Christmastide...

What stinks about Christmas is that we roll everything up into one big day.  Now, I love December 25 as much as the next mom, but what I REALLY love is December 26.  Why?  Because it is the first day we can relax and enjoy.

I probably wouldn't enjoy December 26 so much if I had to take down all the decorations by then.  I don't think I'd enjoy the whole week-between-Christmas-and-New-Year's time nearly as much if I hadn't been raised to extend the Christmas season all the way through Epiphany (January 6).  I can't remember a single time when we took the decorations down before January 6. Sometimes we didn't even take the down until Valentine's Day, but that's another blog post. :)

Whoever started the whole tradition that it's bad luck to go into the new year without taking down  Christmas decorations was just nuts.  Everyone knows:  a) there's no such thing as luck, and b) if there were, it all hinges on eating collard greens and black-eyed peas (the food, not the group) with a shiny dime under your dinner plate on New Year's Day. Not that we would ever do all those things in our family...

What was the point of this?  Oh yeah, Christmastide.  Back in the day when everything wasn't riding on December 25, there was a whole season of feasting and gift-giving.  You didn't have to get it all over with in a couple of days; you had twelve days of Christmas to see all the family and friends you wanted to see and find excuses not to see those you just couldn't tolerate.

December 25 was the first day of Christmas.  December 26, the second.  December 27, the third. December 28, the fourth.  December 29, the fifth (Yes, I am going to write all these out.  Then you'll have a handy guide each day to know what "day" you're on.) December 30, the sixth.  December 31, the seventh.  January 1, the eighth.  January 2, the ninth.  January 3, the tenth.  January 4, the eleventh. And January 5, the twelfth.  On January 5th, you'd be having a Twelfth Night feast.  And on January 6, you'd celebrate the Feast of Epiphany.

Since I wasn't around in previous centuries... other than the one immediately before this one, which had already switched to the December 25 system of celebrating... I don't know if you were allowed to have leftovers from the Twelfth Night feast at the Epiphany feast. It's not really an issue around here, as we have teenagers and no matter how much I cook, there's never enough food left over to make another meal for the entire family.

Jimmy's got Christmastide off from work this year.  Well, he's off until January 3, which is when we go back to school anyway.  We're going to attempt to maintain a festive atmosphere here through January 6. I'll let you know how that goes.

In the meantime, we'll have New Year's dinner (or our eighth night feast) at Gramma's.  We only need five more maids and eight cows to make it work.

It's a most wonderful time of the year...

Sunday evening we lit the first candle of the season. I love our family Advent devotions.  We talked about hope, and each of us shared some things we're hoping for.  Then we paused to thank Jesus for laying down heaven for a time to rescue us so that we can have genuine hope.  Amazing.

Wednesday we started our Advent calendar for daily family devotions.  This year we're using an Advent garland that Zack made in school.  I was still looking for the perfect Advent calendar over the weekend; I found one in the Advent box in the attic, but I had a feeling that it probably wasn't as gospel-centered as I'd hoped.  I even posted as one of my 10 things to do this season that I wanted to find a gospel-centered Advent calendar.  I figured I'd hit all the bookstores on Tuesday afternoon when I had some time.

And then... guess what?  (You know God is in the details, right?) Zack came home with a craft he had done in school: a green and red and white paper chain printed with Old Testament and New Testament verses that "demonstrate how the prophecies of old came true with Jesus' birth."

I love the directions that follow:  "You may want to allow your child to find and read the verses, being ready to offer assistance on how each verse fits into the traditional Christmas story.  May God bless your family's time together as you prepare for this season of Advent."

After devotions, Zack heads to bed and we sing 3, okay 4, Christmas songs.  Meanwhile downstairs, we hang out with Kelsey and Zane.  What a blessing, indeed!

Since the dishes are done and the kitchen is clean...

Let's recap Thanksgiving day.

Since the TV is above the mantle in this house, I had to figure out where to put the old mantle garland.  The light seems so much more festive with berries. 

Gramma and Granddaddy joined us.  Silly folks!  I love my family.

The kids after dinner.  They had to work hard to stay out of the coma state...

... that wiped out Jimmy. 

Ah, Thanksgiving naps.  Nothing like them. 

He woke up. Such a great day!

Ah, I found it online...

