Thinking through the holidays

Todd and I have started a conversation that I wished we would have thought out way before now. We started celebrating Advent when we were first married. We have continued to do it each year and as we have added children to our family it has looked different each year. Last year I made an Advent calendar to help give Ev a better understanding of what we are doing. This year Elijah is more into it, last year he was a sweet little 7 month old who just sat in his high chair (since we did our Advent time around the dinner table). This year I hung the Advent calendar beside one of our couches near our large bookshelf so the wreath, kids nativity scene and the calendar are in the living room. Ev loves the routine every night - we pull something out of the calendar and each day share more of birth story of Jesus. We use a picture book as Todd tells the story and we add characters to the kids nativity scene. We end up with singing "Oh Come Let Us Adore Him". Ev can sing that with us since the chorus is easy and we decided to sing the same song over and over this year. Last year we would do more but it was just Todd and I singing. It is much more kid friendly now! Then Ev picks a picture of a people group that we have hung on our Christmas tree and we pray for them to know Jesus.

So after a whole month of focusing on Jesus we do what... open presents on Christmas day? Presents are not bad at all we are thankful that our families love us and want to shower us with wonderful things. I just want our kids to be able to give to others and more importantly give to Jesus. How did we stray from Jesus' birth story of the wise men giving Him gifts to getting gifts ourselves?

I think as we are in the process of adopting a child our hearts are heavy to give to the orphans and people in need around the world. We started way too late but I think next year I want to do as much as I can with our kids to give to others. We have a few orphanages in our city, I need to check if they will let foreigners in them. But I was thinking of doing something for the kids here locally. Hopefully we will have our new addition by Christmas and I want Ev and Elijah to be able to understand what they can of that process.

Next year we will be here for some of the month and then we will hopefully be going back to America. I hope to do some things here locally and then also when we get back to America. I think it would be meaningful for Ev to pick out items for a girl her age and Elijah to pick out items for a boy his age. Maybe as the years go by we can dig deeper into demonstrating God's love to others. I know they can only understand so much right now so maybe next year Ev will really comprehend more.