7 Complicated Advent Preps

So, it's farewell to The Glorious Turkey and all the gourds and pumpkins, and hello to all the Advent stuff!

The thing to keep in mind is that we have now been doing the Advent thing with kids for 20 years.  In the beginning, I was looking for Advent stuff to do that would be meaningful, helpful, and fun.


Now we have the weight of Tradition, as well as the "need" to have 6 small things to do each day so each kid can do an Advent thing each day. Also, I've done it so long, it's easy for me.

Do what I did: if it looks like fun, and not too much work, try it.  If it doesn't, smile and nod.

This is what it looks like for us.


Kid 1: Open a door on the Advent House.  Inside, there are 6 pieces of candy, and a Playmobil Advent piece to put in the stable.

Yeah, the sheep is in the attic.  The kid decides where to put it.





Kid 2: Find and place the Jesse Tree ornament while I read the scripture passages.

You can find all sorts of sources for Jesse Tree scripture and ornaments.  My set are from an ornament swap organized years ago by my friend Jolene - this means I have a set of cool and creative ornaments while only having had to come up with one good idea.

As they've broken or gotten lost, we've been replacing them with shrinky dinks.  Not as cool, but doable.




Kid 3: Opens the day's flap on the paper calendar.

I thought we would reuse last year's 3D calendar, pictured here on the fish tank, but, at the last minute, they decided to go with a round one I had on hand.


Kid 4: Lights and blows out the Advent candles and does the felt calendar.

Back in the day, it was just blowing out the candles, you know, before we trusted the kids with producing fire!




Kid 5: Chooses a book to unwrap.

We have way to many Advent and Christmas books, so I just wrap 25 of our favorites in tissue paper.  The rest are loose in the other box.

Most are religious, but some are secular, and you never quite know what you are picking!

I've found it's a good way to make sure we actually get to all of them.  As an extra bonus, it's good training for how to politely receive and unwrap gifts, as well as what to do with the paper afterwards...
Kid 6: Chooses and places an ornament.

This is one of the favorite Advent tasks!

They aren't tree ornaments, they are decorations.  It's a lovely, no stress way to decorate, and I love it that the house gets slowly more decorated as Advent goes on!



Kid 7: Well, there is no 7 to do another task, but we all do little acts of love and kindness to soften our hearts for Baby Jesus' arrival.

That's our crib (next to Love, our parakeet!), and we put a piece of hay in every time we pray, sacrifice, or make  little act of love.

Extra bonus: If you don't have time for a complicated Advent, here's yesterday's Easy Advent Prep:
A Christmas Kit

More Advent stuff with Kelly and the Quick Takers (sounds like a band...).

Hello Advent!

Shamelessly cribbing from last year, it's farewell to The Glorious Turkey and all the gourds and pumpkins, and hello to all the Advent stuff!

The thing to keep in mind is that we have now been doing the Advent thing with kids for 20 years.  In the beginning, I was looking for Advent stuff to do that would be meaningful, helpful, and fun.


Now we have the weight of Tradition, as well as the "need" to have 6 small things to do each day so each kid can do an Advent thing each day. Also, I've done it so long, it's easy for me.

Do what I did: if it looks like fun, and not too much work, try it.  If it doesn't, smile and nod.

This is what it looks like for us.


Kid 1: Open a door on the Advent House.  Inside, there are 6 pieces of candy, and a Playmobil Advent piece to put in the stable.

Yeah, the sheep is in the attic.  The kid decides where to put it.





Kid 2: Find and place the Jesse Tree ornament while I read the scripture passages.

You can find all sorts of sources for Jesse Tree scripture and ornaments.  My set are from an ornament swap organized years ago by my friend Jolene - this means I have a set of cool and creative ornaments while only having had to come up with one good idea.

As they've broken or gotten lost, we've been replacing them with shrinky dinks.  Not as cool, but doable.




Kid 3: The velcro calendar!

This was something I thought would fall by the wayside, but it has the weight of Tradition, so on it goes.


Kid 4: Lights and blows out the Advent candles and does the felt calendar.

Back in the day, it was just blowing out the candles, you know, before we trusted the kids with producing fire!




Kid 5: Chooses a book to unwrap.

