A Few Christmas Highlights...

My camera battery died on Christmas Eve, before we could get a family picture. This is as close as we get!

My nephew Cole shows me his dinosaur:

Guess who is sitting up by herself these days?

One of the best lines I overheard during Christmas: "I handcuff you in the name of the Lord."

Laurel had a great time hanging out with her cousins and grandparents.

On Christmas day, Laurel wore her new reindeer dress that her Ohio Grampa sent.

Our time in Lethbridge was great! Besides the normal eating and card playing, we also went wall climbing (where I realized how out of shape I am) and took Laurel for her first swim! She seemed to enjoy it, even though the water wasn't very warm. She looked so cute in her little swim suit.

We're home now. We'll celebrate our little family's Christmas on Friday. Which should give me enough time to finish making the last stocking. (I finished Jon's last night). Yesterday I bought Christmas cards to mail--better late than never, right?

Hope you had a great Christmas.

Day 12: Too Tired to Write

Merry Christmas!

Day 11: A Wee Little Game

I am struggling to write a blog entry after a day filled with activity. (well, the main activity might have been eating). So, here's a little game I like to call "If I could only choose two things in each category, here's what I choose." Why two? Because one feels too final, and I don't like to play favorites. And three, though a more Biblical number, might just be too difficult for me to think of at this late hour (9:30 p.m. is late for me). Okay, are you ready to play?

Christmas Movies

A Charlie Brown Christmas

Little Women (okay, so it might not technically be a Christmas movie, but it feels like one to me).

Christmas Treats

Peanut Butter Cookies with the Hershey's Kiss in the middle (not sure if that's the technical name for them or not)

Chocolate Covered Cherries (homemade)

Christmas Dinner Items

Cranberries

Sweet Potato Casserole

Christmas Songs

O Little Town of Bethlehem

Joy to the World

Christmas Decorations

A Christmas Tree

Anything that involves candles

Christmas Eve Activities

Church

Eating snacks

Okay, that's all I've got this time. But fill me in on your two choices for each category.

Day 10: Traveling and Traditions

Since graduating from college, my Christmases have involved traveling. I kept thinking that one day, when I had my own family, I wouldn't be traveling for Christmas anymore. But when you live in a different city, not to mention a different country, from your family, Christmas involves long car trips or multiple flights and waiting in airports.

Today we packed the massive suv* we rented and headed five hours south to Lethbridge. I love coming to Lethbridge because I love our family. I've been looking forward to this trip since the last time we were here, about three weeks ago. I know that whenever we are here, and especially at Christmas, we will eat good food, have great conversations, laugh a lot, play games, and just enjoy being together.

With this being Laurel's first Christmas, I find myself thinking about Christmas traditions and wondering what kind of traditions she will grow up experiencing. I loved that I always got to wake up in my own house on Christmas morning. Our traditions were simple, but they were ours.

We might think traditions are the things of older generations, but I think they are especially important for children. Yes, traditions can have a way of becoming stale and void of meaning. But traditions can also have a way of grounding us and reminding us of who we are and where we fit in this world. They provide a rhythm to our lives, giving us markers along the way.

Each year as I was growing up, I knew that Christmas would include the Advent wreath, getting a new Christmas ornament, a bayberry candle, church on Christmas eve (as long as we weren't sick), reading T'was the Night Before Christmas, waiting until we were all awake to go downstairs, opening stockings before gifts, the random greeting of "Christmas gift" (don't ask me to explain that one), and seeing cousins and grandparents later in the day. Later we added the tradition of going to a movie on Christmas day.

How do we develop Christmas traditions for our family when we won't be in our own space? Yes, there is the tradition of traveling (and, after all, the people who celebrated the first Christmas had traveled and weren't in their own space). But what are other traditions that we can share and pass onto our kids?

*we requested a crv and ended up with a tank.

