25 Days of Christmas Days 16-20

I realize I'm not doing much better than I was at keeping up with my 25 Day blog posts. This month has been crazy busy, and this is in spite of the fact that we limited our calendar this season. In fact, we've been on a school break for a week and a half, and I'm still waiting for a day off! Maybe next week, right? 

Day 16

Lukas' Spiritual Birthday

When I was growing up, I was introduced to the idea of celebrating spiritual birthdays by my best friend, Sarah. Her family had cake and a special dinner to celebrate the day each child asked Jesus into their heart. We have grown to love this tradition with our kids. This year, for Lukas' 7th spiritual birthday, the kids decorated a Little Drummer Boy Cake. They had so much fun doing it even though it was cut into about 30 minutes later. On an unrelated note, Ava does not suddenly wear glasses. They were a prop in a play the kids were in last year.

Day 17

Cookie Baking Day

Powdered sugar faces. Ava put more on her own face than she splashed on mine. We always spend a Saturday in December baking cookies, making fudge and other treats. We began this tradition the very first year of our marriage in our little upstairs apartment in Marion, Indiana, and now the kids look forward to it as much as we do. This year, we made Russian teacakes, thumbprints, oatmeal cinnamon chip bars, chocolate fudge, and saltine toffee. The kids are still holding out for sugar cookie cut-outs and peanut butter cookies. It is a good thing we give so much of these treats away!!!

Day 18

Christmas Party with friends

Our friends, the Killianys, hosted a Christmas party at their home along with Sarah's parents, the Swansons. Incidentally, this is the same family I mentioned above with the spiritual birthday photos. We had an amazing evening singing and worshiping with them and many other familiar faces and then enjoyed some sweet fellowship afterward. 

Day 19

Christmas Card Making

I love glitter. It is always worth the mess. Shiny things make me happy. Very, very happy. This is what my table looked like this morning since I let the kids leave the mess overnight so they could make more cards today. So worth the sparkles!

Day 20

Santa Claus Visit

Since we ended up at the mall today, and there was NO ONE waiting to see Santa, we surprised the kids with a visit. The children are certain this was not the REAL Santa. Their explanations for this were varied and hilarious including the fact that he was much too short to be Santa, his beard wasn't long enough and Santa absolutely has to be at the North Pole this week. Lukas kept giving me a look like I was crazy to even ask that question. I'm still not sure what is behind that look. Let it be known that I purposefully didn't dress them up for this year's Santa visit because they would have caught onto the surprise, and, had their been an extensive line to see Santa, there wouldn't have been a surprise. Also, Ava chose her crazy outfit today. When you are 7, you can wear anything. 

I make no promises about my future posts other than to say that days 21-25 will get posted either in increments or all at once. Haha! Check back soon!