We have way to many Advent and Christmas books, so I just wrap 25 of our favorites in tissue paper.  The rest are loose in the other box.

Most are religious, but some are secular, and you never quite know what you are picking!

I've found it's a good way to make sure we actually get to all of them.  As an extra bonus, it's good training for how to politely receive and unwrap gifts, as well as what to do with the paper afterwards...
Kid 6: Chooses and places an ornament.

This is one of the favorite Advent tasks!

They aren't tree ornaments, they are decorations.  It's a lovely, no stress way to decorate, and I love it that the house gets slowly more decorated as Advent goes on!



Kid 7: Well, there is no 7 to do another task, but we all do little acts of love and kindness to soften our hearts for Baby Jesus' arrival.

That's our crib (next to Love, our parakeet!), and we put a piece of hay in every time we pray, sacrifice, or make  little act of love.

Extra bonus: If you don't have time for a complicated Advent, here's yesterday's Easy Advent Prep:
A Christmas Kit

Advent!

Shamelessly cribbing from last year, it's farewell to The Glorious Turkey and all the gourds and pumpkins, and hello to all the Advent stuff!

The thing to keep in mind is that we have now been doing the Advent thing with kids for 20 years.  In the beginning, I was looking for Advent stuff to do that would be meaningful, helpful, and fun.


Now we have the weight of Tradition, as well as the "need" to have 6 small things to do each day so each kid can do an Advent thing each day. Also, I've done it so long, it's easy for me.

Do what I did: if it looks like fun, and not too much work, try it.  If it doesn't, smile and nod.

This is what it looks like for us.


Kid 1: Open a door on the Advent House.  Inside, there are 6 pieces of candy, and a Playmobil Advent piece to put in the stable.

Yeah, the sheep is in the attic.  The kid decides where to put it.





Kid 2: Find and place the Jesse Tree ornament while I read the scripture passages.

You can find all sorts of sources for Jesse Tree scripture and ornaments.  My set are from an ornament swap organized years ago by my friend Jolene - this means I have a set of cool and creative ornaments while only having had to come up with one good idea.

As they've broken or gotten lost, we've been replacing them with shrinky dinks.  Not as cool, but doable.




Kid 3: The velcro calendar!

This was something I thought would fall by the wayside, but it has the weight of Tradition, so on it goes.


Kid 4: Lights and blows out the Advent candles and does the felt calendar.

Back in the day, it was just blowing out the candles, you know, before we trusted the kids with producing fire!




Kid 5: Chooses a book to unwrap.

We have way to many Advent and Christmas books, so I just wrap 25 of our favorites in tissue paper.  The rest are loose in the other box.

Most are religious, but some are secular, and you never quite know what you are picking!

I've found it's a good way to make sure we actually get to all of them.  As an extra bonus, it's good training for how to politely receive and unwrap gifts, as well as what to do with the paper afterwards...
Kid 6: Chooses and places an ornament.

This is one of the favorite Advent tasks!

They aren't tree ornaments, they are decorations.  It's a lovely, no stress way to decorate, and I love it that the house gets slowly more decorated as Advent goes on!



Kid 7: Well, there is no 7 to do another task, but we all do little acts of love and kindness to soften our hearts for Baby Jesus' arrival.

That's our crib: we put a piece of hay in every time we pray, sacrifice, or make  little act of love.

Extra bonus: If you don't have time for a complicated Advent, here's yesterday's Easy Advent Prep:
A Christmas Kit

Seven Quick takes Advent

Happy Advent! It's not that I'm doing a ton of stuff for Advent, it's that all six kids are now old enough (or young enough ) to want to do something each day of Advent, so we do the first 6 things each day in rotation.

1.
The Advent House. Each door has 6 pieces of candy and a piece of the Playmobil Nativity. Each year, we lose more pieces of the set, so I usually buy a new set every other year. This year I couldn't find it!

This morning, Choclo opened door 3 and was surprised to find 6 lemon drops and a wooden dog from a puzzle. Ummm. A sheepdog, that's it, the shepherds could have brought a dog...






2. A paper Advent calendar. This one has doors that start before December 1st and goes through the Baptism of the Lord. I like that. I also like that each door has matching scripture and the images go with the saint of the day. It even has the O antiphons. It's also very cool that it's 3 D and you can put a light inside. But I can't fully recommend it.

