Jesus Tree

This year, I wanted to do more than read the Christmas story over and over in the days leading up to Christmas.  So after looking around a bit, I decided to turn our Thanksgiving stick tree into a Jesus tree that would help us celebrate and remember who Jesus was (and is).  Just like celebrating birthdays are more than remembering the birth story, so celebrating Jesus’ birthday became more about his life than about his birth.  Some days were decidedly un-Christmas-y.  Other days were really fun (like when we played flashlight hide-and-seek). 

I love that this led all of us to worship Christ, no matter what age we are. 

The basic framework led us through Jesus as the Son of God, Son of man, a humble servant, and savior of the world.  Each day the kids would open up the ornament for the day and we’d read a story to help us understand more about Jesus.  Some days we did other activities if we had time, forethought, and energy. 

Week 1: Jesus is the Son of God

• Because God said so. Jesus is baptized. (Matthew 3:17)
• Because he is strong like God. Jesus calms the storm. (Matthew 8:23)
• Because he was with God during creation.  The creation story. (John 1, Genesis 1, Colossians 1:16)
• Because people said so. Jesus and Peter walk on the water. (Matthew 14)
• Because he is worthy of worship and only God is worthy of worship.  (Revelation 5:12-13, Exodus 20:3-4) This was a great day to sing “O Come All Ye Faithful” and other worship songs. 
• Because Jesus can forgive sin.  Jesus forgives and heals a paralytic. (Matthew 9:1-8)
• Because Jesus said so. Jesus stays in the temple when he’s 12 years old. (Luke 2:41-52) You can see Caleb’s version of the story here. 

Week 2: Jesus is the Son of Man.

• Mary’s son.  An angel visits Mary. (Luke 1:26-38)
• Adopted by Joseph.  Learned carpentry from Joseph.
• Became tired, hungry, and thirsty. Jesus is tempted in the desert. (Luke 4)
• Sympathizes with our weaknesses. (Hebrews 4:15-16)

Week 3: Jesus is a humble servant.

• Came as a dependent baby.  Joseph, Mary, and Jesus running to Egypt to escape King Herod. (Matthew 2:13-23)
• Born in a barn.
• Announced to shepherds.
• Washed the disciples’ feet. (john 13)
• Died on the cross. (Philippians 2:6-8)

Week 4: Jesus is the Savior of the world.

• Rescuer. I told my salvation story.
• Lamb. The story of the first Passover.  I used a chapter from One Wintry Night by Ruth Bell Graham. 
• Savior. Another telling of the gospel. by the way, this is supposed to be a parachute, but it hangs upside down on the tree.  The parachute has been tested, and it does work.
• Door/Gate. (John 10:9, John 14:6) We reviewed the heaven craft we did in preschool.
• Redeemer. Caleb got to redeem some pop cans at the grocery store.  He chose to keep the coins instead of buying something with them.
• Shepherd. Psalm 23.
• Light. We played flashlight hide-and-seek.  Caleb begged and begged to play it again the next night, so we did.
• King. (Philippians 2:9-11, Revelation 5:12-13 again)
• Emmanuel. God with us.  We were traveling on this day and I didn’t implement any of my ideas. One idea was to hang a prism and talk about how we can’t see God, but we can see what he does.  I could also use a picture of a neighborhood.  We’ll see what we end up doing next year!

My goal in doing this isn’t to create a regimented tradition, but to do something that will lead us into a deeper relationship with Christ. 

Christmas Stories

Our Thanksgiving Tree has morphed into a Jesus Tree.  Here’s Caleb helping to tell one of the stories:

Take 2.  The one in which Sophia decided to participate. 

Apology

The hazards of teaching a kinesthetic learner to apologize:

Mama: You need to apologize.

Son (after a long pause): Sorry.

Mama (prompting): Sorry for…

Son: Doing this. (as he pushes his sister… again.)

More “What for?” Questions

This morning as Luke was reading the Christmas story to Caleb, Caleb searched the pictures intently and asked, “Where’s Jesus’ Christmas tree?”

And then as they were talking about our Christmas tree: “There aren’t any brown Christmas lights.  What for?” 

Nothing like a fresh perspective to identify ritual.  Not that I’m saying I want brown lights on my Christmas tree.  

I’d rather have my kids help decorate:

Thanksgiving Favorite

I almost forgot one of my favorite parts of Thanksgiving this year:

Caleb started learning his first Bible verse, and he was so excited about it.  Ok, I think he also has “Be kind” from Ephesians down too, but this is the first verse he’s willingly tried to learn.  It was fun to see him learn it and teach it!

