Candy Cane: Perfect Christmas?

Our sermon this morning was from Luke and reflected on Mary, mother of Jesus, and her visit from the angel which informed her that she would bear the Son of God. Our Pastor reflected upon his own Christmas experiences and recounted the typical kind of Christmas mornings we all experience but how that all changed when he turned 11 after his parents divorced. He talked a bit of the mad dash and the engagements which were expected and how it just steals the joy out of everything.

It made me reflect on my own Christmas experiences, which were always full of commitments and obligations. My parents were divorced before I had any memories of a home family Christmas, so all I ever knew was the Christmas Eve with Dad, Christmas Day with Mom. The back and forth shuffles. It didn't bother me because that's all I knew.

Now it's even crazier however. I guess the lucky aspect from my childhood was that my grandparents would come stay with us for the holiday. So we didn't have to go to Grandma's house. The downside to that was the presents from grandma and grandpa were combined with those from my mom and step dad and from Santa so there was this WOW factor each morning. I'm sure they spent time strategically placing each gift to give the biggest impact. (As I do now!) I say this was a downside only because now I try to capture that same wow factor for my children but it takes A LOT of presents to do that. My husband just shakes his head and sighs. He knows there's no stopping me!

Now with the kids we find ourselves schlepping all over town beginning Christmas Eve dinner with my husband's entire family, home by midnight. But the real work then begins. The kids are put into bed and the presents are pulled out from every nook and cranny, wrapped, tagged and strategically placed. Thankfully my kids often sleep pretty good that night. Then we have our own small Christmas morning, then we hustle off to the Grandparent's house (my in-laws) once again because Santa also leaves presents there for our kids wink, wink. We have left over tamales for a Christmas brunch and open presents and stay as long as we can without being rude. Then load up the car and race home so we can host my own family coming over for Christmas dinner and more presents from my mother.

There have been so many times I've actually wished we lived too far away... Each year a Christmas Cruise to Hawaii or something sounds better and better!

But our Pastor talked about God's perfect plan which was in actuality man's mess! Mary, a young girl, although betrothed, still unwed and pregnant. The gossip, the rumors, the hurt she must have experienced being shunned by others. Yet she had faith and she never said "Um... No thank you."

So every year I have to say is a perfect Christmas. A perfectly messy, perfectly chaotic, perfectly exhausting Christmas. It's not Normal Rockwell, but it's our memories and my kids will have great ones! Here's a little bit of the stuff we did this week...

As Bella and Lily called her, here is "Baby Gaga!"

The girls looked so pretty getting ready for church. (Please dont judge me based upon our breakfast, this is what happens when I'm trying to get 4 kids out the door on time for church by myself!)

Then we went to go see Santa Claus! He was one of the best Santa's I've ever seen!

After we saw Santa we got some Kettle Corn then went into Macy's where the kids wrote letters to Santa at the "Yes Virginia, there is a Santa Claus" station.