Day 9: One Finished Stocking

Laurel's stocking is finished! The hardest part was figuring out how to attach the solid colored top to the stocking. It made me realize how glad I am that I have a husband who had to take home-ec. I never had to. In fact, Ursuline didn't even offer it. I guess they figured they were educating girls for college and careers, not for sewing and cooking. Jon's the one in our family who knows not only how to change a needle on a sewing machine, but when a different sized needle might be needed.

Now I just have to finish two more for Jon and me. Luckily we aren't celebrating our little family Christmas until January 1, so I have some time.

Here's the back:

And the front:

The snow is falling in Edmonton. I am sipping a chai and eating a biscotti. I would like to stay home all day and work on the stockings. But...I have a meeting and laundry and a few more presents to wrap and packing to do and soup to make.

Day 8: A Christmas Pageant

I've always suspected that not only was Mary gentle, obedient, and reflective, but that she was also strong. I mean, she'd have to be to deal with the gossip of being unmarried and pregnant. And think of the physical strength she'd have needed to travel (by foot or on a donkey) at nine months pregnant. Yes, she must of have been strong. And tonight, if there were any doubts, I have been convinced.

Our friend Rory, who happens to be three years old, had been excited all week about his role in the Sunday School's Christmas play. He had a few short lines, which he had memorized. And. He got to play Joseph. Which means, he would get to walk around the sanctuary and then down the centre aisle with his friend Hannah, who had the role of Mary.

The Sunday School Christmas play was tonight. Rory's mom and dad had prepared a simple costume for him (a towel on his head, and a big brown t-shirt with a big belt around it). But Rory wanted nothing to do with costumes. Nothing. In fact, he wasn't so sure he wanted to be part of this crazy play at all. As his mom tried to convince him to wear the costume and play the role of Joseph, Rory's last ditch effort to get out of it was this: "Mom, funny guys don't wear costumes." And Rory is, definitely, a funny guy. He couldn't risk his funny guy reputation by wearing a costume.

No problem. Just get one of the other little boys in Sunday School to step in and play Joseph. Wrong. There are no other little boys in Sunday School. Seriously. But, there are little boys in the nursery, including Rory's little brother, Jonas, which almost sounds like Joseph. So, 1 year old Jonas, who can't really verbalize his protests against costumes, was suited up to play Joseph. Someone else read Rory's lines, but Jonas got to walk around the sanctuary, hand in hand with Hannah (age 6).

Jonas was doing great. But just as they were about to head down the centre aisle to join all the little animals and angels on the stage, Jonas got distracted and started to head in another direction. Well, Mary couldn't really have her husband desert her, not after all they'd already been through. No way, Joseph, you're in this with me! Mary did what she had to do. She picked up Joseph and carried him the rest of the way.

I can just imagine Mary thinking, "You mean carrying the Lord of the universe isn't enough? Now I've got to carry you, too?"

Day 7: An Early Christmas Dinner

Tonight I ate Christmas dinner with a wonderful group of women. Some of them are friends from church and some are part of a place called the Dream Centre. The Dream Centre women are part of a program that's helping them get their lives back on track, whether they're coming out of addictions or abusive relationships or just need a second chance in life.

We had Christmas dinner with all the fixings--turkey AND ham, stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy, sweet potato casserole, veggies, buns, and pumpkin pie. The men in our church made it all--and they did a fantastic job!

It's amazing how sharing a meal can foster community. Sitting at a table and passing platters of food takes away the "us" and "them"--there was only "us," a group of women and a few children, gathered to enjoy a meal together. Conversation and laughter filled the small room as we crowded around the table and heaped seconds onto our plates.

I don't know the stories of any of the women I met tonight. I don't know what challenges they've faced or what pain they've lived through. But I'm grateful that they let us laugh with them and ask questions about the Dream Centre and joke with their kids. I'm grateful that they let us be part of their lives for a couple of hours tonight, and that they were willing to be part of ours.

Day 6: In My Kitchen

We leave for Lethbridge on Tuesday and have a few Christmas tasks left to do before then. If my days between now and then are anything like this morning, I think we'll be okay.

