Advent Adventures

Happy Advent!

We are off to a great start here. It seems like we are doing a ton of different Advent activities, but that is going to be the main focus of our studies and activities this month (in addition to Math and Reading and Writing of course). I apologize for not getting this post out in ADVANCE of Advent for those of you who may want to use some of these ideas.... but it's still early!


We kicked off Advent on Sunday with a little "Happy New Year Breakfast Party" inspired by one of my favorite bloggers at http://catholicicing.blogspot.com/.



We are using the traditional Advent wreath at dinnertime and also in our room at our family prayer time at night. When we light the candle we sing one verse of "O Come, O Come Emmanuel" and the week's appropriate verses of a song called, "Light One Candle." We also pray this simple little Advent prayer I used to pray with my second graders when I taught school: "Come Lord Jesus. We are waiting for you. Each day we try more and more to get our hearts ready. Thank you for coming to us again this Christmas. Amen."

The Jesse Tree is the "family tree" of Jesus. It tells the story of God in the Old Testament. Jesse was the Father of David who was anointed to establish a royal family. A thousand years later Jesus was bron in this royal line. I have always wanted to start the Jesse Tree tradition with my family. I was so excited several weeks ago when my friend Ginny invited me to be part of a Jesse Tree Ornament exchange.

I was assigned the story of Isaiah's Call to Holiness (Is 1:10-20, 6:1-13, 8:11-9:7). I had to make tongs holding a hot coal! So I made 15 of these:

I also had the story of Jeremiah and the Exile (Jer 1:4-10, 2:4-13, 7:1-15, 8:22-9:11). I made 15 sets of these tears:A few weeks ago all of the ladies in the exchange brought their ornaments to a party. It was so fun to see all of the creative ways people made their ornaments.

Now I have this basket of ornaments to use on our Jesse Tree:

Here's a picture of the boys looking at out the first flakes of snow this morning. The little tree next to them is our Jesse Tree. Each morning at the beginning of our school time we are reading the appropriate Bible story and placing the ornament on the tree. So far we've done a dove for Creation, an apple for Adam and Eve, and a sparkly rainbow for Noah's Ark.Here's a link for another way of doing the Jesse Tree. It includes Scripture passages and coloring pages:
http://showerofroses.blogspot.com/2010/11/jesse-tree-readings-coloring-pages-for.html

Of course we're also reading lots and lots of Advent and Christmas stories and we're learning some new holiday songs. Check out another link from my FAVORITE blog (Shower of Roses). She wrapped up a book for each day of the Advent and Christmas Seasons. Each day the family opens a book and reads it together.
http://showerofroses.blogspot.com/2010/11/this-years-advent-and-christmas-book.html

At breakfast each morning the boys are taking turns putting stickers on our Advent Calendar and then we are reading a page out of this little book:It's from Creative Communications for the Parish (http://www.creativecommunications.com/) . Each day's readings focus on Advent/Christmas traditions in a different country. We are reading the passage and the prayer, locating the country on a world map, and adding a piece to this corresponding mobile:I am attempting to also teach the boys a bit more about each country each day and/or do a related craft and/or try a food from the country. Today was the first day. We learned about Argentina. The reading said that the children often put cotton on their Christmas trees to look like snow, so we made this:

Here's the corner in our kitchen where we've got these activities posted:



Also from Creative Communications for the Parish, we are reading and coloring the pages in this book:

Beginning on the 17th we will be praying the O Antiphons with the help of this O Antiphon House I made with some other homeschool moms. More on that when we get to it!

There are so many wonderful Feasts to celebrate and lessons to learn in the next few weeks: Saint Nicholas, Immaculate Conception, Our Lady of Guadalupe, Saint Lucy....

Here are a few more awesome links with great ideas for celebrating the Advent and Christmas seasons:

http://showerofroses.blogspot.com/2010/11/links-for-advent-planning-from-archives.html

http://www.elizabethfoss.com/reallearning/2010/11/advent-and-christmas-clicking.html#tp

It's so easy to get so busy this season. Let's pray for and encourage one another. May we carve out time each day to be still and prepare our hearts for true celebration that comes with the Birth of Jesus.