I could say I didn't know when it all started, but it really began when I went to a Living Water Gala in September. We learned about billions of people all over the world that don't have clean water. We watched this video that I am sure some of you have seen on you tube about the advent conspiracy.
The entire evening moved me, even to the point that when one pastor's wife talked about her non-profit organization of women giving their engagement rings in exchange for building wells for people that had nothing, I almost took my ring off then and there. I am not kidding - there we were in out nice dresses eating fabulous food watching these children walk 8 kilometers to a water area full of cow manure, fill up these huge tins of that dirty water, and haul it back home on their backs. Every mother needs to see it, for perspective in our over-indulged children's lives.
In November Justin and I had an opportunity to do Samaritan's Purse for Jenn Heitmann's daughter's birthday. Instead of bringing a gift, Justin and I filled up a shoe box for a kid his age who didn't have anything. Justin kept telling me as we were shopping for things at HEB how this little boy "needed this". Let's just say that we came home with more than I would have bought, but Justin was sincerely concerned that this little boy needed a toothbrush, a flashlight, etc. It really hit home with my three year old what we were doing. And I just got an email confirmation that the shoe box went to Mexico - so it's neat that this organization follows up like that.
In December Justin had a toy chapel at his school. They were encouraged to bring a gently used toy to put on the chapel as on offering so that another child could find joy in the reused gift. I told him to find a gift for a little boy to find great joy in, and he picks this big Thomas the Train toy that plays music when you push it. Every kid that comes to my house fights over it. It's a toy my neighbor Denise gave him one Christmas. I tell Justin to get another toy, one we don't play with as much. He insists that he wants another little boy to play with this toy. And then it hits me - I am the one who needs the heart change here. I want to keep this prize toy so we can have yet another toy for other kids to play with. Why not take the prize toy, which holds that much more value in this toy chapel, versus an unused toy. Justin was really starting to get it.
Which is why I decided to get Justin only one big thing for Christmas this year. Derek and I talked a long time about this, and we decided that it was time for us to have a Compassion child. I wanted a three year old so Justin could relate, but I ended up with a needier little boy who was six from Indonesia. My heart has really been pricked for the needy all over the world, and I was tearing up reading the packet that came in the mail for our little boy. They have so little, and here we drive a Camry that my grandfather gave to us, packed to the hilt with gifts, clothes, and lots of extras for the Christmas drive to Waco. We have been given much, and my heart has been stirred to give that much more away lately.
So on Christmas morning, Justin got to watch the Compassion video, we talked about our little boy that we could write letters to, pray for, encourage, etc., and we as a family just had perspective as to what our calling is as Christians. Justin can't wait to send a letter and our family photo, and I am just hoping that he can "get" what this is all about.
As far as my Christmas, I decided to not run around all month in search of the perfect gift. I gave memories instead of filling their house with more stuff - a night at a Bed and Breakfast, a wine club subscription, or monthly movie rental. I get no joy in trying to wrap the most perfect gift (stresses me out!), so I put everything in gift bags with sometimes mismatching tissue paper. I wasn't going to drive my family crazy trying to please others. Thought that counts, and leave the rest of the time to just enjoy what Christmas is all about. I realized that I don't enjoy cookie exchanges. They stress me out, and I receive no joy in making the over-the-top cookies or in wanting to eat the 2 dozen ones I return with. So I just opted out.
I made time for laughs, like our Baptist Sunday School teacher dressing up as Santa at our Christmas party (does anyone else see the irony in this?).
I made time for our best buds, the Junods, who got to stay and play with Justin for a few days. I don't get much time with Wendi, and I have to eat it up as much as I can.
Nothing like eating lunch while watching the workmen right outside your house. Making time for tractor gazing this month was definitely on the agenda.
The only new decor I added to the Christmas stash this year was a nativity set that we put up on the ledge in our kitchen. Justin kept calling the baby Moses, since they were talking about Moses in the basket at school. We finally got it down that this was Jesus, and every morning he would walk out of his room to point at Jesus.
I finally got the Advent calendar I was looking for. Each day we pull out a character from the nativity scene, and then we would read the scripture in the Bible that would coincide with the story. We read a lot of Luke 2 this past month, but the best was when my mom kept Justin while we were in New York. She and Justin would get under the covers early in the morning and read Luke 2 under the covers with a flashlight.