Our must-have Thanksgiving dish is Sweet Potato Souffle. I googled it to see if anyone else calls it the same thing. Sure enough, here it is! Click on the picture for the link to the site and the recipe. Ah-may-zing goodness awaits you.

(It's pretty much the same recipe that we use, only we double the topping because it's everyone's favorite part.)

Happy Thanksgiving Eve Eve!

Night of Christmas Lights 2009: Top 5 Can't-Miss Houses...

Love, love, love the Christmas lights!!! If you can catch only a few, here are the ones not to miss. And if you have only 15 minutes and can go to only one neighborhood, head to #1 and #2. You can actually see them around the corner from each other. Trust me, no still photo could even begin to capture the experience.

5. Pat's Branch Drive in Umstead Ridge. Lights set to really cool Trans-Siberian Orchestra music. The music and dancing lights make this one a lot of fun to watch. One of my besties lives within sight of that house, and I am very, very jealous!

(No picture because the light show moves FAST! By the time we got to the end of the song when all the lights are on at once, I'd put away the camera. Plus, the lights are mainly white. White lights are tough to photograph without looking like one giant flash going off.)

4. Corner of New London and Howard Drive in Stonehenge. Inflatables. Lots and lots of inflatables. Best use of candy canes hanging in a tree award! Great to look at, but on a trafficky road, so be careful! Not everyone out there loves lights as much as we do, so if you are in front of the wrong person, it's a little skeery.

(No pictures because the guy behind us didn't feel the love we were feeling for savoring the inflatable display. I was a-skeert to stop and snap a shot.)

3. Anderson Drive... closer to Six Forks than Glenwood. If you're coming from Glenwood, it'll be on the left. If you're coming from Six Forks, it'll be on the right. Oh. My. Word. You usually have to go to a theme park to find that many giant characters with moving parts. Worth the trip towards Midtown.

(No pictures. Too much traffic. I hate that; it really is a sight to behold. Little kids will LOVE it!)

2. Sleepy Creek Drive. Stonehenge. Lights set to music. Street's not too busy, so you can stop and enjoy. Impressive light choreography, and just around the corner from the #1 house on the tour.



1. Abbey Lane. Stonehenge. Those houses on YouTube have got nothing on this one. Being the owner of an overly-lit home during the Christmas season, I can sincerely appreciate the sheer wattage that goes into this one. You know when you drive up and there's a sign that says "Light Show - 5pm -10pm" that there's something to see. Well, that and the LONG line of cars sitting in front of the house... This house is so spectacular that you do not want to go until you've seen everything else there is to see. This is HGTV-and-TLC-Christmas-Light-Special league. It too is set to music. Look for the singing Christmas tree and Santa in the front yard. Check out the whole Charlie Brown Christmas cast to the right of the driveway and the main attraction of Christmas, the Nativity on the far right of the front yard. On the house itself, a moving sleigh pulled by racing reindeer is perpetually taking off from the roof. And in the front window you'll see the Right Jolly Old Elf wandering through the room and peeking outside. I snapped a few pics, but truly nothing short of sitting there and staring at it for a good little while does it justice.

A Very Nearly Classy Christmas...

Yes, actually, we DID go there.


A near-Christmas snow in Southtown!


Our house on a snowy night. Trust me... it was snowy for a couple of hours.


The new addition I've always wanted... Moravian Star!!! And the perennial decoration we never take down... the Santa gnome.


Wreath.


Lights on the picket fence.

Photography courtesy of Kelsey...

66 West...

Yesterday was the fourth of July. We had a great day, waking up around the time we'd like to get up everyday and spending time leisurely checking a couple of things off the "To Do" list. Gramma came over for a cookout, bringing with her homegrown green beans and our family favorite potato salad. We love it when Gramma comes to visit. Our family is getting so small, and everyone is so busy that we rarely get a chance to enjoy being family. Holiday celebrations are extra special when we can be together. After we ate, Gramma headed home, and I fell asleep at the foot of my bed waiting for 8:30 to come.

