A blessed day to you all!

Now that Christmas is fastly approaching, my family is deep in Christmas preparations!

To be frank, I never thought about blogging about this - I thought it rather boring. But my bloggy buddy MovieCritic encouraged me to write this post, so here goes!

Rorate Mass, Advent 2018 Copyright: Catherine Hawthorn

1st-2nd Week of Advent

For Advent, we have a hand-made Advent calendar that my great-aunts made. Our Advent Calendar is kind of a blend between a traditional Advent calendar and a Jesse Tree. The base is a felt Christmas tree and each day, there is a felt ornament that goes on it. Corresponding to those are slips of paper with Bible readings and prayers, but not in strict time order like a Jesse Tree is. We've had to make some minor notations to these - the original was made with the King James Bible, and 3/4s of the family uses the Douay-Rheims. Most of the time, that isn't too much of a problem, but there are some that the verse numbers don't correspond. Nothing like reading a Bible verse about trial and tribulation and then find that the paper was about joy.....

We used to do an Advent Wreath as well, but we kinda fell out of that because....no one remembered about it. And candles kept disappearing. And we couldn't agree on the proper readings to go with the wreath either....

Oh, and a lot of the times, the outside Christmas decorations will also be set up. We have a light-up Santa Sleigh that my grandparents gave us, and a Shepherd's crook with lights over it. There are a few other light up things we may put out, as well as some outdoor lights around the windows. HOWEVER, these are not turned ON until much later in the month. This way, we take advantage of softer ground and slightly warmer temperatures....

For the first two weeks of Advent, this is typically how far we go. Unless you are me, who completes half of her Christmas shopping in November, and typically finishes about this time.

This picture was taken several years ago, but this is what our big Christmas tree typically looks like.  Copyright: Catherine Hawthorn

3rd Week of Advent

This is when the Christmas preparations really begin to happen.

The first thing that comes on is the Christmas music. We tend to have a bit of argument about that every year, because Tyler (the Protestant brother) likes to listen to Christmas music after Thanksgiving, and the rest of us don't want to listen to it until much later. We make up for it after Christmas Day - after all, the end of the liturgical season for Christmas/Epiphany is Feb 2.

The Christmas decorations also come down from the attic at this time. We start with the house decorations, which include 2-3 creches. These latter things are either set up and covered until Christmas, or the empty creche will stand until closer to Christmas. 2 sets are complete with shepherds and animals. The third one is one that came as a partial and that we added to it as years went on. It's pretty close to complete now, just missing a couple more shepherds and it could use another sheep or two.

The Jesus Gift box will also come down. It's a small cardboard box wrapped in old Christmas paper with a slit in it. It is sealed shut, and thus it will remain. Slips of paper will then be set out, and any sacrifices that we make for Jesus will be written down and placed in the box. Only the person and Jesus know about it :).

When we were younger, we used to pair this tradition with straw for the Creche. Our first creche set (the partial one I mentioned) had no straw in it when we bought it from my church. One year, I decided to remedy that by taking some straw from an old archery target we had. We've kept that straw ever since.

Christmas shopping typically happens during this week. Our living room will also be shifted to accommodate the big Christmas Tree!

Christmas cookies!! Copyright: Catherine Hawthorn

4th Week of Advent

Depending on when Christmas falls, our trees usually goes up right before the 4th Sunday of Advent. The big tree is a 50 years old artificial tree that reaches our ceiling. Leveling the pole is the biggest headache of the year, and then lifting the sagging branches is not much better. That is Mom's department though.

I am in charge of the little artificial tree, which typically resides in our family office. That one isn't as old, and it's about 3 ft high.
Several years ago, we discovered that we had too many ornaments for the big tree. So we sorted a lot of the non-breakable ornaments out and placed them on this little tree.

This week is also when the BAKING happens!

Traditionally, we always make Cinnamon Twist bread. Lately, each of us kids has made a batch, which is 2 loaves. Freezing it allows us to have bread through Christmas and New Years.

I will then also make my Christmas Cookies. I typically make between 2-5 kinds of cookies. Gingerbread cookies are always made. Other kinds could be sugar cookies, chocolate chip oatmeal cookies, peanut butter cookies, and Italian Fig cookies.

As all glorious chaos is going on, we also have present wrapping happening, and of course, the last minute Christmas shopping as we discover that the online gifts are NOT coming in time....LOL.

And that brings us to Christmas Eve!

My mother and Tyler will go to their Christmas Eve service first, while the Catholics of the house will typically sleep. Unless I happen to be baking, which I typically am on Christmas Eve.
And then before the rest of us go to Midnight Mass, I will typically lay out the stockings and make sure most of the presents are under the tree.

Mom will then make the final preparations as we're travelling up.

And then comes the big Nativity day, which starts with Mass, a few hours of sleep, then opening stockings and unwrapping gifts. Followed then by a month of rejoice, cookie eating, and watching the snow fall outside.

Goodness, I'd better stop rambling or else we'll still be here when Christmas comes! How does your family prepare for Christmas? 

Old-fashionably yours,

Catherine