I was very last minute this past month, which is highly out of character for me. And you know what, it didn't matter at all. I last minute made gifts for my neighbors out of this huge stash of homemade hot chocolate mix that I had made from my mother's recipe.
Hot chocolate mix, marshmallows, and chocolate peppermint stirring straws from Williams Sonoma. I always stress about what to do as a nice gesture, and here I already had it all on hand. Justin and I kept talking about why this was a season of giving, even if others can't do the same in return.
I gave myself 10 hours one day to decorate for Christmas and then I was done. No adding more ribbon, extras here and there, etc. I have never done so little, but since I wasn't hosting much, did it really matter? Derek and I only put up about 1/3 of our ornaments, and both of us thought the tree (which is real, we are not a fakey tree family) looked so clean and simple. Kind of like the theme of my Christmas this year- simple. We ended up putting the Justin and Roxy ornaments on the tree right by Justin's room.
I take back the statement about not adding anything extra to the decor. I love looking at the Christmas cards we get in the mail. I still don't have a great way of displaying all of them. So the afternoon of the 22nd (um yes, three days before Christmas), just hours before hosting a mini shower for Wendi that evening, I decide to start on a project. I decided to put up 4 long ribbons on these columns in my entryway and tape the photos to them.
Innocent, right? It's hard to see in these photos (can I get someone to edit some photos around here?), but the one on the left is all ribbon and no photos. The one on the right shows you why - they were sticking to each other, NOT the ribbon. I begin to start stapling and taking stick pins to make these photos stay with the ribbon. It was pure madness, and doubled the time of the entire project, Should have stuck with the theme and not worried about it.
In the end, it all lasted for 24 hours. And when I went over to Amanda Stewart's house and saw the same display but only paper clips were holding them up, I was stunned into realizing that I should never do a time waster again. Yes, small clothes pin would have worked great, if I had had them...
All in all, I got some great time with this little boy and we spent a lot more time talking about Jesus' birthday then we did running around like madmen all month. And with a month where we had an activity every day or evening on the calendar, I jealously wanted every minute I could get.
The entire evening moved me, even to the point that when one pastor's wife talked about her non-profit organization of women giving their engagement rings in exchange for building wells for people that had nothing, I almost took my ring off then and there. I am not kidding - there we were in out nice dresses eating fabulous food watching these children walk 8 kilometers to a water area full of cow manure, fill up these huge tins of that dirty water, and haul it back home on their backs. Every mother needs to see it, for perspective in our over-indulged children's lives.
In November Justin and I had an opportunity to do Samaritan's Purse for Jenn Heitmann's daughter's birthday. Instead of bringing a gift, Justin and I filled up a shoe box for a kid his age who didn't have anything. Justin kept telling me as we were shopping for things at HEB how this little boy "needed this". Let's just say that we came home with more than I would have bought, but Justin was sincerely concerned that this little boy needed a toothbrush, a flashlight, etc. It really hit home with my three year old what we were doing. And I just got an email confirmation that the shoe box went to Mexico - so it's neat that this organization follows up like that.
In December Justin had a toy chapel at his school. They were encouraged to bring a gently used toy to put on the chapel as on offering so that another child could find joy in the reused gift. I told him to find a gift for a little boy to find great joy in, and he picks this big Thomas the Train toy that plays music when you push it. Every kid that comes to my house fights over it. It's a toy my neighbor Denise gave him one Christmas. I tell Justin to get another toy, one we don't play with as much. He insists that he wants another little boy to play with this toy. And then it hits me - I am the one who needs the heart change here. I want to keep this prize toy so we can have yet another toy for other kids to play with. Why not take the prize toy, which holds that much more value in this toy chapel, versus an unused toy. Justin was really starting to get it.
Which is why I decided to get Justin only one big thing for Christmas this year. Derek and I talked a long time about this, and we decided that it was time for us to have a Compassion child. I wanted a three year old so Justin could relate, but I ended up with a needier little boy who was six from Indonesia. My heart has really been pricked for the needy all over the world, and I was tearing up reading the packet that came in the mail for our little boy. They have so little, and here we drive a Camry that my grandfather gave to us, packed to the hilt with gifts, clothes, and lots of extras for the Christmas drive to Waco. We have been given much, and my heart has been stirred to give that much more away lately.