I do not like that it has Rosa Parks on December 1st. Why? Dorothy Day on December 4th I can kinda see, but Rosa Parks for Advent? I'm all for Rosa Parks, but it's an odd choice. These are the only two like that in the whole calendar, but they are both in the first week. I also feel one of the less noticeable images over one of the doors is kinda immodest. My kids haven't noticed it, but why put it in? That being said, I got it from LTP.

3. The Jesse Tree. Every year I want to give my friend a hug (you know who you are!). It was she who organized the Jesse tree swap. She found 28 people and we each made 28 of one kind of ornament. Then we all got together and, you know, swapped! She even made a little booklet of all the scripture passages for each day.

If you haven't heard of it, the Jesse Tree goes through Salvation History one ornament at a time. We start with a little salt dough Earth and read the Creation story. Then we had a play-doh apple for the fall of man. Today we had a fabric camel to symbolize the covenant with Abraham. This may be my favorite Advent activity.


4. The velcro calendar. I'm afraid I should have gotten a new one this year, ours is looking a bit shabby! I got this one cheaply at Oriental Trading 3 years ago. I think it's time to invest in an upgrade.










5. Choose a decoration. We have all our Christmas decorations in a big heap on the guest room bed and #5 gets to choose one each day.

This actually is a nice, low stress way to decorate. I also like the gradual build up better than the *poof* now it's Christmas approach, although I can see why some people prefer the latter.

If the house were all decorated I would feel like the presents all ought to be wrapped (or at least bought). For me, that way lies madness!


6.Zorg and I built our Advent wreath last weekend. We've found having the glass pillar candles solves a lot of the problems with little kids and Advent candles (no picking apart the wax, the flames are less accessible, etc.)

It didn't occur to me that it looked less like a wreath until Choclo explained to (non-Catholic) guests, "This is our Advent nest."

Now, every time I look at it, I think, "Nest." Not a bad image for Advent, actually, I guess. # 6 gets to light and/or blow out the Advent wreath/nest.

7. The hay in the manger. This isn't rotating. We try to do good deeds, make small sacrifices, or spend extra time praying to prepare our hearts for Christmas. Each time, we put a little hay in the manger to make Baby Jesus' bed (and our hearts) a little softer when He comes.

OK, this has to be my favorite! We have a very beautiful statue that we put in the manger at Christmas and it is always the first thing the kids look for on Christmas morning.

My all time favorite Christmas memory was the year the Mxyl was 4, Klenda was 3, and Zorg was 1. They were completely focused on Christmas as Jesus coming. They had filled the manger with cotton balls (instead of hay). They had made presents for other people as a way of giving presents to Jesus. It hadn't occurred to them that they would get any presents themselves. The pure joy on their face that morning when they saw the Baby Jesus in the manger is something I will always treasure. They were fully and completely happy with Jesus. The presents later were just nice extras.

Happy Advent!!

More with Jen!

A More Appalling Thought

This Sunday is the feast of Christ the King, which means the next Sunday will start Advent! Yikes!
Time to start planning out Advent!

I've actually had a lovely year or two where I was done Christmas shopping by Advent. Not this year, I think. :)

On the plus side, this gets easier to plan since we have settled into some fun traditions and I don't feel like I have to "come up with" something each year.

I like to print out a blank calendar to plan on so I don't try to stuff in too much.

It helps that we have a tradition of decorating slowly. The big stuff gets scheduled: the second Sunday of Advent we put out our outside decorations and lights, the family creche goes up on the Feast of the Immaculate Conception, the third Sunday we do the inside greenery, beads and bows (we decorate the light fixtures and doorways), and the fourth Sunday we do the tree.

All the rest of the decorations are hauled into the guest room. Each day a kid gets to go in and pick a decoration to put up. Naturally, what gets picked first every year is the light up talking Nativity.

The figures don't actually talk, instead there is a narration with music. Inexplicably, they start with the Wise men and then do the shepherds. It is played some 5 or 6 hundred times a day for the entire Advent and Christmas season. $10 at Walmart 5 years ago. Who knew?

Then I poll the kids about their favorite Advent activities. The results this year?

