traditions Archives - Page 2 of 4 - Feathers in Our Nest

Keeping Christmas Simple & Jesus-Centered

December 13, 2012 by Aliesha

Tad and I knew even before we had children that we wanted Christmas to be Jesus-centered and we wanted our children to have an understanding at a young age that Christmas is about giving.

We don’t do Santa (that’s a topic for another time) or Elf on the Shelf. We don’t want anything like that to distract from celebrating Jesus’ birth! We still make the Christmas season a joyous, special time.

Our family does simple gifts, too. We give the girls three gifts: something to read, something to wear, and something to play with (as well as pajamas on Christmas eve and stockings on Christmas morning).

We are teaching the girls traditional Christmas carols, like Joy to the World, Hark the Herald Angels Sing, Away in a Manger, Silent Night, and O Little Town of Bethlehem. We are planning on going caroling at a nursing home and to shut-ins from our church closer to Christmas.

When we talk about Christmas, I ask Vera what we are celebrating. She responds with either, “Baby Jesus!” or “Jesus’ birthday!” She’s learning to say “Merry Christmas!” (Right now it’s coming out, “Merry Chris-chris!”)

We have been doing Advent using a kit that my mom made for us. It’s a set of magnetic nativity figures (a new one to open every day) and portions of Luke 2 to read each day. Vera looks forward to “Avend,” as she says it, every day. Vera loves all of the animals and playing with the magnets on the fridge. She knows what a stable is and she’ll tell you that a manger is a place where the donkey eats.

We have a plastic nativity set that the girls love to play with. Vera carries the pieces throughout the house and can identify many of them.

Vera and Cordelia have a little tree in their room with lights and small jingle bell ornaments. Vera has also been bringing home lots of ornaments from church that she made in Sunday School and AWANA.

The chalkboard in the kitchen reminds us of the reason for the season.

A stack of red and green towels adds color to a corner of the kitchen.

Our tree is simply decorated with meaningful ornaments.

Our mantle is simple this year, with the focus being a ceramic nativity set my grandmother gave me. Vera was excited to see it when I first put it up.

We have been reading Christmas books with Vera and Cordelia. These two were given to the girls by Grammy and MiMi.

How do you help your children understand the true meaning of Christmas?

Our Christmas Tree

December 10, 2012 by Aliesha

Since we’ve been married, Tad has been singing the praises of a real Christmas tree. My family had an artificial tree for most of my life, so Tad and I gave that a shot for our first three Christmases (yes, this is our fourth Christmas together). This year, I wanted to get a real tree since I knew Tad would love it. I also thought Vera would enjoy helping pick one out.

We got our tree the weekend after Thanksgiving and finally got the lights and decorations on it the next weekend.

(On a side note: when we tied the tree to the roof of our van, Vera said, “It’s gonna fall off!” Fortunately, it didn’t.)

I ended up doing most of the decorating since Vera got bored after putting on 4 ornaments and Tad had to keep Cordelia from eating pine needles.

Both of our girls love it just the right amount: they aren’t terrified of it, but they aren’t super-touchy or into removing all of the ornaments. Occasionally Cordelia will pull one off, but all of the low-hanging ornaments are not breakable.

I really love how it looks (and smells)!

We also have a little artificial tree in our dining room decorated with jingle bells, which delight Cordelia.

Is your family’s tree real or artificial?

Gratitude Jar

September 13, 2012 by Aliesha

We recently started a family gratitude jar. Every day (or sometimes a couple of times throughout the day), Tad and I will write down on a piece of paper something that we are thankful for and place it in the jar.