Simple and Sweet

We chose to eliminate Santa from our Christmas tradition. Early in the holiday season Streed said something about Santa. I simply said, "what if he doesn't come to our house this year?" He asked why and I just said "Lets just get presents from those that love us and Celebrate Jesus rather than focusing on gifts." It should not have been a big deal. We really never spoke of Santa much and they only got one thing "from him" last year anyway. It was fine until about two days till Christmas. Before bed, in his extremely tired state, Streed was crying because Santa was not coming. Probably because everywhere you go people ask what Santa is bringing you. It is awkward for a 5 year old to say "He's not coming to our house." It was awkward for me to have to explain it after they would say, "Sure he is." Streed was fine once we talked about opening presents in a few days and then by naming everything he got in Mobile the previous weekend.

In December we briefly spoke of the real St. Nick. Next year we will do a better job with that. We did buy for one Angel Tree child. Maybe next year we can celebrate St. Nick by combining his generosity with our Angel Tree giving. Just a thought. Anyway, we decided to open presents on Christmas Eve morning and focus only on Jesus on Christmas day. We loved it. The kids got a few small gifts from us. So, we opened presents and ate breakfast. We laid low most of day and went to a Christmas Eve service that night and a friend's house after that.

Christmas morning Ella and I were up first. We set up a nativity scene on the kitchen table with candles all around it. Then we went and got Daddy and Streed and told them baby Jesus was born. We all came to the kitchen and read the nativity story and sang some carols. After that Chip and the older kids went outside and saw the new swing set that Chip's parents got them. It was still in the box so they looked forward to playing on it that afternoon. (We would have given it to them Christmas Eve as well but the weather was horrible and it would have been torture to have to hear about it all day.) At 10:30 that morning we went to our church for a brief service. It is by far one of my new favorite traditions. It was sweet being with our church that we love on Christmas morning reading scripture and singing a few hymns. After that we came home and cooked. Chip and the kids and I ate a simple meal: turkey, corn casserole, grammy's peas and rolls. For dessert we had a Jesus cake. We spent the rest of the day watching Chip put together the swing set. A few friends came and ate leftovers that night. Chip and I agree it was our best Christmas thus far.

Grammy's Peas
Le Sueur peas (reserve some juice)
cream cheese
pimentos (for color)
salt and pepper
Heat in a sauce pan, add juice as needed till consistency desired

This is my grammy's recipe. It is a Christmas must for our family.

Jesus Cake
chocolate cake (represents sin)
white icing (purity and the forgiveness of sin)
wrapped in evergreens (representing everlasting life)