Advent Devotional Day 11

The boys were pretty smitten with the ornament tonight (see below) because they think donkeys are pretty awesome. I'm not sure riding 70 miles on a donkey while pregnant is my idea of a good time (and man can I totally sympathize with Mary in my current state), but tonight's lesson was about doing the things we don't want to do with a good attitude. Boy do I struggle with this one. But we are called sometimes to do things we do not want to do. And we are called to do it cheerfully (or at least without too much grumbling).

So back to Mary and that donkey...she traveled to Bethlehem while pregnant on a donkey with a good attitude. Her story is a reminder that some things that are necessary are not fun or easy.

I asked the boys if they ever had to do things that they didn't like to do. They couldn't think of anything, but a "how about cleaning up the play room?" was really all it took to get the list rolling. We try to make those things "more fun" by incorporating the clean up song, or making the chore a game, but the truth is, Ted and I expect the boys to do those kinds of things--if not cheerfully--then at least without complaining. God expects the same from us.

One thing Miles definitely did not mind doing was hanging tonight's ornament.

11 days in, our Advent tree is looking pretty spectacular.

The boys drew pictures of things they thought Mary and Joseph might have seen along the way to Bethlehem. There were animals, and candy canes, and all sorts of sights. :)

~Miles' Mommy

Advent Devotional Day 10

Today's lesson was about Immanuel. It was about how an angel told Joseph that Jesus would be called Immanuel, meaning God is with us. The message that "God is with us" has appeared in many places in my life lately. As I struggle with learning (over and over again it seems) patience for God to show me His plan regarding a couple of areas of my life. I keep hearing in different places a gentle reminder that in the midst of my frustration with developing patience, God is with me. I heard it today in Sunday School. I heard it in this devotional. I heard it at a funeral I attended earlier this week. And so this was an easy message for me to talk to the boys about, because it is one that has been on my mind a lot lately.

And as I think about what I'm waiting for God's guidance on (truly simple things in the grand scheme), I think about Joseph and his visit from that angel. Here's a guy who is engaged to a woman, and finds out: (1) she's pregnant; and (2) not only it is not his, it's God's. Talk about trusting God. Wow. But Joseph knew God would be with him, just like he is with you and me today.

Today's ornament is a hand with the word Immanuel on it. A reminder that God is always with us. He sent His son, Jesus to live among us and die for us. He is always walking with us. And the Holy Spirit lives in us. I am trying to remember that when I feel most lost (now is not one of those times by the way), He is right there.

I wrote the word "God" on the boys' arms tonight so that tomorrow when they looked down at their arm, they could be reminded that God is with them.

Max hung the ornament (on a blue light)

Our tree update.

About a decade ago, someone told me about a great way to remind yourself that God is with you, so I thought I'd pass it along. I do a lot of my talking to God in the car. I commute, and I just find that it's a time of silence for me. (it also helps with the road rage...just saying). Anyway, someone advised me to put a little sticky note in my dashboard that says "Invite me to come with you. --God" Of course God doesn't need an invite. He is always there. But He is there waiting for you and me to engage with Him. So the note is really a prompt for me to talk to Him. And I have found that I do so much more since the note took it's spot right next to my fuel gauge about 10 years ago. Try it. Maybe you'll find that the car ride is a great time to share a conversation with the guy who wants to talk to you more than anyone else in the world.

~Miles' Mommy

Advent Devotional Day 9

Tonight's lesson was about trusting God. It was about how Mary had to trust God in His plan for her as Jesus' mother. But it was also about how when God asks us to do hard things, we just have to trust Him.

This is a hard lesson for the boys at this young age. I think it will be a great lesson in a few years. But tonight I asked each one if they could think of something hard they had been asked to do. Miles said it's hard when I ask him to clean his room. Max said it's hard to get Mason to be nice to him. So...clearly...we have a bit of work to do on this message, but we tried :)

Can I just say, how cute are these boys? Here they are laying down watching a movie tonight. Love.

Our ornament tonight is of Mary while pregnant. So we talked about how I'm pregnant like Mary (but you know...it's not Jesus). The boys were fascinated with Mary's eyes--and one may have fallen off--but that's what glue is for.

Miles hung the ornament.

Our tree update

This has been such a fun thing to do with the boys each night. Even on the days that I am not sure it is sinking in, I know that at least we have this sweet time each day to think about the reason for the season.

~Miles' Mommy

Advent Devotional Day 8: Family

Tonight's lesson was about how Mary was chosen for a very special job--to be Jesus' Mommy. We also talked about how God chose the boys to be part of His family (He chose you too by the way). And finally, we talked about our family.

