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Hello friends! Sorry for the lag in updates! It’s been a busy couple of weeks, and there’s been no surplus of sleep for any of us. Anyway, on to the start of the Christmas festivities!
Advent started for us on November 15, so we’ve enjoyed the beautiful red Vestments at Church for a few weeks now. For me though, St. Nicholas Day (Dec. 6) is what really turns up the heat on the Christmas season. I had a three day weekend last weekend to enjoy the festivities.
Friday evening (Dec. 5), our Church held its St. Nicholas Vesperal Liturgy. Read more about the real St. Nicholas here. It’s always a very special liturgy which, besides the fanfare of any ’special’ liturgy, includes the handing out of big candy canes by our wonderful Subdeacon who dressed up like a traditional St. Nicholas. Naturally, we brought the camera. And while someone stepped in front of the camera when I attempted to take a picture of Justin receiving his candy cane from “St. Nicholas”, I did get a few others – you can guess what he did with it:
As the evening continued, we discovered that Justin was more able to get past the wrapper than we suspected…
On Saturday, my family came up from the Seattle area to go tree hunting. My sister, Chrystal, took this picture on her phone:
After a lot of traipsing around, we ended up leaving the tree farm in favor of heading to Haggen (yes, the grocery store) to actually buy our tree. I know, I know; we’re crazy. But seriously, they have reliably more gorgeous and inexpensive trees than any tree farm I’ve been to - though we still like the adventure of schlepping through the mud hunting trees (and yes, I’m enjoying the irony of using a Yiddish word to describe finding a Christmas tree).
We then loaded our respective family trees into Poppa’s truck and retreated to the warmth of our tiny apartment for some pizza and Christmas movies (Muppet Christmas Carol) with the fam’.
That evening, Matt and I put the tree up (with surprisingly little interference from Mr. Inquisitive-Grabby-Hands), and started decorating. We, of course, had to include Justin in the sorting of the ornaments which were baby-appropriate to have on the tree:
This year, we had a very special ornament (besides the buri squirrel-above) from Justin’s Godparents to hang on our tree:
We are so blessed! Not only do we have a beautiful tree and some wonderful memories started, we also have Christmas yet-to-come!
How, you may ask, is Justin doing with a big sparkly tree in his living room? Pretty darn well, I’d answer. A couple of times a day he goes up to it, pulls on the lights or an ornament or two; then we remind him to “look with his eyes and not with his mouth” and he generally finds something else to get into. We’re SO lucky! I expected to have to be wrestling him out of it a hundred times a day!
Next stop: Nouno (Godfather) Niko’s ordination to the Deaconate!
Hello everyone! Thanksgiving has passed, and it was a little hectic, but in the end, enjoyable. We got to hang out with my “incredible-shrinking-momma” (my awesome mom recently underwent gastric-bypass surgery and she looks absolutely amazing!); Poppa; my brother, Ryan; my sister Chrystal; and her two kids Jacey and Madysen (who was a great help with Justin).
At dinner, Justin enjoyed his mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, and ciabatta bread. While the turkey my folks lovingly made was delicious, I have to admit, my favorite turkey was this one:
As the last few weeks have progressed, though, the fact that Christmas is coming has become increasingly evident. I’ve been excited about Justin’s first Christmas since he was born, but now we’re faced with the reality of it. Aside from figuring out how to pay for it, there are a lot of things to consider as we navigate the unfamiliar waters of starting new family holiday traditions (especially since we’re Orthodox):
1. Does Santa come to our house?
2. What role should he play?
3. How could we emphasize the real St. Nicholas over “Santa”?
4. When should we open gifts? (after the Christmas Eve vesperal liturgy?, before or after the Christmas Day liturgy? maybe in phases?)
5. How do we emphasize Christmas as a Holy Day celebrating the birth of Christ, and the Christmas season as a time of love, generosity, and faith?
I know I have a very diverse readership out there – what are your family traditions? How do you work out the above considerations about Christmas?
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