As the 12-Day Nativity gets launched this year, I have asked friends and family to try some of the activities in the book -- Here is one of them:
Gifts for the Baby Jesus
It is a tradition for our family to have a red breakfast on Dec 1st. Now that the kids have school and the mornings are super crazy, we have our special breakfast for dinner. But we still make a big breakfast and go all out even if it's dinner time. We use special red plates, decorate with red decorations, get red juice etc. We talk about the color red and how it is significant as one of the Christmas colors. It has been a good way to start off the Christmas season and remember what we are really celebrating. So the Day 12: Baby Jesus activities fit perfectly and helped to enhance our red breakfast. We read the scriptures and the little devotional included in this section of the book. Then we talked about what we should get for Jesus this Christmas. It was really neat to have the kids stop and really think about this concept and to hear the kids ideas of what they thought the Savior would want for Christmas. Some of the ideas were helping to bring peace on Earth by being kind to others, being more patient with each other so it would be easier to feel the Spirit in our home, teaching others about Jesus, help sad people feel happy etc.
We made a list of everyone's ideas and then each picked one that we would work on during the month of December and give to Jesus for Christmas this year. Then each of the kids wrote a letter to Jesus about their "Gifts for Him" and we put it in a special stocking and hung on the fireplace as a reminder. It was such a great start to the season and I can't wait to try more ideas from 12-Day Nativity to help keep Christ, centered in our home this Christmas Season.
I cant tell you how awesome this activity was! It was such a neat experience for our family and I am excited to make it a permanent tradition!! Thanks so much!!
Lisa
