Tuesday, December 27, 2011

Merry Christmas

Well, Christmas has come and gone.  I always feel a little sad when Christmas is done.  I love all the anticipation and build up to Christmas day.  I love watching the streets light up as people add their Christmas lights and listening to the Christmas music playing everywhere.  I love the time with family and getting excited about the kids opening presents on Christmas morning.  And then, all of a sudden it is all done and we have to wait another year for it to come again.  So, of course I wanted to drag my kids into this emotional roller coaster of withdrawal by creating some fun Christmas traditions.  So, I bought a new advent calendar.  The kids took turns opening it each morning and finding an ornament to put on the tree.  Then there was also a piece of paper with an activity on it for the day.  Madeline woke up each morning asking what our "job" was for the day.  The day after Christmas, she asked to fill it up again.  I told her she had wait until next year.  See, the withdrawal is already happening.  Here are some of the things we enjoyed this past month.   

We got our Christmas tree on the first day.  We always get it from our local fire department, load it up on top of the car and then get milk shakes from Chicks A Fla (as Madeline calls it).  And then, every year we say, "let's not forget to water the tree as soon as we get home", and every year, we forget until the next day.    

The next day, we decorated the tree.  And the kids got to decorate little trees for their own rooms.

We made cookies...

 and decorated them.



 We made gifts for Madeline's Mom's Day Out and Cubbies teachers.  We filled jars with a gift card, smarties and a sharpie and wrote something about being thankful for making Madeline smart and sharp.  

We went to a Christmas party at our neighbor's house and Mr. Mark dressed up like Santa.  Oliver wanted nothing to do with Santa.

We played games by the fire, our first fire in our new house.  Andrew got a new ax to chop us some wood.  

We acted out the nativity story.  All the Magna Tiles are gifts for baby Jesus.  Oliver only wanted to watch Bob Mano (Veggie Tales) and Madeline only wanted to be the angel.  That left Lucy to be baby Jesus and Andrew and I to be everything else.  

We made salt dough ornaments with the kids handprints and Madeline made one with her footprint.  We used cookie cutters and made ornaments with the rest of the dough.  


We made wrapping paper.  Who knew white rolls of paper were so hard to find as well as stamp pads.  So, we just used a roll of white wrapping paper and markers.  


We made a birthday cake for baby Jesus and sang happy birthday to him.

We made a gingerbread nativity (thanks pinterest).  Madeline did not like the smell of the coconut.  I loved it.  
 We never got around to making Mary, Joseph or the horse. It took us a while to get this far.  But, at least we did the most important part, Jesus.  
Some of our other activities included decorating the house, driving to see Christmas lights, singing Christmas carols, reading the Christmas story in Luke 2, watching a Christmas movie (Boz Christmas) and drink hot chocolate with marshmallows.  Maybe that is why I am so sad that Christmas is done.  We had such a fabulous time counting down to the birth of our savior.  

4 comments:

ranelle said...

this looks excellent. and all with a new baby :) God will bless you for spending this time with your adorable children, for teaching them about Him!

Mary said...

You are such great parents... and I love these photos!!! Such a fun celebration!

Brad and Lauren Holmes said...

I LOVE the gingerbread nativity scene idea, I am definitely going to try to do that next year!!! I love all your Christmas traditions!!

Katherine said...

Great Photos. Thanks for the Christmas card. You were all very well coordinated.