Kasen’s cousins were very good with him. They played lots of games and entertained him well. In this game, the boys played along really well. Made Kasen feel like such a big boy too.
Inspired by my friend Heather Zempel who posted a similar list, I decided to create my own list of things everyone should experience sometime in their lives during the Christmas season. I have already experienced some of these, but some are things I hope to experience.
50 Things to do during Christmas:
1. Watch “A Christmas Story” 5 times in a row on TBS.
2. Sit in Santa’s lap for a picture. It still counts if you cry your way through it.
3. Adopt a child (or 2 or 3) from the “Angel Tree” at church and buy gifts for him/her.
4. Cut down your own Christmas tree.
5. Decorate a Christmas tree with ornaments that have memories attached to them. Never waste your time making the tree look pretty or having matching ornaments.
6. Let your kids eat the strands of popcorn/fruit loops that you decorated the tree with.
7. Cut and decorate Christmas cookies with colored icing, sprinkles, red hots, etc. (Or just eat the ones your Aunt makes.)
8. Build a fire in the fireplace (yes, even if it’s 80 degrees outside) and read the Christmas story as a family.
9. Let the kids unwrap one gift on Christmas Eve, but make sure they get that same gift every year so there’s still no surprise.
10. Be intentional about spending some time reflecting on Emmanuel (God with Us) – Jesus.
11. Participate in a live nativity.
12. Spend at least 100 hours placing exactly 6 colored stars on tree cookies made of green tasteless dough which you will sell to the nearest Christmas Tree Farm to make $$ for Christmas gifts. (This was for you, Laurie.)
13. Go Christmas caroling.
14. Be surprised when someone kisses you under the mistletoe.
15. Attend a candlelight service with your family.
16. Incur some kind of injury Christmas afternoon as you play with your new toy. (“You’ll shoot your eye out kid.”)
17. Give a memory to someone. Experience something together.
18. Unwrap “the ball” with your family. (It’s a tape ball with small gifts wrapped inside. The ball gets passed around a circle and you get to keep what you unwrap. You keep unwrapping until the next person rolls a 6 with a pair of dice.)
19. Leave cookies out for Santa.
20. Eat cookies left for Santa.
21. Dress up as Santa Claus so that a child believes at least one more year.
22. Instead of buying gifts, give $$ to your favorite charity.
23. Go to the trouble (in spite of the traffic) to take the kids to see some spectacular Christmas lights.
24. Go on a hayride.
25. Sustain an injury and get frustrated as you ignore the instructions and attempt to assemble the things Santa left your kids.
26. Take family pictures.
27. Re-gift. Or use gift cards to buy gifts for others.
28. Watch the eyes of someone you love as they open a special gift.
29. Play football in the yard with the whole family Christmas afternoon.
30. Put pumpkin pie on your shoe, pretend you came in from outside, and then when someone notices the “poop,” wipe it off with your finger and eat it. (My brother’s idea – and it was hilarious! My grandma is the one who noticed.)
31. Use an advent calendar where you get to do something (Ex: eat a chocolate, hang an ornament, etc.) each day leading up to Christmas.
32. Display a nativity scene in your house and teach your children about the characters. (Last night, my 2-yr-old son Kasen, took “baby Jesus” to bed with him.)
33. See Andrew Peterson’s “Behold the Lamb” Christmas production (or at least listen to the recording each year.)
34. Arrange for your children to play “Jesus” in some sort of local Christmas production. Bonus if you are Mary and Joseph.
35. Wake up way too early as your kids anticipation gets the best of them.
36. Secretly open a gift, seal it back up, and then act surprised on Christmas morning.
37. Watch the “Nativity Story” movie.
38. Use baby powder to leave footprints from the fireplace to the place where Santa left the gifts. (But make sure you make the footprints go back too – my parents missed that last part.)
