The Meaning of Christmas

One of my goals this year has been to introduce some traditions that really help the kids understand the meaning of Christmas.  Not focus as much on the getting and more on the giving and helping aspects.  I have a ton of ideas and only so much time before the big day actually arrives. 

We have been reading a scripture from an Advent calendar each day, and Jac is always very excited to find out what is behind the little window.  We also have been lighting an Advent candle each Sunday.  Both of these are things that we can continue as the kids get older. 

I like the idea of a Jesse tree, a birthday party for Jesus, a good deed manger and many more.  What are some of the traditions that your family has for Christmas?

By the way, on a totally secular topic.  Our elf Paco is doing great, he has been flying back to the North Pole EVERY evening which is true testament to what a devoted Daddy Jac and Mia have.  (Someone has to remember, and I tell you, it isn't going to be Mommy unless I write a note!)  I have used Paco's name to strike fear into the heart of both my children on several occasions, a mom's gotta do what a mom's gotta do.  Bedtime has been going smoother, "you need to go to sleep so that Paco can go ahead and go the North Pole", I guess my children are considerate enough that they don't want him flying about too late at night.  At least three meltdowns have been avoided because, "what will Paco have to report to Santa tonight"?

Oh That Elf

So I had heard of The Elf on the Shelf from some of my neighborhood friends with young children. They were pretty enamored with the little guy. I pretty much knew the gist of the story, you buy an elf he comes to scout out your children for Santa and in return you get some cute memories and maybe a tiny bit better behavior right before the holidays.  I really under estimated the power of the elf.

I had already decided to buy some other things for Christmas in the way of decorations and such so because I had heard of the elf later decided it just wasn't in the budget. I had planned to have some elves visit the house anyway, and did just that when I caught Jac and Mia being especially good one morning. (Check out the blog post that talks about their visit.)

However, my good friend in Dallas sent our family an elf as an early Christmas present. The package arrived at such a serendipitous time, that I instantly knew this elf was going to become part of the family. Jac was melting down, he has recently being going through a growth spurt and eating everything in sight. I had made some zucchini bread and allowed them both to have one piece at around 4:30pm but had said that was it before dinner. It is highly irritating for both Jeff and I when they don't eat anything for supper. So our normal cut off is 4pm but I made an exception on this day because the zucchini bread was chock full of healthy stuff. (I plan to write a post about this recipe because it was so yummy.) Jac started to throw a fit and I decided to go get the mail in order to give him some breathing room to hopefully cool down.  

I got the mail and noticed that we had a package at the side door. I grabbed the box and ran inside. The kiddos were instantly intrigued about the box. I said, let's open it carefully and see if there is a Christmas present in here. I saw that it was from Kerrie and assumed that it would be the first present we could put under the tree. The present was wrapped and it had a big note on the box that said "Open This Now". Hmmm, very interesting. I opened the card and it gave a bit more information saying that we needed to open the package now and that hopefully we would start a new Christmas tradition similar to the one her family had just started. (She seemed maybe a bit dismayed at her choice to start the tradition and maybe a bit concerned about our wanting this tradition also.) I wasn't positive but I was pretty sure the package contained an elf. So in we dug, as dinner was ready and we were just waiting for Daddy to get home I needed a serious distraction.

And distraction is just what I got. In the box was a lovely book about the elf and the elf himself of course. Before we got the elf out, I wanted to read the "instructions" so we sat down and read the book together. The book gave all of the details about the elf and exactly what his job entails. (Read more about him here.) The kids bought it immediately, it makes me a little frightened at exactly what they will believe!

When Jeff got home we sat down to name him, as the book instructed. While we were trying to figure out what his name was, Jeff touched him. You would have thought that he had picked up a bomb. The kids had allowed me touch him to get him out of the box and to put him on the mantle. But after that, the book said not to touch him or the magic might go away, so he was off limits. Mia actually left the room very angry with Daddy, I am sure that she thought the elf would no longer be able to fly to the North Pole that night. (Come to find out that the magic only starts after you name him so, no worries, Daddy will be getting more than coal in his stocking.) After much discussion between the three of us, Jac came up with Paco. We all voted and our elf is Paco the Mexican Elf, oh my.  
He did fly back to the North Pole that first night, and the second night, although I think that I need to put a note on my bathroom mirror to remind me to move him each night because Jeff actually remembered to move him at about 2am last night, thank goodness. It could have been a disaster if he had forgotten entirely. I think that is why Kerrie is a bit dismayed at her family's new tradition, because we can't forget about Paco. The devastation would be monstrous if they thought that he hadn't gone to talk to Santa one night.  Both Mia and Jac were ecstatic, and really I promise they were crazy with joy, when they realized that he had indeed gone to the North Pole, given his report and flown back to our house only to sit in a different spot and wait for them to find him.  Wow - if someone had dumped a truck load of puppies off at our house I am not sure we would have gotten a better response.  I already thanked my friend for the elf, but I want to thank her again for giving us so much joy and happiness with this crazy little elf.

It does creep me out a bit that Paco is moving around the house. The last two mornings I have wondered where I will find him, sort of like a stealthy pet that likes to hide (my roommate in college had an iguana that liked to hide in our closets on top of the hangars!). Regardless, Paco is here to stay, at least until Christmas comes. I will give you more updates as we get to know Paco better over the next few weeks.

Do you have The Elf on The Shelf? If you have Santa believers in the house, I highly recommend him.

Book Review: The Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman

I highly recommend this book for anyone in a relationship - any relationship. I feel that Gary Chapman's theory could be applied to any relationship you are struggling with or that you would like to move to a deeper level.

The writing is just so-so, but Chapman is very genuine and he tells lovely stories about some of the couples he has helped. It is an easy and quick read and you can skim through parts of it to make it faster. The important parts are where he describes each love language and where he gives examples of how couples have missed communicating to each other in those languages.

