Christmas decorations

As is our tradition, we pulled out the Christmas decorations the Sunday after Thanksgiving. This year the kids were so excited to get to help. I (Keri) admit it is a bit hard for me to let them help, but I did my best to let the control-freak in me not get in the way. They had a blast!

This is our Jesse Tree. It is made of green felt and is about 6 feet tall. Last year, this was our only tree. Each ornament correlates to an Old Testament story that points toward the coming of Christ. We have a book that goes with it and read one story every night at the dinner table.

I am also a big fan of St. Nicholas Day. We celebrated St. Nicholas day this past Sunday (Dec 6) by having the kids put their shoes outside their bedroom doors when they went to bed and they awoke to candy and treats inside. More pictures to come on that. But anyway - here is our St. Nicholas with the gold pinecones and leaves Grandma made while she was here.

Here is the table inside our front door. The little penguins sing a song and wag their jingle-bell tails at the push of a button. Mathis loves to make them sing and has been heard singing to himself "Rockin' around the Christmas tree at the penguin party hop..." It's so funny.

And this year we were given an artificial tree. I wasn't going to put it up because we didn't have any of our personal ornaments here and I didn't really want a meaningless tree. However, while my mom was here visiting last week, she insisted that I could have the kids make ornaments and still make it meaningful. And she was so right! She worked with them all week to make jar-lid ornaments with the nativity characters, she taught Rachel to sew and made stuffed felt stars, balls and miniature christmas trees. I made some homemade cinnamon shape ornaments and a paper chain. And I really do love it. (I'm not sure why it looks crooked in the picture.)

So thanks, mom!