Our First Week of Advent - 2015

 

I love Advent and taking this time with my family to slow down from our usual homeschooling activities to curl up on the couch, read some books and learn about Jesus!  We have had a great week and look forward to more as we journey towards Christmas.

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New Traditions

We have a few new traditions that we have added this year.  We have done the activity before of putting a piece of straw in the manger with every act of kindness to make a soft bed for baby Jesus, but this year we got this special new box to put our hay in.  It is a beautiful wooden box with the nativity and "For unto us a child is born" engraved on top.  On the side our family name is also engraved to make this extra special for our family.

 

The Christmas Star from Afar is the second new tradition and it is a beautiful story and wooden nativity set.  As Christmas nears the star is moved throughout the home and the children use the wise men to "follow the star" with a little game of hide and seek each day.  On Christmas morning the star is placed above the manger with baby Jesus!  This has been a fun activity to remind us all about the true meaning of Christmas.

 

 

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St. Andrew's Feast Day and Novena

 

The St. Andrew's novena or Christmas Novena is my favorite novena of the entire liturgical year.  I love how it helps to focus my attention on the nativity during Advent as we pray this novena from St. Andrew's feast day on November 30th through Christmas Eve.  Also, I have truly seen our family's intentions come true from this novena which makes it even more special to us.  My husband and I try to pray the novena together every night (saying the prayer 15 times each day) and we are also teaching our children the prayer to say once with night time prayers as well.

 

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The Christmas Miracle of Jonathon Toomey

We started reading our books from Christmas and Catholic Mosaic and started with one that I think may become a new family favorite, The Christmas Miracle of Jonathan Toomey.  This beautiful story is of a old gentleman who had lost his wife and daughter and had become somewhat of a "scrooge" in the town.  Through following a wish of a widow Mr. Toomey was asked to carve a wooden Christmas Creche and it truly transformed him and his view of Christmas. 

After reading this story we gave the children a beautiful nativity made of carved wood, just like in the story.  This will be a special set for them to play with and experience the story of Christmas.  We also took the time after reading this story to set up our other family nativity sets.  We set them up in stages throughout Advent and Christmas so right now it is just the shepherds and animals in the barn and a pregnant Mary and Joseph traveling to Bethlehem!

 

 

 

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The Cobweb Curtain

The next book that we studied this week was also a new book to our family called The Cobweb Curtain.  We loved this story of how a shepherd helped Joseph, Mary and baby Jesus escape from King Herod and while they were trying to get away they hid in a cave.  To protect the Holy Family from being found a spider who lived in the cave made a beautiful cobweb across the entrance of the cave which made the guards think no one could have entered the cave for weeks.  Once fear of being caught had passed the Holy Family continued on their journey and the shepherd kept the beautiful cobweb curtain that protected the Holy Family and hung it over his tree.  The shepherd's family continued in following years to decorate their tree with tinsel or a "cobweb" to remind them of this beautiful story.

 

In having fun exploring this story we use the recipe in Christmas Mosaic to make chocolate and butterscotch Spider cookies.  This was a new treat for our family and we had a lot of fun making them and even more fun eating them!

 

 

 

The craft suggested in Christmas Mosaic was to make spider webs with glue and glitter, but we decided it would be even more fun to put an image of the Holy Family behind the spider web.  This helped us remember how the spider protected the Holy Family in the cave! 

 

Finally, we decorated our Christmas tree this day as well while listening to Rain for Roots Waiting Songs, which are all beautiful Advent songs!  It was a fun day!

 

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Advent Wreath, Advent Tree and Jesse Tree

 

We love our traditions that we have started during Advent.  Each night at the dinner table we light the Advent wreath together and listen to Advent music and O Come, O Come Emmanuel.  The first night of Advent my husband led us in a beautiful prayer for the Advent wreath and then we have continued reflections each night using the resource of Welcome Baby Jesus.  It is a perfect resources for homes with little children as it puts the words, prayers and actions into concepts that little ones can understand and appreciate!

 

We started doing a Jesse Tree a few years ago, but I think this is probably the first year that our children are really understanding it and starting to appreciate it.  We use the beautiful ornaments from Jesse Tree Treasures, read the Bible Verses that correlate with each day and watch the daily video from Holy Heroes. 

We also started the tradition of having an Advent tree.  It is a small tree that we have in the front room in our home, which we decorate with the colors of Advent (purple, pink and silver).  It is a perfect little reminder to us about what the season is really about.

