Advent

I've been using a lot of Waldorf inspired ideas with the boys recently. I just LOVE how they focus on nature and the reduce, reuse & recycle philosophy. One of the things they find important is celebrating different festivals and having strong family traditions. One of the traditions we decided to start this year was to celebrate Advent. We created this cute advent calendar using wrapping paper and string. Aiden gets to take off one per day and it had an activity that we will do that day. It might have a gift to go along with it (i.e we will give them their ornament on the day we decorate the tree,etc.) Aiden is loving it...although we haven't stuck with the activity of the day every day. Example yesterday was supposed to be a cookie baking day & we never got around to doing it because the errands we needed to run took longer than planned. We will keep at it. I also saw this Excellent idea on another blog to wrap up a Christmas/Winter title for each day of Advent and open one to read every day. LOVE IT!! And you can wrap old books but throw a few new titles in to the mix also. We are going to try this next year.

We are also doing the Advent calendar that Erik's mother gave us for the boys. I found a really cool book at the library that has one part of a story to be read every night of Advent. It's called the Advent Storybook, by Antonie Schneider. Aiden opens the window for the calendar for that day and then we read the corresponding part of the story. We then usually pick one other Christmas/Winter title to read before bed also.

We are also doing the Advent wreath. It looks so lovely on the kitchen table! As you will notice in the pictures I am short a candle. They only had 2 purple candles so I need to go pick up another purple candle today. If you want to learn more about Advent and the meaning behind the wreath and candle colors, etc. take a look at this website. http://www.cptryon.org/prayer/adx/adwreath.html

And here is Aiden lighting the first candle on December 2nd. You cannot tell from this photo (cause Erik used the flash) but we turned all the lights out in the dining room and I lit the candle for Aiden in the living room and we walked into a totally dark room and lit the candle on the table. We then said the following verse:

Winter is dark, yet each tiny spark, brightens the way, to Christmas Day.

Shine little light, and show us the way, to the bright light of Christmas Day.

It was really very lovely and the boys both enjoyed it.

We have many other plans to celebrate during the holiday season. It is a great way to really enjoy the meaning of the season instead of just focusing on the gift giving of Christmas day. We plan to adopt a family/child up here in the area so that will be part of our advent calendar activity and we also plan to make lots of hand made gifts for people so that will be in there as well. Stay tuned for future posts so that we can share our goings on!