Holiday Prep

We put the tree up the Sunday after Thanksgiving. It's in a new spot this year, given that we now have furniture in the upstairs office nook where we've kept the tree for the last 2 years (still visible everywhere, but out of direct fondling access of the kids). Now it's clear we need a much larger tree as it looks small in front of the large windows. While I love being able to have the tree near the fireplace and in the middle of everything, the girls have not yet learned to leave well enough alone with the ornaments. We've had at least 6 broken ornaments, and none are in the spots they were when we first put them on the tree. This is part of the experience, right?

I love how Matt goes about orchestrating the decorating. He sits with the box of ornaments and makes the girls close their eyes as he hands them each an ornament. Then he proceeds to tell them the story of the acquisition of each one.

It's very exciting!

What? You don't decorate your tree in a mermaid costume?

Don't let her cautious presentation fool you--this kid is a brute where ornaments are concerned

On Friday, the kids came into large group time at Bible study to sing to the moms. There were about 50 preschoolers with hand bells singing some rendition of Jingle Bells. Joyful noise, indeed.

Adrienne in yellow, clutching her handbell

Heading back to her classroom after the performance. Trying desperately to smuggle the bell.

I had a pretty fun experience last week at the hair salon. Santa came in and sat in the chair next to me! We have the most awesome Santa at the Rochester mall. We've had the same one for 13 years, and he travels to Rochester for the holidays each year to do this job with lots of love and patience. It's clear he really enjoys it. We had a nice little chat and he gave me lots of tips for making Christmas morning extra magical.

Santa getting dolled up right next to me

He's all done!

As for Advent this year, I wanted to try something different. The activity calendar I made and used the last 2 years caused me a lot of stress. It was hard to always fit in the activity each day, and I knew our time together would be more crunched this year with Jillian in school all day. So, I gathered up the Christmas books in the house and invested in more to make 24 of them. I wrapped them up and put them under the tree. The girls take turns each night unwrapping one and we read it. The unwrapped books go in a basket by the tree and they can look at them for the rest of the season. The books will go away after Christmas and be re-wrapped next year. They love this new tradition, and since we read every night at bedtime anyway, I don't feel like this is really anything 'extra', but it is 'extra special'. That's a win. I also purchased Anne Voskamp's Advent devotional book and it is gorgeous. The writing is a bit above the age level of my girls (especially Adrienne, who declares that "dis book is boring"), but the application questions are good and we will grow into this nicely over the years.