Is it really almost Christmas? Wasn't it just last week that we were ringing in 2008 and wondering what the year had in store for us? Wow. Someone once told me that the older you get the slower the days go by but the faster the years fly. So true. So true.
This year Christmas really snuck up on me. Ever since I can remember Christmas has been my favorite time of the year. The anticipation of Christmas morning was more than I could bare. I can remember trying to unwrap corners of the presents under the tree to sneak a peak. Oh, come one, you know you did it too!
The baking that took place several days before Christmas is also still ingrained into my memory. My mom had this wonderful tradition of baking bread and Christmas wreaths (super yummy sweet dough shaped into a wreath, drizzled with icing and little cherries to make the holly) for the "shut-ins" of the church and close friends nearby. Every year we would bake for an entire day - sunup until sundown - and deliver them the entire next day. Every year people waited for my mom to bring their bread and Christmas wreath. Because it was soooo good? Probably not. It was very good, but the motivation behind the treats meant more to those people than the treats themselves.
This year I have been thinking a lot of my own family now and what traditions we have at this time of year. Do we keep our celebration inside our little castle, all closed up so no one else knows what is going on? Or do we take our celebration of Christ outside of our home and into the community? Sadly, I don't think we've been very influential in that area. My new goal for the coming years is to make sure that those around us know why we celebrate Christmas. How this will be accomplished is still up for grabs, but my prayer is that next year when I say "is it really almost Christmas" the people who live closest to us will know that it is our family means when we say Merry Christmas.
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