O Come O Come Emmanuel

"Advent should be dark and tense. The world desperately needs a Savior, and in advent we should feel the weight of that longing."
One of my wise pastors, Mike Cosper, wrote this on facebook and it has made me think a lot over the past 2 weeks of Advent about how we celebrate and what we focus on.




Advent Season is upon us and this year we have been a little more diligent about starting more traditions surrounding Advent. We really want our children (and ourselves) to be reminded of the birth of Christ and also the longing that we still have for Christ to return.

We have been doing a little combo Advent Calender/Jesse Tree thing with the girls. We put the Jesse Tree Ornament inside the calender (and sometimes a special treat). Ruby pulls it out and colors it as we read the corresponding story and sing a Christmas song/hymn. So far she likes O Come O Come Emmanuel and Angels We Have Heard On High. Not sure what I am talking about when I say "Jesse Tree"? Check out this link from Passionate Homemaking blog.

Ruby coloring one of her ornaments

I have also been reading the Christmas story to Ruby almost daily (they say repetition is good for little ones). We mostly read from the Jesus Storybook Bible but sometimes we have read from a little book my mom gave us called (i think) The Story of Jesus. I pick different parts from the story and find coloring pages online to color. So, the first day we colored a picture of the Angel Gabriel talking to Mary...one day we colored a picture of Joseph and Mary when they arrived in Bethlehem. This has been great to help Ruby remember more details of the story.
This is an old picture of Brian reading to the girls.
Also, here is a more recent picture of the girls. There will be more to come hopefully this week.