It is 11:33 a.m., and it has been a very productive morning here. Let me give you the run down...

I spent 30 minutes on the exercise bike, ate breakfast, showered, fed Laurel, started washing Laurel's diapers, changed the sheets on our bed.

Then the real fun began:

I baked a "Chocolate Lovers Cheesecake" for Jon's birthday celebration tonight (we're having another couple and their kids over for dinner...which evolved from having 3 couples over for dessert). It is currently cooling, waiting to have the topping made and put on.

I took the chicken breasts from the freezer to thaw for tonight's main course--chicken vera cruz.

I baked 5 potatoes so that they will be ready to "twice bake" later for dinner.

I boiled 6 eggs to contribute to a meal our church is doing for a program that helps women who need a second chance. (I don't know what the eggs are for--I was just told to bring them...and the ingredients for sweet potato casserole).

And, finally, I now have orange almond biscotti baking in the oven.

And this is all before lunch!

Still on the agenda for today:

Finish laundry

Clean bathroom

Make dinner

Order family photos

Find babysitter for Monday afternoon

Reserve rental car for Tuesday

Clear stocking project off of table so guests have someplace to sit.

In other news...guess who got her very own highchair?

That's right, solid foods are just a few days away!

I know I promised an update on the stocking project today, but I haven't had a chance to get very far on them. Soon. Maybe this afternoon? (probably not)

So, what's going on in your kitchen?

Day 5: We Wait

...continued from yesterday...

In the season of Advent, especially, we are reminded that we are waiting. We are waiting for the day when all that was accomplished in the birth and life and death and resurrection of Jesus will finally be fully realized. We are waiting for the day when our friends won’t get cancer and when people won’t be sold into slavery, for the day when relationships will be healed and the earth will be, too. We wait for the promises of Isaiah—for the time when the wilderness, barren and desolate, will burst into bloom; for the day when the eyes of the blind will be opened and the ears of the deaf will be unstopped.

We wait and we long. And in the meantime, we live. We live into that future, we live as if it were already here—because we know Christ has already done the work to make that all happen. Because, even though we don’t see it yet, the promises of Isaiah have already been fulfilled in Jesus.

Joy to the world. The Lord has come. Will we receive our King?

tomorrow: an update on the stocking project

Day 4: The LORD Is Come

continued from yesterday...

Or maybe joy is just under-realized and misunderstood.

A dictionary definition of joy goes something like this: “a very glad feeling, happiness, great pleasure, delight.”

I am not satisfied with that definition. I don’t necessarily have a better one to offer, but I think joy is deeper than a very glad feeling and it’s more grounded than happiness. It may result in feeling happy, but I wonder if that feeling isn’t a product of joy, rather than joy itself. It’s more than just being in a good mood—it’s something that resonates in our souls. Maybe joy is more of a disposition that we root ourselves in, rather than a feeling that changes as our circumstances change.

It’s really hard to be happy in the midst of trials and heartbreak. But maybe, maybe it’s possible to still be rooted in joy—it might be a quiet joy, a joy that whispers rather than shouts, but maybe joy can be present, nonetheless. Joy and pain can be found in the same moment—maybe joy that has known pain is a deeper joy.

This is true of worship—our songs of praise have more substance when they are honest, when we acknowledge the brokenness of our world and of our lives. Praises that are sung after songs of lament are praises that somehow have more depth to them.

Joy to the world can only be sung with honesty in a broken world because of the line that comes next: the Lord has come!

The Lord has come!

The Lord has come to the world that is filled with families that don’t get along and children that starve and wars that rage. The Lord has come to the world where there is brokenness and pain and tears and death. And that is exactly why we can sing Joy to the world. That is exactly why we can know joy—because the Lord has come—he didn’t wait for things to be good here—he stepped into our messiness, he walked into our pain. Joy to the world that is hurting and broken—this is the world that Christ was born into, this is the world that God so loves that he sent his only son.

