The Christmas Joy

I thought I loved Christmas before I was a mother. But Oh My do I love it even more now. I treasure each new tradition, each joyful Merry Christmas, each tree we turn over in our advent calendar, each Happy Birthday Jesus song we sing. I love my fridge covered in Christmas cards. I love baking. I love shopping (online ;) ) and decorating and watching White Christmas and Elf. Sometimes I worry about trying to balance all the fun secular parts of Christmas with the birth of Christ. OUR SAVIOR WHO WAS BORN TO DIE FOR ME! I try to stress everyday why we celebrate and explaining the meaning behind the traditions we have chosen. This year I find myself anticipating the birth of Christ even more. Because as I have teaching Noah about Jesus each day I fall more in love with Him myself. I think the message Christ is teaching me this Christmas is JOY. He wants to bring joy to all of us. Joy in salvation. Joy in loving and serving each other. Joy in raising little ones. Joy in life, a life abundant. So I think He is pleased with the joy that surrounds this season.

I have to share one of my favorite joyful moments of Christmas this year (so far). Our neighborhood love holidays. (Last year I took you on a Christmas light tour , here.And told you stories about the Halloween craziness,here and here.) The lights go up and on right after the Thanksgiving leftovers are wrapped up and in the fridge. They are beautiful and in extreme excess! Noah particularly loves them. Saturday night we were coming home from going out to eat with our parents and I had been alerted via texts and Facebook that Santa was in our neighborhood. But these sighting had been around five and it was now eight. I didn't think He would have stuck around that long. But sure enough there he was sitting in a rocking chair near his sleigh in the front yard of a house all lit up. Santa was passing out candy canes to kids driving around. It was so sweet. Noah loved it! Tonight after a trip to our Publix (side story: Our bag boy tonight was the sweetest ever! All the big car carts were being cleaned so Noah was in the back of a regular cart and Miller was up front. So at the check out he got another buggy for our groceries. On the way to the car he asked me if I had had a good day. Like he really cared and wanted to know. We had a conversation about Christmas shopping online. He was so nice! Just one more experience to cement my love for Publix!) we were driving home looking at lights and Santa was out again! How sweet is that? I love this "Santa". When I got home I boxed up some leftover treats, tied a bow on it, and wrote a little thank you note and drove back down to Santa. He had gone in for a break but his little helpers were out. And guess what.... they had Auburn hats on. To some this may not sound like a big deal. But here in Tuscaloosa it is. I always knew Santa was an Auburn fan :) Good people. Spreading the Christmas Joy!