Tonight's ornament held a picture of our family. (We didn't have a picture of the whole crew small enough to fit in this ornament, so it's just the Mitchell Men, but they got the point).

And Max got to hang the ornament (yes I know he's looking a little crazy in that hood, but he loves hats and hoods. I'm pretty sure he wore it like that all day at school). :)

Our Advent tree update.

The boys drew pictures of their family (Miles informed me that he made my head shaped like a mushroom. As long as my tummy was still small, I was happy with his artistic expression) ;)

Hugs!

~Miles' Mommy

Advent Devotional Day 7: Promises

Tonight's lesson was about promises. We talked about God's promise to send His son. I asked the boys if they had ever broken a promise. Answer: "NO!" They're not really big on promising yet so that's probably actually true. But we talked about how nice it is that when God makes a promise, he always keeps it and we can depend on that.

We also talked about how the rainbow is a symbol of God's promises. I asked the boys if they knew about the first time God used a rainbow as a symbol of His promise to us. Miles replied "yes when He flooded out Noah in the ark" lol yep.

So tonight's ornament has a beautiful rainbow on it.

We rotated the tree to share the ornament love. So Miles hung an ornament "low." This picture cracks me up because you can see how devotional time sometimes looks: Me reading and talking to Miles and Max, Ted giving Mason a breathing treatment, one big happy family :)

I had an activity planned for the boys tonight where they could color rainbows, but we went to a visitation for a good family friend tonight. We got home late, and so devotional time had to be cut short. I "promised" (in keeping with our theme) that the boys could color the pictures over breakfast tomorrow, so more pictures to come!

~Miles' Mommy

Edited to Add: Here is a picture of our rainbows from this morning! :)

Advent Devotional Day 6

Tonight's message was about the prophecy of Jesus' birth. Hundreds of years before Jesus was born, God told people of His plan. God used a prophet, Micah, to tell the people where Jesus would be born--Bethlehem.

Our ornament shows the little town of Bethlehem.

Max hung the ornament "at the top!"


We talked about the day Miles and Max were born. I am that mom who insists that all of my children will have completed baby books. That my fourth child won't one day say "why are there no pictures of me????" Each time I would tirelessly fill in blanks or glue on pictures, I would think "will these boys even care about their baby books? Maybe their wives will enjoy them." :) but tonight as we discussed the day they were born, they were in love with their books. They ooo'd and aaah'd over pictures of the day they were born. Then we flipped through them several times to see pictures in Mommy's tummy, pictures of their birthday, and on to pictures of their first holidays, birthdays, haircuts. It was a sweet time.

I am excited to talk to them about the night Jesus was born---but that time is coming on another devotional night. I did ask each of them tonight where Jesus was born and Max said "Mary's house" ha ha, but Miles said "in a place that wasn't a house where there were animals, but they made him a bed" :)

~Miles' Mommy

Advent Devotional Day 5

Today's lesson was about believing. If you're anything like me, at this time of year, the word "believe" invokes thoughts of Santa. But tonight we talked about something much more important to believe in: the fact that God sent his son Jesus to die for our sins.

John 3:16 says for "God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son, that whosoever believes in him shall not perish, but have everlasting life."

The boys have been participating in cubbies this year while I teach AWANAS at church. John 3:16 is the first verse we work on in AWANAS and cubbies, so it was so sweet that when I started saying it, the boys were able to say it with me. At ages 3 and 4, I was so pleased with them that they knew this verse. They are little sponges at this age, so even though they don't fully grasp what this verse means yet, it is never too early to start talking about (and praying for) their salvation. If you have little ones, it is never too early! :)

Our ornament was this beautiful cross. A reminder of God's most precious gift.

Miles got to hang the ornament tonight.


And our little tree update!

What a great message--God loves you!

~Miles' Mommy

Advent Devotional Day 4: God Is Love and A Little Extra Sugar

Today's message is God Is Love. It is such a simple verse. One I have heard many many times. But tonight I got to talk to the boys about how God loves us and how He wants us to love others like He loves us (which is always a good lesson for siblings to hear!) I also got to tell the boys things God loves about them (their smile, their hair, their laugh, how smart they are, what great big brothers they are...I could go on and on of course). It was neat to see them light up when I talked about things God loved about them. I often tell them "good job" or "I love you" or "you are so smart" and even "God loves you," but I am not sure that I have ever specifically listed things God loves about them. They were thrilled to hear it. It reminded me of another way to reaffirm my children through God's love for them. So simple.

