December 1st

Every year in December we do '24 gifts'. 

The name is a bit deceiving…because there are not 24 and the 'gifts' are almost all things we already own. December gets so busy that finding time for something 24 days can be too much and the purpose is to open special christmas items that have meaning to us and not to get new things…

The kids seem to love this tradition and I hope they love reminiscing about it as they get older. 

We also do special Christmas devotions. I've tried lots of different things and this year we are doing something new. I got it from 25daysofchrist.com and after reading up and doing 1 day…I love it. 

Each day this green bag will hang on our tree. 

Inside is a special handmade ornament. 

They will take turns opening it each day and hanging it on these trees. 

And then we will read the corresponding scripture and talk about it. 

Its sweet and simple and gets us into the Christmas story.  

After the devotion we opened the first of the 24 gifts. 

Tori was especially happy to discover that it was our Fisher Price nativity. 

And Avery was especially happy to discover that it included sprees candy!

But this year the stable was empty. 

So we read this story from our Christmas collection and 

talked about all the people and animals missing. 

And then we went on a scavenger hunt to find the missing pieces.

Then we filled the stable. 

When we were done I told the kids that for my personal devotions I am writing out pieces of the Christmas story and drawing along with it. I invited any who wanted to participate to sit down with me. 

I had 3 takers today. 

Happy, excited kids!!