 

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The Legend of the Poinsettia

 

We read the Legend of the Poinsettia by Tomie dePaola another day this week and like all of his other books this was another wonderful story.  The message of this book of what makes a gift truly beautiful is such an important message during this season.  Also my husband had brought us home beautiful Poinsettias this week and the children thought it was simply magical that we had the same "flowers" as from the miracle in the story!

 

 

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Preparing for St. Nicholas's Feast Day

The feast of St. Nicholas is a BIG deal in our house!  My husband and I both grew up believing and celebrating Santa Clause on Christmas morning and loved it.  Yet, when we started celebrating Saint feast days, Advent, and Christmas as a young family we decided that we want to put emphasis on the real St. Nicholas on his feast day (December 6th) and keep Christmas for Christ!  Our children know that St. Nicholas was a real person, and that he gave gifts to the young girls as dowries, and that is how we started the tradition as Santa Clause.  Our kids will exchange the stories around sometimes taking about how St. Nicholas lived in Myra, Greece and then moved to the North Pole, and for now we kind of let them create their own explanations.  If they ask us questions we commonly reply with "What do you think?" 

Our oldest son is very rational and methodological and already explained to me that there is no way that St. Nicholas can visit everyone in one night so "that is why he visits the Catholics on December 6th!"  The closest opinion that I have read to how we treat the St. Nicholas vs. Santa "debate" is written by Bonnie over at A Knotted Life (so I don't have to write out a whole novel myself!!)

This feast day is also special to our family because a mere year ago on the feast of St. Nicholas is when we announced to our family that we were expecting another baby!  It was a day filled with such joy and so much fun for our whole family.  I think of our Samuel Nicholas every day, but will especially think of him with much love on the feast of St. Nicholas. 

To prepare for St. Nicholas's feast day this year we have been doing a lot of fun reading, watching movies (Veggie Tales St. Nicholas) and we have lots of other fun activities this weekend leading up to his feast day on Sunday planned (so stay tuned!)

Linking up with Like Mother Like Daughter, Californa to Korea and This Ain't the Lyceum this week!

My Advent Reading List - 2015

I LOVED my Advent Reading List last year and was so excited to find something new and special for Advent this year.  Finding time for prayer, reflection and reading has always been very important to me and our children have learned (for the most part) to grant this time to me in the mornings.  If they are awake while I am doing my reading they are asked to go play in our basement so that I can have some quiet time.  Here are my selections for Advent this year:

Advent and Christmas Wisdom from St. Therese of Lisieux by John Cleary:

St. Therese of Lisieux has always been one of my favorite Saints so I am really looking forward to exploring more deeply into her life and wisdom this Advent season.  I love that this book has only a few pages to read each day including a story, scripture verse, prayer and action call!  Also I am so happy that this book continues throughout the twelve days of Christmas as well.

 

Blessed is She 2015 Advent Reflection / Journal:

I cannot sing enough praises about Blessed is She's reflections and journals.  I started using them last Advent and have continued daily throughout the year.  I find that when I am reading, reflecting and journaling in one place all together I gain so much more from God's word.  It is especially important to me during Advent to focus on the daily scripture and to take the time to listen to what God is saying to me in my life right now.

Blessed is She Jesse Tree: 

I love following the Jesse Tree with our children using Holy Heroes videos and ornaments from Jesse Tree Treasures, but I am also so excited to have my own reflection time and resource this year!  They are beautifully made cards including the Bible verses to read and a reflection.  I am so excited to be using this new resources this year and know I will treasure them for years to come!

The First Month With A Newborn

I cannot believe that almost one month has gone by with our sweet little Peter already.  A lot of people have been asking how we are doing and honestly the answer is GREAT!  Peter is such a fantastic baby, and I do not want to jinx it, but he is a phenomenal sleeper (which makes a HUGE difference).  Since a few days old he has been sleeping 5-6 hour stretches every night (from about 10pm- 3 or 4am) which that alone allows for me to get more sleep than I did for the first 8-9 months with some of our other babies!  Also, with each and every child I think that we relax more and more into our parenting, have gained confidence and most importantly have learned what really matters! 

Although life is a lot crazier now than with just one child I find myself slowing down more now than I did before.  I have found more time to just sit and relax with our baby, just staring at him and appreciating this amazing gift that God has given to us.  I have learned how fast our children grow and change and how much I adore this newborn phase.  I love learning each of their features, being graced with each new expression and those adorable first smiles. 