We will definitely do the manger (you put a straw in every time you do a good deed and, by Christmas, Baby Jesus has a nice soft bed).

We will also do the Advent house (each day you open a door and find a piece of the playmobil nativity and some candy) .

We will do the sticker book if I can find the stickers. I had thought I'd just buy a new one, but $268 seems a bit steep. I mean, it was great, but not enough for a second mortgage!

The Jesse tree.

Paper advent calendars for each kid.

The Advent wreath, of course. We'll probably make a paper one for the children's altar.

We'll do the O Antiphons, when they come around. We print them out and distribute them at random with a sheet of poster paper. Everyone does their antiphon, and we put them up on the appropriate day.

And then, each week, we'll have a day to make cookies, a day to do make presents, and a day to make a decoration.

I have been thinking of themes. Advent is so big, I like to have a focus. I am thinking of using a song this year. O Come O Come Emmanuel is obvious, but I've never liked it musically. Growing up, it was sung every Advent (sometimes every Advent Sunday!) and always with a dirge like tempo. The words are great, but...

We used People Look East a few years back, and I liked it very much. There are four verses, with a fifth for Christmas Eve, and each one can be thought of as a different kind of preparation. I may do it again this year. Here are the words:

1. People, look east. The time is near
Of the crowning of the year.
Make your house fair as you are able,
Trim the hearth and set the table.
People, look east and sing today:
Love, the guest, is on the way.

2. Furrows, be glad. Though earth is bare,
One more seed is planted there:
Give up your strength the seed to nourish,
That in course the flower may flourish.
People, look east and sing today:
Love, the rose, is on the way.

3. Birds, though you long have ceased to build,
Guard the nest that must be filled.
Even the hour when wings are frozen
God for fledging time has chosen.
People, look east and sing today:
Love, the bird, is on the way.

4. Stars, keep the watch. When night is dim
One more light the bowl shall brim,
Shining beyond the frosty weather,
Bright as sun and moon together.
People, look east and sing today:
Love, the star, is on the way.

5. Angels, announce with shouts of mirth
Christ who brings new life to earth.
Set every peak and valley humming
With the word, the Lord is coming.
People, look east and sing today:
Love, the Lord, is on the way.

And here we have it sung:

Happy Advent!

 Each Advent we have six daily practices.  Why six?  Six Zoomlians each get to do one Advent thing a day.  We rotate through who does what, of course.

Kid one (Choclo today) opens a door on the Advent House.  Inside is a little Playmobil nativity figure.  And six pieces of candy, which kid one gets to give out.

And, of course, they get to place the figure (a lamb today, the camel just shows up - he doesn't fit in the Advent House).

 Kid two (Oob today), gets the Jesse Tree.  I read a short reading from the Old and New Tesaments about Creation, while Oob looked through the bag to find the "Earth" ornament. 

That's harder than it sounds at the beginning: there are nearly 30 possible ornaments since the length of Advent varies.

Kid three (Mxyl) gets to light and blow out the Advent candles at each meal.

Kid four (Klenda) gets to choose a gift for us to offer Jesus.  Today she suggested we all try to speak kindly and lovingly to each other.

 Child five (Zorg) gets to choose and unwrap an Advent book.  We have... an embarrassment of Advent and Christmas books!  More than 50, at any rate, so I wrap half (making sure to include a lot of favorites), and leave half "free."  It actually makes sure all the books are enjoyed. 

Most of the books are religious, but it's a pretty varied collection.  There are comic books, board books, lift the flaps, picture books, you name it.  Some are seriously beautiful, like Spirit Child, and some are seriously silly, like Santa Cows.  All well loved!

Child six (Leena) gets to pick an ornament.  Today she picked the snow globe you can see near the Advent House.

We've also put up our manger, which the kids are filling with hay as symbols of their prayers and sacrifices making their hearts a soft place for Jesus at Christmas.

I love Advent!  May your Advent be a peaceful and hope filled season, and may Christmas find each of us with soft hearts, ready for the infant King.

Getting Ready for Advent

I love these years where Advent starts more than a week after Thanksgiving!  Having the week to get ready makes everything feel less stressful.  Although I do realize I am getting ready for getting ready for Christmas, which does seem silly...

