On the Third, Fourth, and Fifth Days of Avent...

...I did not update the blog.

Day 3:
Locating door #3:
Madeline's turn to put one together:

A little skateboarder dude!

So cute!!

Madeline played with this little guy for a looooong time:

Day 4:
Ethan's turn to locate the door:

Took us a while to figure out what it was...what's your guess?

Day 5:

The sharing/taking turns went well for a couple days:

But finally, Madeline was able to get to work with Daddy:

My favorite piece thus far....we call him, Nate:

Hopefully I will have more timely, in depth updates to come...but probably not :)

On the Second Day of Advent...

...we're learning how to share. Well, tonight we didn't get much of a chance to talk about the coming Light. We gave a brief reminder, but today's lesson was mainly on how we can work together :) This would make Jesus happy, right?!? Madeline and Ethan couldn't wait to get today's pieces out. Here they are trying to find the number 2. Ethan is pointing to 21....but hey, he saw a 2!
After a wee bit of a fight over the pieces, we settled things by deciding Ethan would put the figure together, then Madeline could take it apart and reassemble. Hopefully we have this agreement understood tomorrow so that we can skip the fighting and focus on the reason for the season :)
He worked so hard to get that little man together!

Attaching the sword:

Ta Da!!

On the First Day of Advent...

we got a new Advent Calendar!!! We knew we wanted to get a fun Advent Calendar this year since Madeline just turned 4 and she is understanding so much now, and when we came across a coupon that informed me there was such thing as a Lego Advent Calendar...we headed right over to the store!! Our kids are so into Lego's these days, so it was perfect.
Trying to find the "1"

Madeline and Ethan took turns putting a piece on the figure (there was a brief moment Doug and I were really wishing we had got 2!!!). Hopefully, as the days go on, they'll get the idea of working together on the one little figure:

Ta Da!!!!!

This is going to be such an extra-special Christmas season because of how mature Madeline is getting. Certainly, she only understands so much, but Doug and I are trying to figure out how to best teach her about Christmas. This is the first year we really felt like we had to think outside ourselves when it came to talking about and celebrating the birth of Jesus. We lit a fire and mentioned that Advent is about waiting for the coming Light. We hope this helps her understand the Advent Candles she sees each Sunday. We explain that the "lights of the candles on the Advent Wreath break through the darkness, reminding us of the Light of Christ that we anticipate during this holy season."

We found a lot of great ideas of traditions we could be doing in our home on this site: CERC One of the things suggested is a Jesse Tree. My aunt recently mentioned this to me and sent this link: Jesse Tree.

We haven't put together the tree yet, but I'm a big believer in "it's never too late" and hope to have one up this week :)

Anyway, just thought I'd share where we're at this season :)

Today's thought, taken from The Jesse Tree, "God's love longs for us."