 

 

I no longer am doing things like recording feedings and diapers like I did with our first baby.  When the baby cries now, I feed him.  If he is sleeping, I let him sleep!  If he is fussy at night I bring him in bed with me and cuddle.  I do not find myself worrying about if he is gaining weight or reaching milestones, I just let him be who he is and trust that for the most part children will all grow and learn at their own rates in their own time. 

I am appreciating having little helpers in our home!  When our last child was born our other children were 3 1/2 years old and 19 months old.  Now our other children are almost 6 years old, 4 years, and 2 1/2 years old, which is a HUGE difference!  I find myself being able to enjoy the simple pleasures that I never felt like I had before with infants in our home like going to the bathroom by myself.  We have slowly been learning what we trust our boys to do with the baby and are teaching them new things every day!  I am also appreciating the fact that I have stopped feeling the "need" to entertain our children all of the time and realized that they can play with each other well and do not always need me.  I find our boys reading books to each other, setting up games to play together and even enjoying quiet time individually so much more than I did even a few months ago!

 

 

I have learned to appreciate homeschooling on a whole new level with having a newborn in our home.  As I expected, our older children did not really want to take a true break from doing school work, but I love how we can adjust our schedule as needed to flow with the changes in our life.  It has been such a blessing for our family to not have to rush to drop kids off at school and to be able to do reading lessons while I am nursing the baby!  When the children have had activities out of our home I have learned when to ask for other people to help so that I can stay home and not push myself too much during the first few weeks.  In balance with that though, I have also learned to say "yes" more to our children to fun simple activities that have always been a part of our daily routine like bike rides around the lake.

The biggest thing that is helping though this first month is learning to accept and appreciate help!  6 years ago when I was a brand new mom to our first son I not only thought I could do everything and anything all by myself, but I thought that I NEEDED to do it all!  I have humbly and graciously learned that having a community and giving myself the grace of taking a few things off my platter makes me a better person.  My dear husband came to me a few weeks before our newest son was born and tactfully told me that he thought that I keep our home tended to well but wanted to know if I would want him to hire a housekeeper for a while once the baby was born.  I was kind of against it at first, feeling like it is truly part of my role in our home to clean, but humbly accepted his kind gesture.  Our housekeeper is now coming two times a month and it has made such a difference to take things like scrubbing the showers or other heavy cleaning off my to-do list!  Am I really weird to love really clean carpet, and even more that I was not the one to have to clean it?

 

The other part is having a community who support me and my family.  Between my family, dear friends, our church and homeschool communities we have had over 20 meals brought to us this first month.  Yes, you read that correctly, TWENTY!  And when you figure in how large most of these meals are and all of the left overs, the people who bring breakfast as well for the next morning; I basically have not had to make a thing for dinner all month!  I think that our children might be truly depressed once they realize that people are not bringing meals every night because usually they involve not only dinner but also dessert!  My parents and in laws have helped with our older boys bringing them to activities and creating fun special moments for them.  My friends have even gone out of their way to create special playdates with our children as well!  All of these things truly help our family realize that we are a part of a wonderful community and it makes the transition of a new baby into our family so much smoother.  I cannot express my thankfulness and appreciation enough.  We are truly blessed.

Happy 1st month of life little Peter!

Thankful

 

Thanksgiving came and went and it was crazy, busy, beautiful and full of love.  Having my husband and/or myself working in the medical profession for the past 10 years we have gotten "kind of" used to people needing to work during holidays.  This year my husband had to work Wednesday, Thursday and Friday of Thanksgiving week, which made for a long week for all of us.  Usually I would be thrilled for him to be working Thanksgiving, because that means he gets to be home for all of Christmas, but even though I am excited for him to be off work for Christmas it was still kind of hard thinking of him working so much for Thanksgiving when we are still adjusting to our family having FOUR children! 

 

We are so blessed to have family near by, and even more blessed that our family adjusted to our crazy life and all pitched in to make wonderful celebrations!  We have so much to be thankful for this year!  It was different to have the first Thanksgiving after our little saint Samuel went to Heaven and also welcoming Peter into our family.  What a year it has been!  My sweet mother in law made sure to remember all of our boys this Thanksgiving with special cookies (including Samuel).  It feels good to celebrate each one of our boys this Thanksgiving as they are all truly blessings to us all.

 

 

There was lots of delicious food, lots of games of Chutes and Ladders, Candy Land, and laughter; but most importantly there was an abundance of love.  Probably everyone's favorite part of this Thanksgiving was cuddling and loving our little Peter.  We are all so in love with our him and truly thankful that God has blessed us with him being a part of our family.

 

I hope that you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving!