<\/p>\nSeveral years ago, Jon’s parents gave us a great Advent calendar. It looks like a little chest of drawers, but with swinging doors like a closet. We’ve tried several different ways to celebrate Advent using this over the years, but I think we’ve finally settled on a good one. <\/p>\n
Instead of filling the cubbies with chocolates (yummy, but we have those in the house anyway) or little trinkets (fun, but ultimately more expensive than useful), we have stuffed each little closet with a slip of paper containing a fun activity to do with Lucy that day, running all through December until Christmas Day.<\/p>\n
We hope this works well and helps us all experience the joy of waiting through Advent for the arrival of Jesus. Here’s what’s on the schedule. And hey — don’t show Lucy or you’ll spoil the surprises!<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
p{color:gray}. Photo: Here’s Lucy on Christmas Day a year ago, definitely still looking like a baby, at eight months old to the day. (See below for a current holiday portrait of the young lady.)<\/p>\n
# extra reading time with Mama or Papa
\n# visit with Grandma & Grandpa (Happy birthday tomorrow, Grandma!)
\n# walk outside, then cocoa & cookies inside
\n# experiment with washable crayons
\n# watch lots of “Daily Lucy videos”:\/news\/category\/baby\/video\/
\n# make a Christmas shaker
\n# play with trains with Deborah, Evan, Grandma, and Grandpa
\n# “Sankta Lucia pageant”:http:\/\/www.northpark.edu\/news\/story.cfm?ID=2450 at North Park University
\n# wear jingle bells and dance
\n# watch “_How the Grinch Stole Christmas_”:http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/exec\/obidos\/ASIN\/B000HA4WDY\/octothorppres-20
\n# make and play with playdoh
\n# M&Ms for a snack
\n# put up Christmas lights in the play room (for “Sankta Lucia”:http:\/\/www.serve.com\/shea\/germusa\/lucia.htm Day)
\n# scarves in the Kleenex box
\n# decorate Christmas cookies with Grandma
\n# a family walk
\n# extra-long hand-washing (i.e., play in sink)
\n# watch “_A Charlie Brown Christmas_”:http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/exec\/obidos\/ASIN\/B00004W5UM\/octothorppres-20
\n# color hunt (look for several small objects of one color and put them in a bag)
\n# roll on cushions on the floor
\n# make a toddler train (string little boxes together to fill with stuff and let Lucy drag them around)
\n# experiment with (washable!) markers
\n# trim the Christmas tree
\n# sing Christmas carols
\n# Christmas!<\/p>\n
Several of these ideas come from “_The Toddler’s Busy Book_”:http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/exec\/obidos\/ASIN\/0671317741\/octothorppres-20 , such as the “toddler train,” “scarves in the Kleenex box,” and “color hunt.” Other activities are just fun or silly or, frankly, things we had planned already. We hope this Advent tradition helps us to enjoy lots of joyful family time together. Come, Lord Jesus!<\/p>\n
p{color:gray}. Photo: Here’s Lucy all dressed up for brunch on Thanksgiving Day 2007 with the Gortner family. So big!<\/p>\n
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Several years ago, Jon’s parents gave us a great Advent calendar. It looks like a little chest of drawers, but with swinging doors like a closet. We’ve tried several different ways to celebrate Advent using this over the years, but I think we’ve finally settled on a good one.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1510","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-kids"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/boydsnest.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1510","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/boydsnest.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/boydsnest.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/boydsnest.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/boydsnest.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1510"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/boydsnest.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1510\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/boydsnest.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1510"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/boydsnest.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1510"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/boydsnest.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1510"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}