Actually, I love Advent, but now I find it's nice to ease into it. I've found I need to do 6 Advent things a day so that everyone can do something each day.  Plus stepping up the prayer (daily Mass), fasting (I'll be skipping sweets and minimizing desserts until Christmas proper), and alms giving (Heifer donation Jar, and probably Angel Tree).  Plus doing good deeds to put hay in the manger.  Plus we need to make an Advent wreath.  Plus, to start out, I need to strip all the walls... I love it all, but it's tough to do from a standing start.

Anyway, our 6 daily activities this year are:

1. The Advent House, full of Playmobil nativity figures and candy (6 pieces plus a figure behind each door).  This year I'll have the older kids set it up.

2. The paper Advent calendar.

3. The Jesse Tree.  This is doubling as our Bible time since each day goes through a part of salvation history in both the Old and New Testaments. I need to go through and replace the missing ornaments.

4. The ornament: a new Christmas decoration picked out each day!

5. Lighting (or just blowing out ) the Advent wreath candles.

6.  A kid gets to pick one thing we all can do as a gift to God that day.


Also, we may do the old velcro nativity scene Advent calendar (if we can find enough pieces!), so that may get combined with number 6.

You can see pictures of everything Advent here.

I also love online Advent calendars!  My favorite religious one is on Busted Halo, my favorite secular one is Boola and Kwala.

Gaudete Sunday!

Rejoice! We've lit the pink candle! Our Advent house has 16 doors open! Our Advent calenders are opening! Our nativity scenes are growing a cast of dozens! Best of all, the manger is growing an ever fluffier bed of cotton balls! Jesus is coming!!!!

For those who aren't cradle Catholics: The Advent wreath has 4 candles, 3 purple, and 1 pink, one for each week of Advent. Pink is the color of joy (gaudete means "rejoice"). Our Advent house has a door for each day. Behind each door is a piece of the Playmobil nativity set (and 5 pieces of candy!)

Since we have 5 kids old enough to "do" Advent, we have 5 daily Advent things (the kids rotate who does what). The Advent house is one, then there is a velcro/felt nativity scene, a traditional 3D paper Advent calendar, a Jesse Tree (daily scripture with representative ornament recounting salvation history and how Jesus fulfills the Old Testament), and the last kid gets to pick a Christmas decoration to take out.

The manger is my favorite Advent tradition. Every time some one does a good deed, says extra prayers, or makes a sacrifice, they put a cotton ball in the manger. The idea is actually that we are preparing a soft bed in our hearts for Baby Jesus, but it's a great visual aid! I have also seen this done with grass, hay, straw, or even shredded paper. The highlight of Christmas morning is seeing the lovely statue of Baby Jesus resting comfortably in the manger.

Seven Quick Takes: Advent Ready?

Well, ready might be overstating it, but at least we dragged all the Advent and Christmas stuff out of the basement and into the guest room!


We do six things each day in Advent (because we have six kids), and the kids rotate through who does what.


1. One thing is to choose a Christmas decoration to put up, hence all the stuff on the bed!


2. The second is to unwrap a Christmas book which we then read.  This year I came to grips with the fact that there will never be 52 days in Advent, so I could let go of a few of the less favorite books.


3. The third is the Jesse Tree.  We usually use this little tree to hang our ornaments (they're in the bag), but we are talking about drawing each symbol this year. Haven't figured it out yet!

4. The fourth is lighting/blowing out the Advent candles.  We use these glass protected candles which has saved us from ever burning any houses or children, even when we had wee ones blowing out the candles.

We'll make the wreath on the first Sunday of Advent (we set the candles in a pie plate and surround it with evergreen bits from the yard).


It looks very pretty, even if Choclo thought it was the Advent Nest for the first few years of his life!


5. The fifth is the Advent House!  It has a piece of the (Playmobil) nativity scene and 6 pieces of candy behind each door.


6. And the sixth is the paper calendar.  I love this one because opening the windows around the edge leaves the center picture intact.



7. Besides the individual stuff, we always have an empty manger to which we add hay.

 We try to do good deeds, make small sacrifices, or spend extra time praying to prepare our hearts for Christmas.

Each time, we put a little hay in the manger to make Baby Jesus' bed (and our hearts) a little softer when He comes.

