Advent

Christmas is coming.  Tomorrow is Dec 1st.  I'm a rule follower.  Somehow, I decided that the rule was that all moms had to make the month of December a magical wonderland for their children.  (I decided this years ago while watching Sleepless in Seattle when Tom Hanks said his angelic wife did this).

This is my 6th Christmas as a mom.  I'll say the one when the twins were 3 was great.  I did Advent activities and I really got to teach them that Jesus' birth is the true meaning of Christmas.  As a mom, it was one of my most treasured memories with them.

Last Christmas missed that wonderful mark.  We did Advent activities, but I just didn't "feel as Christmasy" as I wanted to.  Granted, we had moved in the summer before and I didn't really feel settled into our house yet.  The decorations looked wrong.  The boys misbehaved in the Christmas Eve service.  Boy #2 insisted on eating the carrots we put on a plate for Rudolf beside Santa's cookies by the fireplace.  In my mind, there were lots of ways lacking as the best Christmas ever.

The ironic thing is that on the way home from Church last Wednesday night, son #2 talked about everything we did last year and to him, it was absolutely magical.  He wants to do it exactly the same this year.  Really?

I succeeded in my crazy notion that to be a mom, I have to make Christmas a magical, special time.  How ironic that I was kicking myself, thinking I had somehow failed as he waxed on about the greatness of Christmas.

Tonight my husband and I have a date night.  We're going to talk through how we want Christmas to go for our family.  In years past, I've been very structured with daily activities with the kids.  This year, I've decided to put things I want to do in a file folder with materials nearby and if there's time, I have energy and I think we'll enjoy it, we'll do something.  If not, we won't and I won't feel bad. 

Advent is about preparing my heart of Jesus' coming.  There's a peace, a joy and such beauty in that.  The materialism of our culture robs those jewels and leaves in their place a busyness that leaves all of us feeling frustrated.  There's this pervading feeling that we have to all be this superChristmasMom or else we've failed.  Pintrest has only made this worse.  I've decided to not get on Pintrest again until after the new year.  It's my way to say, "Stop that Polar Express.  I want to get off and sit at the station, pondering the miracle of this season."  Easy to write, much bigger challenge to do.