25 Days of Christmas

It's so hard to believe that it is December and Christmas is just around the corner. I won't get back on my soapbox from yesterday about how commercialized Christmas has become but I will say we are trying hard to teach our children what Christmas truly is about. To help with this, we've started something new...an Advent calendar. For each of the 25 days leading up to Christmas, we have planned an activity to do as a family. From reading Christmas stories, to making cookies, to delivering those cookies to elderly people, we are trying to focus on quality time together as a family while learning about the true meaning of Christmas...Jesus' birth and sharing His love with others.


Last night was, of course, the 3rd day and the first Sunday of Advent. We read from the Bible about the angel Gabriel visiting Mary and telling her she would be the mother of Jesus.

We made this Advent wreath and lit the first candle. This wreath has a special meaning to me thanks from some borrowed items from our families. The wreath is borrowed from my mother-in-law while the candle holders of the white candles are from my mother. The tall candle holder in the middle was a wedding present. Something from each of our separate families as well as our own family...

Every night Riley has a coloring page with a scripture from about the birth of Christ.

Today we made Christmas cookies from scratch. I always plan WAY more than I can actually accomplish. I had this whole big plan of making the cookies from scratch as well as royal icing to do this nice smooth decorating on top. That was way to complex to try with a 3 year old and 8 month old! Riley was very helpful though and once Phil got home he pitched right in and we improvised on the decorating.

I worked with the royal icing while Daddy and Riley used some buttercream icing I whipped up then topped the cookies off with colored sugar.

Josie being her normal wonderfully content self!

Here are the finished products...

Tomorrow we plan to deliver cookies to some of our elderly family members that can't get out. We also plan to deliver this special plate of cookies to our dear friends who just welcomed their fourth child last night. Congrats to Joe & Miranda! We can't wait to meet little Brady!