Thanksgiving Recap

My parents came to our place on Thursday:

We traveled to Luke’s parents’ on Saturday:

We looked forward to it for a week by making a calendar and paper chain: (Why am I not more embarrassed to post my awful art skills online?)

We decorated our “thankful tree” on Thanksgiving Day. 

We also made turkey napkin holders to help satiate Caleb’s requests to make something. 

Like last year, we filled our gift bag with things we were thankful for throughout the month of November. I’ve grown to appreciate the symbolism and simplicity of collecting our thanks in a gift bag. We’re counting all the little and big gifts God gives us each day.  I’m learning that a thankful heart puts so much of life in the proper perspective.  I’m also learning a thankful heart isn’t an emotion, but a practice.  This is the day the Lord has made.  I will choose to be glad and rejoice in it. 

What For?

Sometimes it sounds like “what fo-or?”  It usually means, “Why?”  We’ve entered that stage. 

Mommy: We’re going to put on hats so our ears don’t get cold.

Son: What for?

Today it was something a little more difficult to answer.

Mommy: Let’s go look for Grandpa’s Christmas present.

Son: What for?  Christmas is Jesus’ birthday.

Preschool: Letter H

I taught Caleb’s preschool today, and it was a little nutty. I was glad to see that Caleb was completely comfortable being himself around his preschool friends since he usually clams up in groups, but it also meant he required more than the usual amount of intervention.  I’m so thankful that he’s making friends!

Here was what I came up with for the Letter H:

Opening play time: Build houses using boxes.  We used various sized boxes to make houses for elephants, giraffes, big puppies, little puppies, and even frogs.  Part of this time was spent hiding in the boxes as well…and spinning with boxes over their heads.  Boys….

Introduce the letter: Read the letter.  Say the sound.  Repeat for hat, hug, and hop.

Story: Heaven.  Since we had been building houses just before this, I started off by saying heaven is Jesus’ house.  We also read an abbreviated story about heaven from The Jesus Storybook Bible.  Heaven is a wonderful, exciting, happy place! 

Heaven Sorting Activity:  What is in heaven?  What is not in heaven?  I loved seeing the kids imitate the happy, sad, and angry faces.  Hilarious!

Song:  Big House, originally by Audio Adrenaline.  We used a kids’ version.  I took the time to introduce some hand motions before playing the song, and the kids actually followed along and did the actions as the song played.  Usually, when we’ve tried songs, I see a lot of “deer in the headlights” faces. 

Craft: Heaven’s gate.  We spent a lot more time talking about what is in heaven during the craft (along with monitoring glue stick usage).  The kids glued on things they thought would be in heaven like Jesus, angels, toys, good food, trees, and musical instruments.  Then we glued a door on top, showing that Jesus is the only way to heaven.  On Caleb’s, I think Jesus got buried under the Christmas tree and piano:

Bathroom break

Game: Hide and Seek with the letter H.  Our kids are too young for full-blown hide and seek, so I simply hid an “H” cut out of construction paper and had them find it. 

Snack time: Honey Nut O’s.  Before snack time we talked about how God Hears us all the time, whether we whisper, shout, or just think.  so we practiced by whispering, shouting, and then thinking, “Thank you for snack.”  Whispering and shouting went really well.  Not so sure they got the “thinking” part.  We also spent time talking about what kinds of foods would be in heaven.  Foods like Halloween candy, oatmeal with “flies,” mac and cheese, and ice cream.

Craft (again): Thank you card for the guy in charge of the Paint-A-Plow program. (By this time the kids were done with crafting!)

Show and Tell: Each child brought something that started with “H” and told us about it.  Honda, helicopter, horses, hammer, heart, hot rod.  This is another time when Caleb needed some intervention…to not hammer on his classmates. 

Counting by Hundreds: I had written 100, 200, 300, etc. on different sheets of paper.  We read the numbers together, and then I laid the sheets of paper on the floor and had them find different numbers that I called out.

The end.  They were done and ready to play, and moms were starting to come. 

If you’re still reading, you must be my mom.  It takes quite a bit of planning to keep 6 active preschoolers engaged all morning long!

Paint is Easier to Clean than I Thought

Recently I learned of an opportunity to have preschools paint a city snowplow, so I signed our little preschool group up.  We were all a little nervous giving our kids real paint, but it was well worth the mess!  We also got a short tour of the garage, which included dump trucks, graders, street sweepers, and snowplows.  Little boy heaven?

Typical preschool photo…about half the kids and no one looking at the camera.

Some kids were done by this point. I think Caleb and Sophia would have kept painting all day.

Sophia was starting to blend in by this point.  Surprisingly, it wasn’t too difficult to get the paint out of her hair. 

Another First

Sophia’s first sentence: “I do it.” 

I think we’re in trouble.