At 8:30 every July 4th, we load up the truck and head out to see the fireworks. We always go see the same show, but part of the fun of the night is trying to find the best place to watch it. For a few years, we discovered the hill on a major road where we would pull onto the grassy median and watch two fireworks shows at the same time. But the grassy median is grassy. And buggy. And we spent a good amount of time after we got home checking for ticks and putting lotion on mosquito bites. So we decided to hunt a new spot. Last year we found a pretty decent one, so we headed that direction there this year to see if we could improve the view. Oh. My. Word. We hit the jackpot!

We found an asphalt-covered viewing spot that only about 10 other vehicle-loads of people knew about. It was epic. The spot was directly in front of the fireworks show, far enough away not to get covered with ash, but close enough that you could hear the swoosh of the launcher and feel the boom as the powder exploded. About 15 minutes into the show, we heard rival fireworks. Sure enough, looking just slightly west of where we were sitting, we could see the show from the next town over. Two shows, just like in the grassy spot. No bugs. No crowds. Just lights and booms and oohs and ahhhs. It was a great night.

We're thinking next year we might head out a little earlier, with some friends and a homemade ice cream maker. Want to join us?

Better late than never...

I about let the last Christmas Memories Monday get away. It's still the Christmas season, so I'm going to attempt to finish strong...

CHRISTMAS MEMORIES MONDAY: Food and Family

1. Do you have your big meal on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day? Christmas Day. Christmas Eve is dedicated to the Love Feast at church. See the post just below this one for pictures.

2. Is there a certain meal you always cook (with maybe changing a few sides now and then) or is it just a feast no matter what the menu? For about the past five years we have been having bacon-wrapped rosemary pork tenderloin. I got the recipe at the first Holidays Fit for the King and everyone loved it so much, it became out new Christmas dinner tradition.

3. Who will come, or you go see, on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day? My mom goes with us to the Love Feast and then comes over to our house on Christmas Day just after noon. It's just our immediate family on Christmas morning, though.

4. What time do your kids wake you up (or do YOU wake up if you do not have kids in the house with you)? Well... this year Zack woke up at 3:30am and I don't know that he ever really went back to sleep. I attempted to stay in his room until fell asleep again, but finally at 5am, I gave up. I told him that if I had to stay in his room any longer, I'd have to sleep in and we couldn't open presents until after noon. :-D Amazingly, he found a way to go back to sleep. The rule for our house is that you don't get to go downstairs until Mom and Dad are awake and go with you. And Mom and Dad sleep in until 7am. At 7am the kids, who each have a Christmas bell that sits next to their bed, are allowed to ring the Christmas bells announcing the birth of Jesus and then they come into our room, where Jimmy reads The Christmas Story. THEN we go downstairs.

5. Do you do the Santa thing? We play the Santa game. We tell the kids that it's pretend... but fun! We also tell them that even though the Santa game is pretend, lots of parents choose not to tell their kids it's pretend until they get older. "Santa" fills the stockings. That's it. Mom and Dad give the rest of the presents. We have found it to be a wonderful compromise that keeps the focus on Jesus as the greatest gift and our giving gifts to each other out of love as a reflection of the gifts that God gives us. The biggest blessings we have seen from being up-front about Santa is that if there's a "hot gift" of the year that we can't get, we simply tell the kids and ask them if they want to wait or get something else. There's no explaining that Santa does really love you and you are really special even though you didn't get what you really, really wanted and your friend asked for the same thing and got it. The other thing that is good is that there's not the dreaded conversation about how we lied to them about Santa until they were a certain age and now we're telling them the truth. As neat as the whole magical wonder of Christmas thing is, we just couldn't bring ourselves to pretend without letting our kids know we were pretending. Ironically, our oldest was talking about the Santa game just a couple of days ago and saying she was thankful we did it that way as many of her friend were devastated when they found out the truth.

OK... done! Hope you all had a very Merry Christmas!!!

Christmas Memories Monday: Li'l Traditions...

1. Does your family do some type of countdown?

Oh goodness, yes. We countdown and countdown and countdown. This year we're opening drawers in the wooden Advent calendar. We're also flipping the number blocks on our snowmen countdown decoration.

2. Where are your stockings hung?

By the chimney with care. But not until Christmas Eve night. After the Love Feast.

