First Week of Advent

 We light one candle shining bright
Upon this Holy Advent night
Fill our hearts with loving might
Lead us to Christmas Day's brilliant light!

 - M. T. Schunemann

I love this time of year as our excitement for the Christmas season grows with each candle that we light :) 

This morning the children and I pulled out the box deep in the back of my closet with our advent candle holder and beeswax candles and brought it to the coffee table. We cleared off the miscellaneous school books that were scattered all over it so that we would have lots of space to set it up in its special spot for the holiday season where it will be joined in the coming weeks by our nativity scene and St. Nicholas.

 Rudolph Steiner incorporates the four kingdoms into the four weeks of advent as well and for the first week he shares:

 The first light of Advent is the light of stones,
Light that lives in seashells, in crystals and in bones.

So the kids picked through their stash of favorite stones and shells and I brought out the special hour glass crystals that were gifted to us from a fellow waldorf family earlier this spring and for the bones we thought maybe our dried starfish might qualify since it's just the skeleton of it left *grin*.

Our tradition is that the youngest child gets to light the first candle and then the middle and so on so little M had the honor of holding the match all on his own to light his candle tonight and then we turned out all of the lights and sat under the glow of our star lanterns from Martinmas and watched the light of the candle grow as the wick burned down and the flame grew larger. This went on for a little while until Hubby and I were the last ones left enjoying one anothers quiet company :)

 Over the next couple of days we'll start to pull out all of our favorite Christmas books including  Celebrate with Joy by Sondra Burnett  which is full of inspiration on scriptures to read, craft ideas and ways to make Christmas even more special and our library wish list is overflowing with seasonal favorites. Each trip into town finds us with a few more that are waiting for us to be picked up and brought home. I think I might even grab a few paper whites to plant for next week's light of plants. I can't wait :)

What are your plans for advent and the coming weeks?

Hugs,

Rosina

Advent and Love

Tonight we lit two candles for advent starting with the one we lit last week and then the lighting of a second one to symbolize love and family. We spent the entire day reading Christmas books, baking and just enjoying one anothers company. I couldn't help but think how blessed I am to have three beautiful children and how homeschooling allows us to spend so much time together :)

Rudolph Steiner incorporates the four kingdoms into the four weeks of advent and for the second week he shares:

“The second light of Advent is the light of plants–
Plants that reach up to the sun and in the breezes dance.”

So this week we will plant our paper whites which I have been sprouting in the dark pantry and we will gather and bring in pinecones along with some fresh cedar boughs from the cedar tree in the back yard. I can't wait. They are going to smell so good!

Our nativity set has made its way to our table as well and the children have been happily arranging and rearranging all of the figures. This week we will have an empty barn and manger and the angels singing but for now I'm letting everyone have a little play time *grin*.

One of the lovely ideas in our Celebrate the Joy holiday book is the filling of an empty manger all month long with bits of straw, string and what not so the kids built a little manger out of popsicle sticks and I found a bunch of natural colored raffia that looks like hay for them to cut and place inside of it. Each morning they pull a little bit out of the top of the mason jar, snip it off and then put it in our manger. By the 24th it should be overflowing and ready for our little baby Jesus to be placed within :)

May you all enjoy joy and love this week.

Hugs,
Rosina

First Candle of Advent

We may not have been home for the first day of advent but that didn't stop us from lighting the first candle :)

Sunday happened to be the day we were stranded at my mom's house during our flooding but she has the very same advent candle holder or Aadventsleuchter as me so during dinnertime we set it on the table and lit the first candle starting our journey of filling our hearts with the joy of the season and getting ready for baby Jesus' birthday :)

Over the past several years I have slowly been moving our family further away from the hub bub of purchasing mass amounts of unnecessary gifts and the focus on santa and what he is going to bring us. Instead of all that we think of all the good deeds we can do for others during the holiday season and what special handmade gifts we can make for one another. One of the books that I love to pull out for inspiration on scriptures to read, craft ideas and ways to make Christmas even more special is Celebrate with Joy by Sondra Burnett. I've had it for a quite a few years and while I've read it over and over many times I always find something new to add to our festivities :)

This year I thought it would be fun to make our own advent countdown calendar since everyone is old enough now to wield a needle and thread *grin*. I've been cutting out little felt hearts, stars, gingerbread men, trees and more and we've been stitching them together and filling them with a bit of wool stuffing every afternoon. I have a few more that I'm going to finish up tomorrow and we'll have them all ready for the first of December.

In the coming days I'm looking forward to sharing stories with the children about St. Nicholas to and how he gave selflessly to others without any expectation of receiving something in return and I have a big baking party in the works. Every December there is a seniors dinner at our community hall that is open for everyone to come down and enjoy and if you are home bound you can also have a meal delivered right to your door. How great is that! So I thought it would be fun for us to bake cookies for the dessert portion of the meal that can be taken home and enjoyed later and it is something that even my 5 year old can do and feel really proud of himself for helping with :)

I just love this time of the year *grin*. I just pulled out my stash of hot cocoa and am looking forward to crafting and sipping it in front of the fire with the children. They don't know it yet but I'm going to set aside a few special nights for each of them to spend some one on one gift making time with me to so that if any of them needs help finishing or making a gift they can do that after the others have gone to bed. What child doesn't love staying up later to work on secret projects :)

What do you have planned for the holiday season? Also hop over to Frontier Dreams to read more lovely entries others have shared about this week's advent.

Hugs,
Rosina