Advent - Day 14 - Kids' Christmas Party

It's one of our favorite events of the holiday season.  We invite our friends (8 years of age and under) and their parents to come celebrate Christmas with us!  This year it was an art themed party.

We had three art projects for the kids to do with their parents.  There was a wood ornament, a handprint potholder, and an accordion Santa.

Santa and Mrs. Claus came to have pictures with the kids and families.  They also shared the book, God's Christmas Gift, with us.  It reminded us of the real reason for Christmas, the birth of Jesus.

We also had cookies & milk with Santa.  Yes, I baked all of those cookies except the set of sugar cookies.  I had lots of friends share great cookie recipes...and my Kitchenaide was put to the test over the past few weeks.  I think it ended up being 400+ cookies.  The cookie table doesn't make it look like it was this many...but it was a lot of cookies!  I don't know if all the parents knew this, but on the party favor table I had recipe cards for all the cookies.  They were there for anyone to take if they had a favorite or many favorite cookies.  

At the milk bar, there were three type of milk and paper straws.  Paper straws make everything a little more fun!

Cookies & Milk with Santa

Remember the art palette invitation?  These cookies by Mary-Beth Smith are a replica of the invitation.  So CUTE!

A lot of my ideas came from the Simply So Good blog.  Her son had a milk and cookies wedding reception.  How fun is that?  Janet was so kind to give me pointers for this party.  The Homemade Oreo recipe came from her.  You can find the recipe on my blog {here}.  They were the first cookie to go.  People loved them!

I didn't realize the straws were covering the milks...but you can see the strawberry here.  There was also plain and chocolate.  They are in the containers behind the straws.

The party was a lot of fun.  I changed the party from a set two hours to a drop-in style this year.  It helped reduce the masses of people being there at the same time.  (We usually have 80 to 100 people attend.)

Don't forget today and tomorrow are the last days you have to enter in the giveaway for $25 Amazon Card.  What a great treat that will be for someone to win this holiday season!  You can find all the details {here}.

Advent - Day 3 - Lights

Originally, I had planned for us to go look at Christmas lights next week.  Yet, our kids were begging and begging to go...so I switched up the advent activities; we went tonight.  We saw this:

JUST KIDDING!!!  Don't we wish we had??  Honestly, there weren't a lot of lights up.  So if you are planning on doing this, then I encourage you to wait until next week.

We gave our kids light up reindeer noses to wear during our light looking with a reminder that Jesus is the real Light of the World.

Our reindeer... I don't know why Maddox felt the need to touch his light up nose for the pictures.

Lots of other wonderful things happened today.  Jessica's little boy had surgery today!  I've known Jessica and her family for years and years!  They had a little over a week to raise $100,000 (yes, that's one hundred thousand dollars) for their son to have surgery...and they did it!  Well, God did it.  Amazing!  You can follow their story by clicking {here}.

Friends of ours found out they are getting two children from the foster system.  Another blessing.  

Lots of wonderful things going on in our world.  Lots of loving and caring people out there.  Wish more of these things were advertised rather than the bad and sad things.

Another happy thing is the Amazon gift card giveaway.  Learn more about it {here}.

Advent - Day 2

Traditionally, an advent wreath would start on a Sunday.  But who said we're traditional around here???  So today for advent activity, we got out a "wreath" the boys made last year.  This wreath has its green from bell pepper painting which Brewer did; its red berries are Maddox's fingerprints.  The outside of the wreath has four candles (battery powered, thank you very much, after all I do have a 3 and 6 year old).  The center has the Christ candle.  We will light one candle each week during advent and be reminded that Christ is the Light of the World.

Don't forget to leave a comment (NOT ON THIS POST...go to the GIVEAWAY POST!!) to be entered for the giveaway.  You could win a $25 gift card to Amazon.  Right now, only two entries have been made...so your chances are good great!!  Click {here} for the giveaway information.  Make sure you leave your comments to enter the giveaway on the GIVEAWAY POST -- not on this post. :)

Advent Starts Today - Day 1 (and a giveaway)

Our front door is decorated with a great saying:

BELIEVE IN THE MAGIC OF THE SEASON

The secular calendar doesn't start advent until Dec. 1; yet, advent in the Christian calendar started today.  And advent is my favorite season.  What is better than preparing for the arrival of Christ?  Preparing for this arrival brings a lot of magic to the season for me.

A few years ago, we started a Christmas (new) tradition where our family does something everyday of advent that focuses on Jesus.  Today was day 1 with:
SHOPPING FOR OUR ANGEL TREE CHILD

Both of the boys adopted a child off the angel tree.  Maddox picked a 3-year-old boy that wanted power tools.

Brewer picked a 6-year-old boy that wanted wrestling things.  

In addition to the toys the boys picked for them, they picked out a complete outfit including Spiderman light up shoes.  (I bet for a few seconds my kids were wishing they were these little boys.  Oh, how they would love to have light up Spiderman tennis shoes.)

It was a blessing to me in watching my kids shop for these kids.  AND THEY GOT IT!  They did not ask for things for themselves while we were out.  They understood we were shopping for others.

There really is a special magic to this season.  If you want to do advent activities with your family but haven't prepared any ahead of time, here are a few good resources.  Plus, you could always start on December 1st -- which gives you a few days to get it together.  Throughout the season, I'll be posting our activities here too.

Advent Resources:
-- Advent ideas from Focus on the Family, click {here}.
-- Advent Forum full of ideas from past years, click {here}.

What are some things you do for advent?

And now onto the giveaway...  I know some of you worked through reading this to find out about the giveaway.  So click {here} for the giveaway information to win an Amazon gift card.  Make sure you leave your comments to enter the giveaway on the GIVEAWAY POST -- not on this post. :)