The book describes how each of us has a preferred love language. A love language is a way of giving and receiving love that makes us feel loved by another individual. Chapman breaks down love languages into five categories: Words of Affirmation, Acts of Service, Quality Time, Receiving Gifts and Physical Touch. It is interesting to note that many times we give love either in the way we want to be loved or in how we were loved most as children, but unless we are lucky and have a happy coincidence we aren't loving our mate in the way THEY need to be loved. I love that Chapman uses a gas tank as an analogy for how loved we feel. The love tank is a nice visual, when spouses speak to each other in their love languages, their love tanks fill up!

There is a quiz at the end of the book to help you understand what your love language is; this is what we did on the drive to my parent's for Thanksgiving. It was kind of fun doing it together. The interesting part of course are the results and interpreting those results.

Not surprising my love language is "Words of Affirmation". I pretty much guessed this after reading the book and before taking the quiz. I am like a peacock who preens after someone gives me a compliment or tries to build me up. And equally so on the negative side, say a harsh word to me and I am a complete mess. The second most important love language for me is "Quality Time". I definitely want Jeff's time, especially after becoming a stay at home mom. With young ones a person can feel like they have done 10 hours of solitary confinement when Daddy finally walks through the door, and if he then browses the mail during dinner and watches 6 hours of football before stumbling to bed - well you can guess that my love tank isn't very full. The most interesting part of my evaluation was that my lowest scoring love language was "Acts of Service".

Coincidentally, when Jeff wants to show me some love, he does something for me. And when he goes above and beyond with an "Act of Service", I had better be pretty darned appreciative and my love tank better be full or he is going to get a bit peeved with me. But the problem is my love tank doesn't get filled up by "Acts of Service". Little does he know (although he should know after we took the quizzes together) that all he has to do is say, "Wow, you look really great today" or "That meatloaf was excellent I really enjoyed it" or "The house smells good, did you clean today" or "I read your blog today and it was really good" (need I go on?)

It gets even more interesting. Upon taking Jeff's evaluation, we discovered that Jeff's primary love language is also "Words of Affirmation"! Which really kind of surprised me, I would have guessed that "Words of Affirmation" was high up, but I would have thought that "Acts of Service" would have been at the top.

I think that why Jeff gives love through "Acts of Service" is because that is how his parents give love. They are amazingly generous with their time, energy and resources to everyone; but most of all their children. He saw this as a model growing up, and it is such a great one I might add, that he now uses it as an adult. What a funny sense of humor God has that he would pick a mate for Jeff like me who not only doesn't really get much out of people doing things for me (I must say that I am so appreciative of my mother and father in-law, I hope they don't take this the wrong way) but also has a love language that actually plays to Jeff's weakness. He has told me in the past that he isn't very good at compliments and that although he likes them, when he gives them he feels that everyone will think he is being disingenuous!

Anyway, back to Jeff's evaluation. His quiz revealed that "Receiving Gifts" and "Physical Touch" tied for second place and that "Quality Time" was on the bottom. I am not the biggest gift giver in the world, it is not that I don't care it is that I don't even think about buying the gift when I am out of town or shopping or running errands. I have to try to do better at this one. And anyone who knows me knows that "Physical Touch" has a time and a place, I am not a hugger, I am not a toucher. When I am busy or in a hurry or just feeling uncomfortable in a situation, I do not want to be touched. Jeff likes hugs and kisses and hand holding, which of course I like - but at the right time when I am comfortable and at ease. We do give kisses before he leaves and I try not to get offended when he does the boob brush - but come on! When I am in a whirlwind in the morning trying to get out the door with two little ones I need him to step off!

I do feel that we should communicate love through all of these languages but be extra sensitive to our mate's primary love language and go out of our way to incorporate it into how we love our mate. I am going to work on "Words of Affirmation" and "Receiving Gifts" and thoughtful "Physical Touch" for Jeff.

I am very interested in reading the The Five Love Languages of Children as I really need some insight into Jac's love language. He is definitely my child whose love tank runs dry.

Funny Jac Questions

Who is that naughty angel again?
We had a conversation the other day about Satan. I believe he had heard the name somewhere and was asking who he was. Well, I told Jac and Mia that Satan was an angel that did bad things and got kicked out of Heaven. I like to keep the answers short, simple and to the point. But now we have baked down millenia of wrongdoing, heartache and hatred to an angel being naughty. If only we all are judged so harshly.

How big is space, is it forever?
My initial answer was, yes. Then I questioned that. "Wait Jac, when we get home I will Google it and figure out if that is correct." (Sure enough, there is now some controversy. Some scientists are saying space is finite. My question then would be, what is on the other side?) Now both Jac and Mia will use "as big as space is" when something is really bothering them or they are very hungry. "My belly hurts, Mommy, I am hungry. As big as space is!" Wow - that is a big hunger.

While putting together a puzzle with Jeff, Jac asked "why is Turkey called Turkey"?
With all the talk of turkeys, I am sure that he envisions a whole country filled with nothing but turkeys. Jeff said, "I'll Google it". Jac then followed up with, "Don't Google it, Gobble it"! Touche! (For all of you now curious about Turkey, the word can be divided into two words meaning "strong" "owner".)

Why do people get married?
Jeff and I had a different take on this, interesting. I said, "because people want to have a family and want to be together forever." Jeff said, "because they love each other and want to be together all their lives." Jeff thought that was hugely different, I thought they were both spot on!

This was actually a question from Mia after Jac asked the marriage question:

Where was I before I was a baby?
Yowser! Who knew that a three year old could come up with that!? My answer was simply, you were in Heaven with Jesus. She was totally satisfied with that.