And our lesson provoked a lot of unsolicited hugs between them, which is always so sweet to witness.

Our ornament today is a simple symbol of love, and of God's love.

It was Maxer's turn to hang the ornament. Our Advent Tree was getting a bit "bottom heavy" so I encouraged him to let Daddy hold him up and hang an onament up high.

I think he was pleased with the result ha ha!

Tree update:

And tonight we also baked and decorated Christmas cookies for the first time at home. These are my Aunt Patsy's famous sugar cookies. We have decorated them at Granny's before, but I have never made them. I decided to give it a go when nothing was riding on the outcome. Other than my red icing looking more pink, they are completely edible! And the boys had fun decorating (lots of clumps of one color sprinkles, which makes me really happy actually because it reminds me that they were made with excitement from a 3 and 4 year old!)

Tasty!

~Miles' Mommy

Advent Devotional Day 3

Today's lesson was about how God created everything. We talked about the things that God created in the beginning, and how he said it was good. I asked the boys to name other things God created. Miles "the whole universe...and space!" Max "the moon"

Tonight's ornament had pictures of some of the things God made:

Miles hung the ornament

Our Advent tree is starting to gain quite the personality.

The boys colored some of their favorite things God has made.

Miles drew a tree (with an apple), grass, and he later added an "acorn"

Max drew a chihuahua ha ha

I am thankful for so many of God's creations, especially these two!

~Miles' Mommy

Advent Day 2

Today we talked about the Trinity. That's a hard concept for a 3 & 4 year old--that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are one and three. Thankfully, A Meaningful Christmas did not disappoint.

It had a great visual activity about how an egg is like the trinity. It is one, and yet when you break it open, it is three: the shell, the yoke, and the egg white. The boys really liked cracking the egg (then Max wanted me to scramble it so he could eat it. But it's 7:00 p.m. so he's having eggs for breakfast instead) :)

And this is our ornament. The three rings represent the trinity.

And tonight was Max's turn to hang the ornament on the Advent Tree. (FYI he wanted to hang it on a "blue light." Ah, the important things to a 3 year old).

I am excited about this time with the boys. I hope some of it sticks, but I'm thankful to know that we can do this as a family for years to come.

~Miles' Mommy

Tis the Season: Advent

I'm temporarily taking over the blog to write about a very special devotional time we are doing as a family for the first time this Christmas. My good friend, Leslie, put together an amazing group of women to coordinate this activity to prepare our kids' little hearts for the true meaning of Christmas- celebrating the birth of Jesus Christ.

We were each assigned a day to make 24 of the same ornmanet (I'm day 21, I know the suspense is killing you!). Then we all got together for a wonderful gathering and shared our 24 ornaments. We each came home with 24 different ornaments and this great devotional book:

A Meaningful Christmas.

This book has wonderful short lessons for each of the 24 days to do with your children. It has some great visual activities to do together too.

Leslie made us each these personalized buckets to put our ornaments and books in.

On the first day, Max was very excited. We spent time talking about Advent and about what Christmas is really about (don't get me wrong, they're super pumped about Santa, but we want to be intentional all the time, and especially during this time, about reminding our children about God's love for us and the wonderful gift of his Son, Jesus Christ). Advent is a wonderful time of hope and anticipation for the arrival of Jesus. To share some of that hope with you, I am going to try to blog about our lesson daily. I am already behind since we started yesterday, so without further ado...

ADVENT DEVOTIONAL DAY 1

Today's lesson (yesterday's lesson really) was about how God is the Alpha and Omega. We talked about how God is, and was, and ever will be. (I would love to show you the one-page devotional, but copyright infringement is a bad bad thing. I can (probably) figure out where you can purchase this wonderful book if you're interested!).

And THIS was our precious ornament for Day 1.

The boys are taking turns hanging the ornaments on our Advent tree. Miles got to go first.

I am very thankful for friends who are intentional about helping us work to raise Godly men. Each of the other 23 women helped me with that this month, and I am so thankful. I hope to get another group together next year so that 24 new people can share this experience with their children.

~Miles' Mommy

Giving Thanks

We had a great Thanksgiving in South Texas. Mommy was so busy enjoying the good company that she did not take nearly enough photos. BUT...we did get this great shot of Granny and Pop with ALL of the grandkids (well, almost all...there are two currently baking!)


I hope you had a great Thanksgiving with your loved ones.

~Miles