The Lord has come. He was born in a dark and smelly stable—if that doesn’t remind us that we have a God who enters into our brokenness, I don’t know what does. And can you imagine, after the whispers and the sideways glances Mary received when she had first started to show, after the hard travelling that Mary and Joseph had to do to get to Bethlehem, after being told there was no place for them to sleep, after the pain of labor, can you imagine the joy that filled the hearts of these young new parents when they heard this tiny baby cry for the first time? In some ways, maybe it was like the joy that most new parents feel. But in other ways, it was probably so different—because they knew who this little baby was.

The Lord has come. And nothing will ever be the same again. Our joy is rooted in this—that God is present and active in our world, that God created and is re-creating our world. Our joy is rooted in the fact that Jesus showed up and proved that death does not win, that evil does not get the final word. No more let sin and sorrow grow, or thorns infest the ground—that line in the song gets me every time I sing it—he comes to make his blessings flow far as the curse is found.

to be continued...

Day Three: Joy To The World

Here is part of the reflection I gave on Sunday night at church:

Joy and loss can be so intermingled during the Christmas season. When the decorations come out of the attic, for some of us, so does the pain—loss and heartache and depression are often felt much more poignantly during the holidays—somehow the pain feels so much bigger, so much more penetrating. There are some of us who would much rather fall asleep on December 1 and wake up on January 1, skipping Advent and Christmas altogether.

For some, talk about joy sounds trite or distant, elusive and other. And yet, this week, we lit the Advent candle of joy. Why should joy be more of a focus at this time of year? Does it have any more substance than the shiny tinsel on the tree? Where is joy for those who are hurting or lonely or busy with a long list of parties to attend, presents to buy, a house to clean and decorate, and an extended family to try to contend with? Is joy just another empty word we toss around?

Joy to the world.

Joy to a world where families will fight this Christmas and daughters will use all of the strength they have to sit through dinner with their mothers?

Joy to a world where 13 year olds will open piles of gifts and still feel like they need more stuff?

Joy to a world where homeless shelters will be filled to capacity on Christmas eve?

Joy to a world where wars are raging?

Joy to a world where every five seconds, a child dies of hunger related causes?

Joy to a world people are sold as possessions?

Joy to a world that is polluted?

Joy to a world where churches split, leaving hurt and damaged people in their wake?

Joy to a world where bullies and gossips seem to win?

Joy to a world where our friends get cancer?

Maybe joy is overrated.

to be continued...

Day Two: Stockings

Jon and I tend to be last minute gift people. We are those people who spend the time between a wedding and the reception buying and wrapping the gift. In fact, I've wrapped at least two gifts on the hood of my car while standing in the shopping center parking lot. When it comes to Christmas, we are no different. Because we are never home for Christmas, we usually celebrate our own Christmas sometime after December 25. Which means, in our world, that we also shop after December 25. Once we have gifts for each other, we usually discover that we have no wrapping paper (because, let's be honest, to wrap our gifts for our extended family, we bummed wrapping paper off whoever we spent Christmas with). We have given a number of gifts to each other wrapped in newspaper (which is often hard to find at our house, since we don't subscribe to a paper) or "wrapped" in the bag the gift came in or "wrapped" in a gift bag that we received a wedding gift in. When we do have wrapping paper, it is not unusual to discover that we don't have tape. And if we do have tape and wrapping paper, you can bet we don't have any bows or ribbons. That's just the way we roll.

Until this year.

Ladies and Gentlemen, Jon and Julianne Gilchrist are finally growing up. This past weekend we crossed all but one gift off of our list for our extended families. And I even bought some of Jon's stocking stuffer gifts. AND a birthday present for Jon--a whole 5 days before his birthday.

But bigger than that is this: we have, at our house, this very moment...wrapping paper, ribbon, and tape. True story. And I have already begun wrapping gifts.

Here's proof....

