Making Memories

Checking in to let you all know I'm still here. We are having a wonderful time "Celebrating Christmas" with lots of activities to fill our days. Fun with friends and family are what makes the Christmas season so special.
Although we have been pretty busy I make sure we are taking time to relax and enjoy the season and spend time together as a family! Here are some ideas to help enjoy the season to the fullest! These sound simple but sometimes we need to be reminded to slow down and enjoy the season.

Enjoy hot chocolate together often
Read a good Christmas book or better yet the Christmas Story from the Bible
Make cookies together
Visit a nursing home or elderly person
Take a meal to a neighbor
Set up a night with friends, church members, etc. to go Caroling
Play in the snow
Sing and learn about Christmas Carols together
Watch a Christmas Movie

"Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign; the virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.
Isaiah 7:14

FRIENDS

We have a very special home school group that we love very much and we are spending time doing lots of fun activities such as:
ice skating, join together to see a symphony and a ballet, The Christmas Carol, caroling at an elderly apartment complex, Christmas party, and next week we will meet with a few close friends to make cookies and ginger bread houses.

The kids are not the only ones who are having much fun and fellowship, our mom's had a Mom's Christmas party and had a blast!! We sang and acted out The Twelve Days of Christmas
and also exchanged gifts as we played the game of "stealing the gift" theme. What a hoot these ladies are!! We had such a great time as we laughed, enjoyed wonderful food and fellowship and even danced a bit!

FAMILY

Taking time out to visit our family is something we are doing this year as we try to show the LOVE OF CHRIST during this special time of year. Little visits, helping with wrapping gifts, shopping, and anything else needed that me and my girls can do to help others.
We have also enjoyed shopping together with family and of course grandma who lives next door always makes Christmas special by baking cookies together and making special recipes that are traditional each year. Now, mind you, our children and the nieces and nephews are all teens now, but, grandma still has a stocking as she has every year filled with goodies for them to enjoy before Christmas. Spoiled I tell you! Spoiled rotten.

SERVANTS

As we continue to teach our children (young adults) to serve others by example, we can lead in guiding them to serve during the holidays.
The youth in our church served in a homeless shelter a couple of weeks ago and this has been such a blessing for them to reach out to others less fortunate. The timing of being so close to Christmas really touched the hearts of our teens as they realize giving is better than receiving.
Many of them testified about how much this meant during a special Youth Service during the morning worship service.
Another way they helped to serve is by buying for two children from an Angel Tree set up in our local Mall. The youth did the shopping, budgeting, and wrapping of this project.

HOMESCHOOL

Yes, we continue to do school between all the wonderful activities that surround the Christmas season. We are doing a bit of a Unit Study on Christmas which includes reading several good books for the season.

The Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
The Best Christmas Pageant Ever by Barbara Robinson
The Christmas Barn by C.L. Davis
The Christmas Box by Richard Paul Evans

We are also using several of the wonderful resources found here.

HOMEMADE GIFTS

A few of our gifts this year are homemade. It's become a tradition to make the GIFT JARS like the ones found here and here.
Oh, what fun we have making these, especially the cookies using M&M's are really pretty for Christmas and the most YUMMY and very pretty are the Chocolate Chip Oatmeal!!

We hope you are enjoying this Christmas season as much as we are!!!