Advent Traditions

Our family has some Christmas-time traditions that we've continued for many years, some that we started a few years ago, and some that we are starting this year.

We have ornaments that we have collected over the years, many bought to represent things from that year, and we have special ornaments that were given to us as gifts. But I think our favorite ornaments are the ones that we buy each year for our family picture. We have an ornament from every year since my husband and I were married that represent our family that year. The first one is a picture of us at our wedding and the ornament is a little VW bug that says "Our first Christmas together". That's the one that started this little tradition and I just love to look at each of these ornaments and see what our family looked like during that year.

We also have an advent calendar that we've used for years that has little drawers and the kids pull the corresponding drawer each day to find a little candy surprise. This year we also decided to add a slip of paper in each drawer that says what we will do together as a family that day (an idea I got from Famliy Fun magazine).

Some of them are things we do each year already and others are new things (here are a few):

-go look at Christmas lights

-watch Polar Express while sipping hot chocolate

-make and decorate Christmas cookies

-read about Jesus' birth in the Bible

-make crafts

-do something nice for someone else without him/her knowing

-make wrapping paper

-make a gingerbread house

-play Christmas games such as To Bethlehem

-decorate Christmas cupcakes

-go Christmas Caroling at a children's hospital

-visit our city's special light show.

Each morning the kids are excited to see what is planned for the day, and it has really helped me from getting too busy and not doing these fun things like I may have in the past. Since it's in the calendar, the kids hold me to it!! Our family has had so much fun with this already!

A new tradition we have added this year is to read the book Jotham's Journey for advent. It is a great story set at the time of Jesus' birth about a boy who learns all about the coming Messiah while having quite an adventure. We read a section each night and the story eventually leads to the birth of Christ on the Christmas Day reading. The boys are enjoying it so much they often ask us to read more than one a night, which we don't do unless we are behind a day!

We also still enjoy our Elf on the Shelf, who hides in a new location every day. The kids usually get up and search for it as soon as they are awake.

Christmas Eve day the kids will go on a scavenger hunt to find one small present each. Then in the evening we read the story of Christ's birth in the Bible, read "The Night Before Christmas" and then the kids' cajun uncle reads a hilarious book called "The Cajun Night Before Christmas".
I really love traditions, especially ones surrounding my favorite holiday, Christmas.

I'll post some pictures of some of the things we do together as a family as we do them!