This Advent Will Be Special
I've been getting really excited about Christmas over the last few days (actually weeks, but Sssh!) and am busy planning everything to make this Christmas the most magical and Spiritual yet. Well, apart from the first one as a Baby being born to be Saviour of the world is pretty magical and spiritual.
Anyway.
With Daddy being in Birmingham all week, I want to plan things that the children and I can do together that I can also either give a simplified version to Daddy for whilst he is away or that he can "catch up" with when he gets back home, and of course that's why I need to start planning now. After all, December is really just a few days away if you take out all the hours of sleeping, eating, bathing, chore doing, shopping, cooking, school run, petrol filling, TV watching, blogging and whatever else it is that I do.
So, what have I got planned. Actually planned seems a little grown up and fully arranged, it's more like what have I got in mind.
Well, lets start with the things we're going to do together.
Each Sunday, we're going to light our Advent wreath candles together. We'll pray, read some scriptures and sing some of our favourite Christmas Hymns or Carols. I love the Spiritual refill that we get on a Sunday from this and the chance that we have as a family to read scriptures and pray together. I love Jen's candles this year, but mine are much smaller... I can't find a picture however!
I'm thinking of starting a Jesse Tree this year, and so each Sunday we'll work together to create various ornaments, If you don't know about Jesse trees then this Catholic website is brilliant at explaining about it all. Have you ever made a Jesse tree? If so, let me know if you found it added to your Spiritual appreciation of the season in the comments!
Each Saturday night we'll watch a movie together, We have plenty of Christmas movies to chose from, but I'll make sure we watch a Nativity film at least once, after all "it is the reason for the season". I just have to pick my favourite from all the ones that I've seen over the past *cough* twenty-five *cough* years. Of course, we'll definitely watch my Top Ten Christmas Movies and more than likely the film Nativity! at least twenty times...
For the time that we're apart I'm busy combing Pinterest for ideas and I've got several already, but if you have any ideas then please let me know either in the comments here, or on Facebook or Twitter, as it takes a village and all that!
One of the things we are definitely do is go to the Cinema (different towns, same time showings) to see Get Santa. My sister is planning on taking her troop to the cinema to see the same film, so we might get together to go as a BIG group and have some family time too.
We're going to make some new decorations (I quite like the Santa Hand print Baubles), and we'll try and top our 21 Christmas trees total this year too.. Oh and don't forget that I have a surprise for all of you this Advent, a little like our Calorie free Chocolate calender a few years back!
On top of all this we have a few ideas, that I can't actually share here on the blog because, well they are secret and we don't want people to know that it is us! However if you leave a comment because you're after some ideas from what we are up to, leave a comment and I'll send you an email or DM me or private message me or something!
So what are you up to this advent and what should I be adding to my list too?
Anyway.
With Daddy being in Birmingham all week, I want to plan things that the children and I can do together that I can also either give a simplified version to Daddy for whilst he is away or that he can "catch up" with when he gets back home, and of course that's why I need to start planning now. After all, December is really just a few days away if you take out all the hours of sleeping, eating, bathing, chore doing, shopping, cooking, school run, petrol filling, TV watching, blogging and whatever else it is that I do.
So, what have I got planned. Actually planned seems a little grown up and fully arranged, it's more like what have I got in mind.
Well, lets start with the things we're going to do together.
Each Sunday, we're going to light our Advent wreath candles together. We'll pray, read some scriptures and sing some of our favourite Christmas Hymns or Carols. I love the Spiritual refill that we get on a Sunday from this and the chance that we have as a family to read scriptures and pray together. I love Jen's candles this year, but mine are much smaller... I can't find a picture however!
I'm thinking of starting a Jesse Tree this year, and so each Sunday we'll work together to create various ornaments, If you don't know about Jesse trees then this Catholic website is brilliant at explaining about it all. Have you ever made a Jesse tree? If so, let me know if you found it added to your Spiritual appreciation of the season in the comments!
Each Saturday night we'll watch a movie together, We have plenty of Christmas movies to chose from, but I'll make sure we watch a Nativity film at least once, after all "it is the reason for the season". I just have to pick my favourite from all the ones that I've seen over the past *cough* twenty-five *cough* years. Of course, we'll definitely watch my Top Ten Christmas Movies and more than likely the film Nativity! at least twenty times...
For the time that we're apart I'm busy combing Pinterest for ideas and I've got several already, but if you have any ideas then please let me know either in the comments here, or on Facebook or Twitter, as it takes a village and all that!
One of the things we are definitely do is go to the Cinema (different towns, same time showings) to see Get Santa. My sister is planning on taking her troop to the cinema to see the same film, so we might get together to go as a BIG group and have some family time too.
We're going to make some new decorations (I quite like the Santa Hand print Baubles), and we'll try and top our 21 Christmas trees total this year too.. Oh and don't forget that I have a surprise for all of you this Advent, a little like our Calorie free Chocolate calender a few years back!
On top of all this we have a few ideas, that I can't actually share here on the blog because, well they are secret and we don't want people to know that it is us! However if you leave a comment because you're after some ideas from what we are up to, leave a comment and I'll send you an email or DM me or private message me or something!
So what are you up to this advent and what should I be adding to my list too?