So on Christmas morning, Justin got to watch the Compassion video, we talked about our little boy that we could write letters to, pray for, encourage, etc., and we as a family just had perspective as to what our calling is as Christians. Justin can't wait to send a letter and our family photo, and I am just hoping that he can "get" what this is all about.
As far as my Christmas, I decided to not run around all month in search of the perfect gift. I gave memories instead of filling their house with more stuff - a night at a Bed and Breakfast, a wine club subscription, or monthly movie rental. I get no joy in trying to wrap the most perfect gift (stresses me out!), so I put everything in gift bags with sometimes mismatching tissue paper. I wasn't going to drive my family crazy trying to please others. Thought that counts, and leave the rest of the time to just enjoy what Christmas is all about. I realized that I don't enjoy cookie exchanges. They stress me out, and I receive no joy in making the over-the-top cookies or in wanting to eat the 2 dozen ones I return with. So I just opted out.
I made time for laughs, like our Baptist Sunday School teacher dressing up as Santa at our Christmas party (does anyone else see the irony in this?).
I made time for our best buds, the Junods, who got to stay and play with Justin for a few days. I don't get much time with Wendi, and I have to eat it up as much as I can.
Nothing like eating lunch while watching the workmen right outside your house. Making time for tractor gazing this month was definitely on the agenda.
The only new decor I added to the Christmas stash this year was a nativity set that we put up on the ledge in our kitchen. Justin kept calling the baby Moses, since they were talking about Moses in the basket at school. We finally got it down that this was Jesus, and every morning he would walk out of his room to point at Jesus.
I finally got the Advent calendar I was looking for. Each day we pull out a character from the nativity scene, and then we would read the scripture in the Bible that would coincide with the story. We read a lot of Luke 2 this past month, but the best was when my mom kept Justin while we were in New York. She and Justin would get under the covers early in the morning and read Luke 2 under the covers with a flashlight.
I was very last minute this past month, which is highly out of character for me. And you know what, it didn't matter at all. I last minute made gifts for my neighbors out of this huge stash of homemade hot chocolate mix that I had made from my mother's recipe.
Hot chocolate mix, marshmallows, and chocolate peppermint stirring straws from Williams Sonoma. I always stress about what to do as a nice gesture, and here I already had it all on hand. Justin and I kept talking about why this was a season of giving, even if others can't do the same in return.
I gave myself 10 hours one day to decorate for Christmas and then I was done. No adding more ribbon, extras here and there, etc. I have never done so little, but since I wasn't hosting much, did it really matter? Derek and I only put up about 1/3 of our ornaments, and both of us thought the tree (which is real, we are not a fakey tree family) looked so clean and simple. Kind of like the theme of my Christmas this year- simple. We ended up putting the Justin and Roxy ornaments on the tree right by Justin's room.
I take back the statement about not adding anything extra to the decor. I love looking at the Christmas cards we get in the mail. I still don't have a great way of displaying all of them. So the afternoon of the 22nd (um yes, three days before Christmas), just hours before hosting a mini shower for Wendi that evening, I decide to start on a project. I decided to put up 4 long ribbons on these columns in my entryway and tape the photos to them.
Innocent, right? It's hard to see in these photos (can I get someone to edit some photos around here?), but the one on the left is all ribbon and no photos. The one on the right shows you why - they were sticking to each other, NOT the ribbon. I begin to start stapling and taking stick pins to make these photos stay with the ribbon. It was pure madness, and doubled the time of the entire project, Should have stuck with the theme and not worried about it.
In the end, it all lasted for 24 hours. And when I went over to Amanda Stewart's house and saw the same display but only paper clips were holding them up, I was stunned into realizing that I should never do a time waster again. Yes, small clothes pin would have worked great, if I had had them...
All in all, I got some great time with this little boy and we spent a lot more time talking about Jesus' birthday then we did running around like madmen all month. And with a month where we had an activity every day or evening on the calendar, I jealously wanted every minute I could get.
Because the truth of it is, are we "brave enough and worthy enough to bear the name of Jesus"? (Epicenter, by Joel Rosenberg)
![147 million orphans](http://i39.tinypic.com/29giv4g.jpg" border=)
1 comments:
very nice and perfectly said by a great mom, a great wife and a perfect Godchild
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