A Few Christmas Twists

Thanksgiving has always been my favorite holiday. And once NBC added the National Dog Show to a new tradition, it is seriously just like an extra piece of bacon to an already perfect breakfast. My family all knows how I feel about "holiday skipping". If you meet up with my cousins, you will inevitably hear stories from many Thanksgivings passed including board game mishaps, movies, naked babies crawling under dressing rooms... So. Much. Fun. There will be no trees, carols, or presents until after the wishbone has been broken. (Except for this year, it never broke, it just kind of awkwardly bent. Which is really unfortunate since my brother brought a friend home from Germany for her first American Thanksgiving and we thought we would let her break it. And it didn't. But the photo was cute) I do make the exception for the "hot items" for kids because last year, my mom and I chased a Doc McStuffins office like a dog chasing its tail. But generally, I buy no present until the day after. (A big shout out to being an Amazon Prime member. I love you, UPS man, I promise.)

I tell you, Christmas changed for me and became MAGICAL when Nina came to us. I went to Hobby Lobby (she was 3 months old) and I seriously had more enthusiasm than I do when I enter the gates of Disney World. It was a complete game changer. Lee and I had recently discussed how we would do Christmas. We wanted to keep the magical portion of it all without losing that Christmas is celebrating the birth of our Savior.

Fast forward a few years and we realize that, really, Nina remembers very little from the last few Christmases. WE had fun, but I think this is the first year that she really GETS IT. So, we have done several things to do both: have the magical fun of Christmas (complete with trees, lights, stockings, presents, and yes, the ever-so-controversial Elf on the Shelf) and concentrated time for remembering that the purpose of the season is to concentrate on God's love for us and the birth of Christ.

While, I am in NO way saying that our way is the best way or that any other way is wrong. Hear me on that: there is no Christmas shaming from this girl. I have several friends that have young kids who are trying to figure out how to do both and here is what I'm loving from both.

Focusing on Advent
Since Nina is 4, we are just starting to teach her words that are mostly used during Christmas, namely "Advent". It really helped our cause that Nina's best friend, Emily's, family did the first advent reading of the year for our church. ("What is "advent"? "You know, where we focus on 4 things at Christmas and light a candle each week for each one. You know, Emily lit the "Hope" candle." "Oh yea!") We have an advent ring at our house (Okay, I'll be real. We ordered an advent ring and when we got it, it was broken into 5 pieces, so we have another advent ring currently on a truck somewhere that will be delivered to us this week. So, we have one, we just don't HAVE one. But we have candles. That counts, right?)

Decorating the House
For us, decorating is a family event. We sing, dance, unintentionally clean off book shelves from papers floating free from college... Family time (Mostly fun, except for cleaning part. And realizing how long I've been out of college).

How we Do "Elf on the Shelf"
We were gifted the elf when Nina was 1 and really, are low-key elf owners. Let's be real, I don't use my elementary education degree because of the creativity required. We're more of the "Try to not forget to move the elf" type of people. I recently was reading a blog about how many families choose not to do the elf because of different familial philosophies about what the elf does or represents at their house. (Again, no shaming here either way) While I was reading the comments on the section, I saw an idea that we have adopted and have fallen in love with. Instead of the elf representing mischief or spying, he is a messenger for us. Bernard (Yes, I LOVE the Santa Clause series) leaves "Missions of Kidness" for Nina to complete. Notes are left for her that reemphasize what we are learning in our family advent devotions and give a mission to show Christ's love for that day. Notes aren't left every day, but a few times a week. Nina loves her missions and she loves that Bernard brings them. 

The Greatest Gift
I read a blog last year about Ann Voskamp and her "The Greatest Gift" books and let me tell you, it has lived up to my expectations. We are using "Unwrapping the Greatest Gift". It has a daily scripture that walks through the Bible discussing scripture that demonstrates God's love to us and equates it to God's love through Christ. You can print off ornaments that can be colored and hung on a "Jesse tree" (Either paper, felt, or a small tree) that is solely for these special ornaments that illustrate each day's lesson. We ordered ours from Amazon, but they are currently sold out. I was able to find it still available on Christian Book.

