Kicking off Christmas

It's finally December and with a successful Thanksgiving behind us that can only mean one thing...time for kicking off Christmas!  I love, love, love Christmas and it has always been such a special time to me.  I think it's become even more meaningful and special now that I have kids who love the magic of Christmas. We have a lot of really fun traditions that we do to begin our Christmas.  The first of those that I do every single year to get us in the mood is decorating for Christmas.  I reserved all day on Friday for packing away fall and bringing out Christmas. I worked from about 10 AM - 10 PM only stopping briefly for meals, but I can say it is all done! 

***I'll do a house tour of all my decorations next week sometime so be looking for that!***

On Saturday morning I sat and just enjoyed the peaceful quiet of our living room and this pretty view of our tree.  

That view wasn't quite as enjoyable on Friday night when Little Mama knocked the tree over after it was pretty much all decorated.  My hubby told her to be sure to spread all the ornaments out and she took that to mean that the back needed some, too.  Well, her squeezing behind the tree and the wall caused it to fall.  I had to laugh though when after it fell Boo-Boo looked at it very seriously and said, "Well that doesn't look very good." If I wasn't laughing I would have cried.  Thankfully, only a handful of ornaments were broken and we got the tree situated.  We'd had a great track record with our trees so I guess one was bound to fall at some point.  (I just hope Jen shares the stories of her tress with y'all soon because the first thing Blondie said to me on Saturday morning was that I needed to text Jen and let her know our tree fell just like hers did.)

Not only did I decorate the inside of the house, but I got to work outside, too.  I still have some things to add and some more lights to put out, but for now I just love seeing it all lit up! 

 And of course we put out my favorite wooden reindeer, also.

The entire Christmas season we talk about the real reason for Christmas and celebrate the birth of Jesus.  In fact, yesterday while Boo-Boo and I were cruising the aisles of Hobby Lobby he yelled with just as much excitement every time he saw "Baby Jesus" as he did when he saw something Santa related.  However, with yesterday being the first day of December, that meant it was time for a few of my kids' favorite Christmas traditions to begin that involve the big man in red.  They woke up to this: 

These chocolate advent calendars  are something they look forward to every morning in December.  Their great-grandmother sends one for each of them them every year.   They hunt for the correct number on the little doors and a chocolate candy is hiding behind each door.  It's the only time I let them eat candy before breakfast!  Such a fun and inexpensive way to countdown to Christmas Day.

A new tradition that we started last year was using the Hallmark North Pole Communicator.  Gigi and Papa bought this for the kids and I'll tell you something, it fascinated us all!  Parents set the communicator to "North Pole Time" and then everyday from December 1 through Christmas Eve you can push the button, turn the knob and connect with Santa, an elf, or one of his North Pole friends.  It's interactive, too!  My kids rotate turns each day getting to be the one to call, but they all sit on the edge of their seats to hear who might be on the other end and what they might have to say. I highly recommend this as a fun way to keep the magic of Christmas alive for your kids.

And of course, our Elf on the Shelf, Elfie, comes back to visit!  I know some parents have a love/hate relationship with their elves, but ours never gets into too much trouble and last night he even got all my kids to finish their green beans at dinner, so that is a win in my book!

We have so many traditions that take place over December and little ways that we make this time of year special for our family and friends.  I can't wait to share them all and would love to know your favorite traditions, too so please share.  It really is the most wonderful time of the year!