joyous almost Christmas

This Christmas season could not have come a better time this year.  I really need some eager anticipation right now.  And what better way to practice this than through a month of advent readings and nightly devotionals with the Man to celebrate the miraculous-albeit-on-the-wrong-date birth of our Savior?

 

And thus, our cramped apartment has made way for our Christmas corner.  It's become home to: Winifred the Christmas Potted Plant (as known by her less formal name: Christmas Bush), Mildred the Cow and the Christmas fox.

Winifred joined us mid-November.  Which is probably against some of your Christmas decoration morals, but I am impervious to your judgments..  Besides, she's a potted plant, she'll be with us year round.

As I said, I was pretty eager.  Okay, maybe ravenously eager.  So much so that I ended up with two advent calendar tracking devices.

The first is a handmade wreath.  Light a candle each night.  Mark progress with a wooden donkey laden with a pregnant Mary.

Found it from a blog.  Hand crafted by the children of a Canadian farmer.  (Internet ftw!)  Perfectly simple and beautiful way to track the days as we draw near to the celebration of God's greatest gift to us.

Each night, Man and I slow down to light a candle and move a donkey, read scripture and pray.  A nightly pause.  A moment of breathing after a day of work and school and world-torn hearts.  Gratefulness washing away stress and frustration and fear.

And then, time for the second moment of advent.  The robots:

Twenty-four adorable robots.  Another blog.  Another awesome find.

They have become a sort of inverted advent.  Each night, after devotion and prayer, we write a small note of thanks for our new marriage and life together.  Into a robot-brain the notes go before the robot joins his friends on the tree.

Twenty-four robots who may or may not throw light switch raves once we've gone to bed...

...and destroy towns zombie-robot apocalypse style.

Man was totally responsible for this carnage...

Twenty-four robots that merited a description of "Geek Martha Stewart." (Which has simultaneously gone to my head and become my new life goal.)

Twenty-four days of remembering to be thankful and to be loveful.  Twenty-four robot moments we have treasured during our First Married Christmas.  

On Christmas morning, we will open twenty-four of the best presents we could give each other.  Until then, we end each night with a loving, "Happy almost-Christmas!"  Full of excitement for our little romantic moment.  Full of anticipation for our Lord's coming.

Until then...  happy almost-Christmas, folks!