranz” with 4 candles on it – one for every advent-sunday. We light the first candle on the evening before the first advent-sunday (which has been on the 26 of November this year) and then we read a story. This is a tradition I kept from my own childhood – we also used to sing songs then together but now it is only my son and I and our singing is a bit … but we still try. The stories are from a special book that also includes a poster with with spaces on it.. Every night there is a picture that has something to do with the story (storys are mostly about a family in advent or some animals and are about values and giving and helping each other… and always include at some point the actual story of christmas), we cut out the picture after reading and put it on the poster that gets filled until christmas. We also light the candle (and two candles on the 3 sunday…) while reading and singing. We also do some baking or crafting every weekend together. Christmas we celebrate with my parents. We go out into the woods, put some candles on a tree (after dark), light them, sing together and enjoy the stars … (or snow), then we walk home, give each other small gifts, read a story about christmas and have a nice dinner together …
7
2011
Love those decorations! I think my favorite thing that we do at Christmas is read “The Best Christmas Pageant Ever”. We read it last year and laughed so much that we decided to make it a yearly tradition, along with reading the biblical account of Jesus birth on Christmas Eve.