But the real point of this post is this:

While we were shopping, we went to a fabric store. And I bought fun Christmas fabric to make us each our own stocking! Jon was ever so patient and didn't even balk when he heard the total at the register (if these work, they will be more pricey than our current dollar store stockings...if they don't work...well...we've paid for me to develop a hobby?). So now, I am beginning the project of making quilted stockings for the three of us. Without a pattern. I know what I want them to look like. And I have made a quilt before. But I have never had to deal with anything that wasn't square...so we'll see if they end up looking more like an "L" than a stocking. I will keep you posted as I progress. So far, the fabric has been washed. Step one is done!

12 Days of Christmas...Day 1

Well, faithful blog readers, I am beginning a bit of a blog project. For the next 12 days, I'm going to blog every day about Christmas. I'll share either a Christmas memory, thoughts about Advent, or some Christmas project I'm working on. 12 days will take me to Christmas Eve...and if I finish this venture, it will be the most consistent blogging I've done in some time. So, here we go...

Day One: A Teapot and A Surprise

It was the first Christmas that Jon and I spent together. We weren't yet engaged, although we would be in a little over a week. We travelled from Vancouver to Lethbridge, Alberta to spend Christmas with his family. It was Christmas Eve and the stockings were hung by the chimney and all that jazz. The kids somehow convinced the adults that they should get to open, not one, but all of their gifts that night. (My strong opinions about waiting until Christmas morning to open gifts is a whole other story). So, the kids opened their gifts...they weren't allowed to play with them though because they had to go to bed. (Does anyone else think that's worse than just making them wait until the next morning to open the gifts?). The kids were nestled into bed with visions of sugarplums and the toys they couldn't yet play with. And then it was time for the adults to open their gifts.

I had been so privileged as to be allowed to participate in the family gift exchange. Jon's brother-in-law had my name. When it was my turn to open my gift, I unwrapped a teapot. Just what I had asked for. Perfect. I was happy. I said my thank you's and placed it on the floor in front of me.

And Jon's sisters quickly chided me for not looking inside the teapot. I felt such shame that I hadn't properly admired the gift--maybe they would think I didn't like it. So, I quickly picked the teapot back up and took off the lid.

Tucked inside were three dainty pairs of..well...there's no other way to say this...three dainty pairs of panties. And, of course, Jon's sisters made me hold them up for the family to see.

That was my induction into the family. And that is likely the last time that Sid asked Jenn to do his Christmas shopping for him.

I think this is also the Christmas when most of the family got the stomach flu....which meant that Owen (Jon's brother-in-law...and mine, now, too) suddenly had a strong aversion to shrimp after getting the stomach flu the night we ate a pasta dish with shrimp in it. And of course, that meant that a few days later Jenn made pancakes for us for breakfast...and made a special shrimp pancake for Owen...he ate the whole thing before realizing there was something fishy about it.

And that was only the beginning of that Christmas...because a few days after the shrimp pancake episode, Jon and I flew to France. More on that later. Maybe.

Christmas is Coming!

The ground is covered with crazy amounts of snow and more is falling. The temperature has dipped ridiculously low (especially when you add windchill). No, it's not the horrible month of February (and, really, February in Edmonton, really is horrible). It's December--and Christmas is coming. (And just to prove it, the H1N1 vaccination clinic at the mall near our house has closed because Santa needed a place to get his picture taken with an assortment of lil' ones (who, hopefully, have already been vaccinated)).

We braved the weather two nights ago to get our Christmas tree. We didn't have to trudge through any fields or scale any mountains to bring home our tree--we just had to drive to our local Home Depot. Maybe trudging and scaling would have been a better option because once we got the tree in our house and started decorating it, we discovered that the top half is pretty much already dead. Well, better luck next year, I suppose.

I love this time of year. I love the lights, I love the decorations, I love love LOVE the music. (I do not, at all, love the malls). I hope to write some reflections on Advent and Christmas in the coming weeks (and hopefully one on "Joy" before this Sunday when I have to preach it). But for now, here are a few photos of our half-dead tree....and Laurel in her snowsuit!

A Few New Shots