39. Count the number of Jesus figurines you can find at grandma’s house.
40. Ask your grandma/grandpa about how they remember spending Christmas as kids.
41. Eat monkey bread.
42. Enjoy a “White Christmas” and do some sledding, have a snowball fight, or build a snowman.
43. Take the family skiing in Colorado over the Christmas break.
44. Take the family to an old barn and read the Christmas story there among the animals and smells.
45. Bluebell Peppermint Ice Cream – it’s only made during the holidays.
46. Search the sky for Santa’s sleigh.
47. Get stranded due to icy/closed roads in some random west Texas town on the way to a ski trip. End up having to sleep with the animals ’cause there is “no room at the inn.” (It was Quanah, TX and the people of First Baptist Church were very gracious with their gym. They even let traveling pets sleep there.)
48. Drive all over the country trying to see all your relatives and in-laws on Christmas Day.
49. Snack on Chex Mix and Peppermint Bark.
50. Celebrate Emmanuel!!! (Jesus = Emmanuel = “God with Us”)
Things not to do:
1. Get so busy trying to do the things on this list that you forget #50.
Last night Miranda and I took the kids to a traveling circus. It wasn’t really something we planned, but we heard about it (and heard it was cheap) and decided we’d check it out. It was great! We got to sit about 10 feet from the center ring. The elephants walked between us and the ring. Kasen and I also rode an elephant. Miranda says I looked really out of place. That’s OK – I’m amazed at the things I find myself doing for my children. Thought I’d put up a few pics. (Not sure how it happened, but we didn’t get even one picture with Miranda and Kesleigh.)
Sorry if you’re not interested, but it’s been a while since I posted any “proud parent” pics. Besides – some of these are just too good not to share. I especially like this first one of Kesleigh. She found the Veggie Tales nativity Jesus yesterday and decided to “chew on Jesus.” I figure that’s a pretty good thing. She’s not even a year old and already knows that Jesus tastes good – that “feasting on the Word” is the best way to live.
I think this is awesome! The world has forgotten how to “play” and yet, they long for opportunities and jump at the chance for a little fun. I wonder what other ways we could be subversive and create more “play” opportunities like this? I wonder what Jesus would have thought about this kind of thing? I think most of His contemporaries would have thought it was a waste of time, but somehow I think Jesus would have stood up for it. He opened the way for the children to come to him and then told everyone they were supposed to be like them. As a father, it’s my job to roll around on the floor wrestling with my son and to play chase down the hallway. If Jesus were in my house when I come home from work, I can’t imagine that He wouldn’t join in on the fun.
Anyway, Leonard Sweet posted this video and I just had to share it. He also has a few things to say about “play” in his book Soul Tsunami. I wrote about it in another post quite a while back. Check it out here: Play
She’s been crawling a little here and there this week, but I was finally able to capture it on video. She was chewing on a plastic fish toy and so we set it out in front of her. It’s a bit intimidating to think about having 2 mobile children under 2yrs old in one house, but still very exciting times. Anyway, here it is:
She’s been crawling a little bit all week, but this is the first time we were able to get it on film.
Here’s another with she and Kasen. She loves watching him and laughing at the things he does. He really had her cracking up with the watergun this morning.
Yes, I went back in time last night. (or at least it seemed like it.) Miranda and I had driven to Nacogdoches for a wedding (congrats Deana!) where we stayed in a very nice old hotel called Hotel Fredonia. Our friends Josh and Shana were sharing the room with us. Anyway, Josh and I took a little walk ’cause Miranda had to feed Kesleigh. We walked down an old road made of bricks and came to a Dolorean – you know like Doc and Marty McFly drove. The silver one with suicide doors. (It was missing the Flux Capacitor.) From there, we walked on up the road and found town square and an old clock. I’m pretty sure I even saw an old theater down the street like the one in the Back to the Future films. Anyway, it was just a fun little experience that I thought I’d share. Especially since I had a great pic to post with it.
We had an incredible time on our vacation to Gulf Shores this year! We spent the week with all the Mathews family and even got to spend a couple of days with Gran. (We went up early.) We spent most of our time on the beach or in the pool, (Kasen liked the pool better.) but we also went to the local zoo one day. We decided that if we ever go back, we’ll plan on a special outing at the zoo ’cause they offer an experience where you can play with monkeys for an extra $10. (We were too late to sign up this time around.) Anyway, I posted all the videos below and here is the link for all the pics from our trip: http://cornphotos.shutterfly.com/5456 (Some of them look professional.)