Santa

We still do "Santa" but try to not put too much stock in him. He only brings 3 gifts to show the 3 gifts from the Wiesmen. Last year, Nina insisted on leaving Santa a banana because she was concerned he may get a stomach ache from too many cookies. 

We still sing "Jingle Bells" along side of "O, Come All Ye Faitful" (Which, hilariously, is the only song that seems to calm Brooks down when he's upset). We love to bake, send cards, etc. But I'm really loving our magnetic nativity board with a countdown and our family time with our Jesse tree. I love Santa and the fun and Magic of Christmas, but man, I love my Savior so much. Especially seeing the whole story unfold new in my child's eyes. 

I'm sure there are a ton of more ideas that people use to show the love of Christ and I would LOVE to hear them. The day I stop learning is the day I die. I thought I would share a few things we do!

No One Can Teach You to Teach

I come from a long line of teachers, and one thing I have heard from all of them is, "No one can teach you how to teach." I agree. In 3.5 years of undergrad (don't mock my overachiever, "I took too many AP classes", self), I took classes on educational philosophy, psychology, history, and methods, and my family was right, I was still clueless.

At UT, they have a 5 year masters degree education program. The intention is 4 years of undergrad, a semester of grad school (typically done in the summer) of research classes and then a year of student teaching while writing an action research paper. The first semester, you teach half a day and do classes the second half of the day and second semester, you teach all day and present your research.

 (And, in my case, plan a wedding. What was I thinking?! Oh yea. He was awesome :))

In the second semester, I was told I would be a traveling teacher with the hearing specialist in a neighboring county. I learned that I would hop in a car every morning with the teacher and we would go around to all of the schools in the county to provide services. I also learned that my teacher had been fighting ovarian cancer for four years. When I met Mickey, we had instant chemistry. She was laid back and jovial and had an awesome sense of sarcasm, which is my love language. We were a perfect match. We provided services to special needs preschools, sweet  elementary students, scattered middle schoolers (who would always hide their hearing aides from us), and a few high schoolers who wished we would just go away. While traveling around the county, we discussed our dogs (she had a schnauzer that provided her tons of company during her cancer fight), cooking, family, weddings... No topic was off limits. 

In our teaching, we had lots of tough situations. Parents who had divorced over their child's IEP, pregnant teens, parents who didn't bother to show up to their IEP meetings, and, of course, Mickey's cancer. 

What I learned is that there are tough things in teaching. Often times, the lesson doesn't work, the students don't cooperate, you're provided no space to work, no materials to work with... But that it's all in perspective because life happens. At the end of your life, is what is going wrong going to matter? (Which, for Mickey, could have been any time) She always chose joy. Always. She had a hysterical story to tell about every situation and I still laugh about many of them today. 

When I got my first teaching job, I was assigned a mentor teacher who embodied the same philosophy that Mickey had. It was as if my new mentor teacher had talked to my college mentor about how to teach me to teach. Meg is now one of my best friends in the world and gives so much wisdom to my career, including the advice I always turn to, "No matter what decisions are made by higher ups, I will show up and do my job tomorrow." And we always choose laughter. (Most of which, we find funnier than anyone else does) Incredible mentors.

Mickey and I have been Facebook friends where she and I would interact and relive inside jokes. Her sense of humor always has made me laugh more than most.

Last night, I dreamed that Mickey had moved into our house and told me that she had called hospice. I woke up shaken and grabbed my phone at 4:30 and realized that the last post on her Facebook was in an album called "Mickey's last trip to the beach" and it was posted at the beginning of October and my heart sank. I googled her name and found her obituary and found out that she lost her battle with cancer on November 11. 

My heart breaks that the world has lost such an incredible woman. I celebrate for her that she is finally done fighting. From her, I learned so much about life and how to face it. And I consider my life and career so much better off that I had her as my original mentor. I will forever laugh a little when I hear the word "behoove" and will never look at a ShopVac the same. 

If you're a teacher, mentor a new one that is starting and teach them the positive and the laughter behind our profession. And teach them that life is never too bad to not laugh along the way. 

My life is better off that I was taught that.