December 23, 2016

Christmas to Me

One of my favorite Christmas songs is by a group I really cannot recommend, but it played on Pandora last year and I really liked it. It's called "That's Christmas to Me", and it just reminded me that while there are so many holiday traditions, the special ones are the ones that each family has for themselves.

Christmas can be a bit of a touchy subject in Christian groups. Celebrate or don't celebrate? Tree or no tree? Christmas music or no?

While my family does celebrate Christmas, and we do set up a tree, and I've had my Christmas cd's playing on repeat, I have several friends who don't, and that's ok. We don't try to shove our beliefs on each other, and we respect the differences in opinion.

But do you know what Christmas is to me?

It's not about unwrapping presents, it's about spending the time picking out those perfect gifts that let the other person know you've been listening, that you truly do know them - likes, dislikes, wants, and needs. You heard, and wanted to do something special for those special people. This year, I'm most excited to give my mom her gift. In one way I want her to open it right now, but in another way, I want to put it off as long as possible because once everything's been given, the excitement of anticipation is over.

Anticipation. That's my most favorite part. The weeks leading up to the 25th. For us, it starts on Thanksgiving Day putting up the tree and the lights and all the decorations. In the following weeks we go shopping, we bake, we stay up late watching Christmas movies. I wish it lasted 2 months, if I'm being honest - it goes by way too fast!

Christmas is about family and friends, and spending quality with those you love the most. It's helping others who are maybe a little lonely or have a little less. 

It's telling the story of Christ's birth over and over while Lena Rae moves our nativity magnets where they go. Mary and "Jophus" making the trip to Bethlehem to have baby Jesus, the angel telling the shepherds who were watching their sheep to find the sleeping baby, and the wise men from the east following the star that pointed to Jesus. Then we move it to the other side of the fridge as we tell it again.


It's our quiet Christmas Day (which we spend as Christmas Eve), playing games, eating good food, and ending with "It's a Wonderful Life". I cannot tell you how much I love this movie, I truly look forward to watching it every year and I don't think Christmas would be the same to me without it.  "Remember, no man is a failure who has friends."

cousins! matching was a BIG deal :)

It's making Stromboli with the kids and buying them pajamas to wear while we drive around town with our hot chocolate looking at Christmas lights. They're old enough now to remember and realize that it's an annual tradition, and their excitement makes me even more excited. Just the aunts and our nephews and niece! 

I always try to take some extra time to contemplate (and usually write) about Mary and Joseph and what the birth of Jesus must have been like for them. There's no way to even come close to imagining carrying the maker of your own body inside of that body. To nourish and clothe and raise the One who gave you life. If I had the chance to sit down and talk to Mary and ask her questions and hear her stories, I would never stop listening. I would always want to know more. 

Christmas doesn't have to look the same for everyone - indeed, I hope it doesn't! But I do hope you don't get caught up in the commercialism of it. The stress and worry of trying to get everyone you know a present. My friends and I try to get together for coffee or just a talk, but we made a "no gift" rule several years ago because that's just not what it's all about. 

Anyway, I just wanted to tell you a bit of what Christmas is to me and I hope you have a very merry one. I will be spending it in church with my very large "extended" family! Thank you for reading, and I'll "see" you in 2017.





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