Merry Christmas everyone! Yes, it's still Christmas! That 12 Days of Christmas song is legit...
Anyhow, traditionally Christians celebrated Christmas all the days from December 25th through the Epiphany (12 days later), so that's how we're going to do it. Most of our plans for the season from Advent (December 1-ish) through the Epiphany (January 6th) are counter-American-culture. But that's okay, and even good, if it helps us to celebrate Christ's birth more fully. It's okay if you think we are weird.
We totally are.
FYI: This list is mostly for posterity's sake so that I have a reference for next year. But the point of the blog is to share our lives with friends and family, (and apparently people read it??? because we have over 8000 page views????) so I'm putting it out for all to see.
ADVENT:
The Church, in her wisdom, knows all about celebrating at the proper time and place. Advent is a time of reflection, quite, and simplicity in which we "prepare the way of the Lord". The best way to prepare is in our hearts and souls by spending extra time in prayer and quiet reflection. In addition though, there are outwards signs or actions that can help us inwardly prepare. The outward signs reflect the reality within--that we are preparing for Christ.
- This year (and in future years), I'm going to do my Christmas
shopping before Advent begins. I did pretty good this year, aside from
some DIY-ing that was done in Advent.
- During Advent, the music in Mass reflects the waiting, longing, and
hopeful expectancy of the Messiah's birth. Therefore, we too will/did
listen to Advent music and abstained from Christmas songs. We have a lot
of great hymns in church like "O Come, O Come Emmanuel"; "Come Thou
Long Expected Jesus", etc that I love. I also found 4 resources with
some more examples of music/CDs (here, here, here, and here!) to start building our Advent music collection, and I'm so excited that we'll be prepared for next Advent!
- Decorate, but only for Advent. We put up our nativity sets, set up
angels, and put out the tree. The nativity sets don't include Jesus
though, because he hasn't been born until December 25th!
- What goes on the tree, you say? Jesse tree ornaments! The CMOMs
group did a Jesse tree ornament swap this year, so many of us have sets
of our own to do with our families. Basically, each ornament represents a
piece of salvation history from Genesis through Christ's birth. Each
day, there is an ornament to hang on the tree and related scriptures. (here is more information)
Jesse Tree Ornaments
- Advent Wreath and Calendar. We didn't do a wreath this this year, but I will next year. Like ones you might see in Church, it's a green wreath with 3 purple candles (symbol of penitence and also royalty), 1 pink candle (for Gaudete/Rejoice Sunday...we're halfway there!), and 1 white candle in the middle (representing Jesus). I had an Advent calendar that I made of purple/pink/white felt loops for G to tear off each day. Too bad she wasn't into it. Whomp whomp.
- St. Nicholas Day, December 6th. This year we did (and will continue to do) St. Nicholas stockings. I hope to make this day a pretty big deal, since St. Nick is the real "Santa Claus" (Saint Nicholas is Santa Niklaas or Santa Klaas, depending on translation/language). St. Nicholas was a totally badass Bishop who punched a heretic, was imprisoned for his faith,and was very generous to children and the poor. So, obviously, he's a cool dude to celebrate.
- We hope in the future to do simple celebrations of other Advent feast days, like the Immaculate Conception (maybe dress in "Mary blue" all day), Our Lady of Guadalupe (each Mexican food), and St. Lucia (patron saint of light....hang up Christmas lights on this day or go see a Christmas lights show).
- Last and obviously not least, pray more. This year, Chris and I purposely used Advent to start meeting with a small group at our Church called Encounter, which is part of a greater network of groups within the apostolate Communities of Prayer that we're a part of. It was really great to have extra time carved out to "be still" to prepare my heart for the coming Messiah.
- Read Advent, saint, or Bible stories exclusively. We're working on a collection (and will add one each year, I hope), and thanks to Tom and Renee, we've got one on St. Lucia, St. Nicholas, and our Lady of Guadalupe already!
CHRISTMAS:
Again, the Church knows whats up. We celebrate and celebrate big. Christmas music at every Sunday Mass until the Epiphany, the entire Church decorated with a zillion poinsettias, and even the prayers at Mass reflect the celebration and thanksgiving. Therefore, we shall do the same :-)
- CHRISTMAS MUSIC!!!! But not the crappy/weird songs like "Baby, It's Cold Outside" (Can you say "creepiest date rape-ish song EVER"? If you don't know what I mean...check out the lyrics). I have like 3 Pandora Christmas stations. Still not sick of them (that's the beauty of waiting!)
- Swap out/add Christmas decorations and bust out baby Jesus for all nativities.
- Watch Christmas movies! All of them. Except that weird clay-mation Rudolf one I can't stand...Also, any Nativity movie. We LOVE White Christmas with Bing Crosby and the Nativity Story. Any suggestions? Send them my way!
- Outside of Christmas Day with my family, we did all of our gift
exchanging before/after December 25th. I think from now on though, we're
going give each other 3 gifts (one to represent each wiseman) on the
Epiphany (January 6), in which we celebrate the 3 wisemen bringing gifts
to Baby Jesus. There's probably no better way for me to prolong the
real Christmas season than waiting until the verrrrry last day to do the
exciting part! Plus, maybe I will be able to shop "after-Christmas"
sales for good deals hehe.
- Starting Christmas Day, do a wisemen version of "elf of the shelf". On Christmas, remove the wisemen from the nativity (they weren't there the day Jesus was born, ahem) and each day move them from room to room for kids to find and make their way back to the manger for the Epiphany! I am super pumped about doing this next year with Gianna.
- Epiphany House Blessing: dedicate our house and family to God each year on January 6th. It involves chalk. Sure to be a win with kids, right?
All in all, I have to remember one thing. All of these outward signs are supposed to inwardly draw our hearts closer to Jesus during this season and to draw our focus towards Christ (instead of the great American dollar). If at anytime I find myself stressed out, or if our family isn't growing closer to eachother or God by these activities...then I reserve the right to add/subtract/edit! :-)
Some random thoughts about our Advent and Christmas:
Gianna ran a fever on Christmas Day and that made for lots of nursing and snuggles. Best. Thing. Ever.
We love us some leaves. And since Papa doesn't rake them...we have plenty :-)