 We have a very beautiful statue that we put in the manger at Christmas and it is always the first thing the kids look for on Christmas morning.

8. Bonus! Since this will be the Year of Mercy, we will be learning about the Corporal and Spiritual Works of Mercy, and seeing how many of them we can do this Advent!

Also: In organizing the Christmas stuff in the spare room, I started wondering if I would have enough room on the floor for present wrapping.

My solution was to put the outdoor stuff in the little guest bathroom.
 
It wasn't until I had done it that I realized...


Baby shower!


Happy almost Advent!  More fun with Kelly!

Happy Advent!

It used to annoy me that all the Advent Calendars started on December first, while Advent itself only managed that trick once every seven years or so.  But I'm feeling muuuuch better now!

Actually, I love Advent, but now I find it's nice to ease into it. I've found I need to do 6 Advent things a day so that everyone can do something each day.  Plus everyone has a paper calendar of their own this year.  Plus putting hay in the manger.  Plus, to start out, I need to strip all the walls... I love it all, but it's tough to do from a standing start.

We got back from Mumpy and Pa's Saturday night (Blue Streak blew the radiator on the way back, so we got home late).  On Sunday I went digging through the Advent and Christmas stuff in the back basement in a wild effort to get my act together.  I wonder if this is a metaphor for what the Second Coming is going to be like that for me...

Anyway, our 6 daily activities this year are:

1. The Advent House, full of Playmobil nativity figures and candy (6 pieces plus a figure behind each door).

2. The velcro calendar: faded and missing a piece or two, but we love it!

3. The Jesse Tree.  This is doubling as our Bible time since each day goes through a part of salvation history in both the Old and New Testaments.

4. The ornament: a new Christmas decoration picked out each day!

5. Lighting (or just blowing out ) the Advent wreath candles.

6.  This is new!  A kid gets to pick one thing we all can do as a gift to God that day.

You can see pictures of everything Advent here.

I also love online Advent calendars!  My favorite religious one is on Busted Halo, my favorite secular one is Boola and Kwala.

Advent Plans

It's true: we've been sick, we couldn't travel, we couldn't see family.  But it's an ill wind that blows no good: we have been able to excavate our Advent stuff and get ready in a fairly stress free way!

So, here's our plan.  Once again we have six kids, and therefore, once again, we have six things to do each day of Advent. We rotate through who does what.

Kid 1: The Advent House.  Behind each door is a piece of the Playmobil nativity set and six pieces of candy.

At this point we have many random pieces of many Playmobil nativity sets, and we set them up in a wooden stable from a long lost breakable nativity.

Anyway, the Bible doesn't specify how many kings showed up, or how many donkeys were at the stable, so as long as we stick to one Mary, Joseph, and Baby Jesus, we are fine.

Kid 2: The Jesse Tree.  That's the little tree next to the house.  Each day has scripture readings tracing salvation history and, of course, a matching ornament.



Kid 3: Unwrap a seasonal book.  This was an idea we picked up on the interwebs somewhere and it has been a big hit.

Plus it makes sure nearly all the books get read!

The only challenge is to choose which are the best 25 Christmas books...

Kid 4: The Advent Calendar.  This year I found a really beautiful one on Amazon.  It's big, it's double sided, and the windows are randomly arranged around the main picture so that opening them doesn't destroy the image.  I love it!!

Kid 5: Advent Candles.  They light and blow out the candles on the Advent wreath each day.  We are still using glass enclosed "7 day" candles, and we highly recommend them!

Kid 6: Choose an ornament.  This way our house gets slowly decorated over the course of Advent.

Besides the individual stuff, we always have an empty manger to which we add hay.

 We try to do good deeds, make small sacrifices, or spend extra time praying to prepare our hearts for Christmas.

Each time, we put a little hay in the manger to make Baby Jesus' bed (and our hearts) a little softer when He comes.

 We have a very beautiful statue that we put in the manger at Christmas and it is always the first thing the kids look for on Christmas morning.


Other stuff is less tangible.  We'll all donate money for a Heifer project. We'll try for more daily Masses (easier when we have no one sick!), and we like to see how many of the corporal and spiritual Works of Mercy we can fit in.