3. Do you have any Christmas Eve traditions?

On Christmas Eve night we attend the Love Feast at our church. We go to the 6:00 service and Gramma comes with us. Nothing says Christmas Eve like Scripture, carols, David and Cathy, and sticky buns and cider. Zack's favorite part is getting to stand in the chair and hold the candle up in the air. Since we lost Granny (my mom's mom) a few years ago and Jimmy's mom (Nana) a few years before that, neither of our extended families get together on Christmas Eve. It's just my mom (Gramma) and us and our kids. But being at church and seeing our dear friends on Christmas Eve makes it feel like family again.

After the service, we come home and eat an easy dinner... subs or chili or something like that. We watch A Christmas Story. We have family devotions. We pray. We get nestled all snug in our beds and drift off until there are visions of sugar plums dancing in our heads.

4. Is there a certain drink that you love that you only drink this time of year?

Grande Pumpkin Spice Latte. Skim. No whip.

5. What do you do for Christmas Cards?

That's a good question. Until last year we sent out picture cards that I made and included a Christmas letter. Last year, my dad was in the hospital twice in the month of December and ended up staying with us for about a total of 6 weeks until he was able to go home and be on his own. I didn't get cards out. This year, I intended to go back to the old way of sending out cards, but I just haven't been able to get all the kids ready for the picture at the same time. I THINK I will likely send out a picture and short note, giving everyone the address for this blog and inviting them to visit with us all year next year. On the blog. I mean, they can come see us for a couple of days, but... really... all year is a LONG time!

Those are our little traditions. If you have ones you'd like to share, leave a comment. Or better yet... email them to me and I'll put them up on Celebrating Christmas. Next Monday begins Christmas Traditions Week!

(Thanks Ivy!)

A Griswold Family Christmas...

Sharing the fun of Christmas decorating...

I have a friend in the blogosphere named Ivy. She and I both LOVE TobyMac. Of course, who doesn't? And if you don't ... shhhhhh ... don't tell me.

Ivy has started posting Christmas Memories Monday on her blog, "A Walk in My Shoes," during the holiday season. It's really fun to answer the questions she posts. Here are my answers. I just love Christmas!!!

CHRISTMAS MEMORIES MONDAY: Decorating

1. When do you start decorating for Christmas?

We start decorating the Saturday after Thanksgiving. Friday goes to packing away all the scarecrows and pumpkins of the fall season. The first things that usually go up for Christmas are the front door wreath, the nativity scenes and anything related to Advent. It took me a lot of years to realize that I needed to pack all the Advent decorations (wreath, calendars, devotionals, etc.) in one box, label it clearly on all four sides and place it on top of everything else in the attic. We used to always miss about the first week of Advent because everything was packed away with all the rest of Christmas decorations. Since we started the Advent box, we haven't missed a December 1st.

2. Do you have a color scheme to your decorations?

Red and green. And gold.

3. Do you have a particular collection or certain Christmas "symbol" that you favor?

Nativity scenes. Snowmen. Snowflakes. Berries. These things manage to appear in just about every room of the house. Since un-decorating in January is a little depressing, we keep the snowmen, snowflakes, and some of the berries up through February. Just to keep things festive for winter.

4. What is a decorating tradition of yours that perhaps your mom did and now you do too?

The Advent wreath. My mom's mom ... Granny ... always had an Advent wreath. And we always had one growing up. When I got married, my mom started us with out own Advent wreath ring. The Advent wreath has always been a treasured centerpiece of our Christmas, although it's taken on many forms over the years.

5. Where do you place your Christmas Tree?

Wherever it fits. This season is only the second we've had in this house. Last year we put the Christmas tree in the family room, next to the fireplace and in front of our largest back-of-the-house window. It's important to us that the tree be in the "heart" of our home, where we spend most of our time. This year the crate for our rescue-puppy, Pepper, is sitting there. The tree goes up this weekend, and we're debating whether we leave Pepper's crate and put the tree in front of the window overlooking the pool or whether we move Pepper's crate and put the tree where we had it last year. We'll let you know! We also have a playroom Christmas tree with the ornaments the kids have made in Sunday school and as craft projects at home and even at school school. Our last Christmas tree appeared just this year. Last year it was the tree at the condo, but this year, it is out Jesse tree. It lives in the living room and you can see it from the front window.

If you are willing to share your decorating traditions, copy and paste this entry into your blog and change the answers to your own. Then leave a comment sharing that you did it. Cool!