Considering Christmas

Stephen is becoming quite the artist lately. Here he holds up a letter and drawing he wrote to his Papa and Nonna as part of my experiment with an advent calendar full of activities. The calendar was crafted by my friend, Jackie. I bought it two years ago, but this is the first year I've gotten my act together in time to fill it with chocolates and little illustrated notes giving various instructions, such as "write a letter" and "make cookies for our neighbors." All of this is my attempt to implement various activities to form our special family  tradition for the holidays. 

I grew up with mostly a secular, traditional, or American cultural Christmas, while Joe grew up without the holiday and all its trappings. As a kid, I didn't mind the presents and cookies and hit cocoa and snow forts that brightened an otherwise dreary season. However, at a certain point in my only-childhood, I had a Christmas where I got every toy I could have wanted and more. And yet I felt this emptiness that bordered on guilt. I wasn't yet a "seeking Christian" at this point, but I think the eternity in my heart was giving out a little gasp for air. Eventually, through God's mercy, the-God-become-man became real and personal to me as i was entering high school. I stopped caring about a lot of things that had consumed my youthful thought and began a habit of studying the Bible and praying over scriptures and hymns each morning before school. I long for my boys to know Him like this. No, better than this. 

Back to Christmas. My junior year, the advisor of the school paper asked me to write an opinion piece about why I celebrate Christmas from a Christian perspective. I think I shocked her and a few other people when I took an anti-pagan ritual stance :) 

These days, I'm not so concerned with pagan worship as I am the idolatry of stuff... That pervasive consumerism and materialism that seems to permeate all American holidays and leech them of any true meaning or holiness. That's what, as a mom, I want to shelter my children from and educate them to reject. 

So, when my five-year-old gazes out the window at Christmas lights and hints that maybe we've forgotten to put up our lights or that the TV show he saw said that everyone needed to have a Christmas tree in their house... I'm in a bit of a quandary. I don't want to be that parent who is so "anti" everything that i suck fun out of his cultural heritage and raise that kid who joyfully dashes his classmates' happy delusions about Santa and reindeers. But I want to hide what's true, lovely and excellent about Jesus' incarnation in his heart so he can ponder something meaningful every Christmas season--- which, seriously, seems to begin the day after Halloween these days.

So. I'm trying. So far, letter writing has been our only successful day thus far. Today's activity is to make the cookies we were supposed to make yesterday --- which, incidentally was so warm and sunny that I couldn't bring myself to turn on the oven while the kids frolicked barefoot in the backyard all afternoon-- and deliver said cookies to our wonderful neighbors who love our boys like surrogate grandparents. 

If anyone is reading this, what holiday traditions have you instituted to keep Christmas sacred? Or what childhood traditions do you find worth preserving in your own household?