New "Advent"ures of Team Van Hook

Ok...go me. I'm back again. Twice in one day... WOOP! I figured if I didn't go ahead and do this now, then I might not ever get my hands on Chuck's computer again to do it. So love it & read up!

Alright. So. I am so totally going out on a limb with this whole advent thing. I follow a couple of blogs that have been driving me crazy talking about advent this and advent that lately. Confessionsofahomeschooler.blogspot.com and impressyourkids.org are the two main ones that I follow. I'm by no means a stalker, however, when I started working with Kennedy on doing a letter a week, these 2 mamas had some really great ideas that I sometimes use. So the past few days, and especially today, HOORAY FOR DECEMBER day, I've seen a lot of advent talk. So I decided to look into it and see what these chicks were talking about. This is the cool informative website that I found. I thought it was super cool!! I tried to remember ever having seen or done an advent wreath and then I remembered my elementary Sunday School teacher at FCC here in Jackson. Mrs. Bettye Cole! *sigh* I LOVE her! She tried her darndest to teach us young bucks about the Israelites and all their drama, but Lord knows we were much to young for all that! lol. I would get so confused! But I also remember at Christmas time, she always brought in this wreath with purple and pink candles. We had no clue! I knew that candles were cool. (Don't yall remember when candles of all sorts were so uh-mazing! lol. feel free to hate me for that link!!) But anyway. Yea. That was it in the advent world for me.

Well Chuck and I laid in bed last night talking about how we could start a family tradition that would last for years to come. I'm a crafty girl, but I'm not one to go getting fresh new traditions every year if I can have one great one that we all love. So we came up with a game plan. Here's a summary.

We will do the advent wreath. I think it's a super cool visual leading up to the single greatest birthday celebration ever! (sidenote: let your kiddo throw a huge birthday party for Jesus and invite all their friends! How fun is that :) we did it with the youth last year at the Gathering and made it a Birthday Party/Ugly Sweater Party!) We'll light one candle each Sunday leading up to Christmas and then light one on Christmas. Each will have a corresponding theme and scripture, which I got from the above informative website. So that is something that we'll do every year.

Also, on the homeschool lady's blog, she provided a link to upload the ornaments that her family used for their advent calendar. SOOOO cool! Everyone should totally check them out, use some of what she has, or maybe tweak them for your own family. I don't even feel one bit bad about copying her idea and using her stuff....if it ain't broke, don't fix it & don't reinvent the wheel...I love those phrases. So we're going to make those ornaments and hang them up! Kennedy will be so in to that stuff and it's stuff that we all will have fun doing for years to come. So we won't have to change it, unless we want to.

Lastly, my favorite idea and this one I am proud to say is 1/2 way original. Chuck & I think it's SUPER important for the girls to know that it is more important to give than receive. That is a ridiculously hard concept to teach when the world tells you that YOU NEED EVERYTHING! We decided that we would yes do Santa, but Santa will bring 3 main gifts because Jesus got 3 gifts. Those will be things that she will really love. Then we got her a few things for under the tree. Nothing huge by any means. BUT, we're making sure to go all out when it comes to giving. For every candle that we light, (which will end up being 5 including the one we light on Christmas day) we will have a person that we are giving to this year. Ex. our compassion child, the girls' angel tree friends, our nursing home buddy we adopt etc. Is this going to be easy? I DUNNO! Probably not. It's gonna take a special effort and sacrifice. But that's what it's all about. We are going to be praying for each of those special people and talking about how God allows us to give back to others, and how much it means to them. I am excited! I can't wait! As I said in my last blog, I am no perfect holy Mother Theresa type mom. Just a mom who recognizes that it is important to start early instilling Godly traits into my children (and ourselves for that matter!)

Fun story about Kennedy! I went through her room and cleared out a ton of toys that we can give away. She found the bag and said, "Hey these are my toys. I wanna play with them." I said, "No baby. We're gonna give those toys to other kids who don't have as many toys as you and sissy might." "Why?" "Because some people don't have money to have any toys and you have plenty to share. So we are going to give some away." "OH! Like my Veggie Tales movie. He gived things away." ... Little did I know, the previous night she had watched her new Saint Nicholas Veggie Tale movie in which the little boy gives all of his fish away. HELLO! She soo gets it! She's only 2! What a simple, pure, beautiful faith! So I know it's not too early, and I pray that as she gets older and all her friends talk about the ridiculously insane presents they got for Christmas, Kennedy can maybe share how her family got to give the gift of love. Christ's love. And maybe the light of Jesus in her life will shine brightly into the lives of all those around her!

I know I love to hear what other people are doing during the season. I love to talk about Christmas traditions with other families! I think it's soo cool to see how everyone celebrates Jesus' birthday :) So I thought maybe someone might like to see how we are going to start celebrating. PLLLEASE feel free to leave comments on here or facebook of favorite traditions.

A Beginner~
Rach