"Silent Night"

Our sweet Eliot (notice that missing tooth!) not only PLAYED "Silent Night" on the piano for our Christmas Eve program this year, but he was also asked to give a brief talk about that hymn for our ward's Christmas Sacrament Meeting program. This is what Eliot shared about "Silent Night":

            A few weeks ago, as we were riding in the car, I got excited when I recognized the Christmas song playing on the radio.  It was “Silent Night,” the hymn we had been practicing in Primary.  My little brother and I listened quietly to the entire song.  My mom said it was a Christmas miracle that we sat so still for so long!

            Sometimes it’s hard to be still and quiet, especially at exciting times like Christmas.  But it’s important to be calm and still sometimes so that we can feel the Spirit.  The Holy Ghost speaks in a still, small voice.  If we are too busy or never take time to think quietly, we can’t hear the gentle promptings from our Heavenly Father.

            The hymn “Silent Night” reminds us that Jesus Christ’s birth was a holy, sacred night.  It uses words like “silent,” “peace,” and “calm” to remind us that we should be still and reverent as we think of Jesus’s birth.  Another Primary song I learned teaches that “If I listen with my heart I hear the Savior’s voice.”

 I know that if we will take the time to think quietly about the Savior this Christmas, we will feel the Holy Ghost. We will also feel close to Jesus and our Heavenly Father. They love us and want us to feel the heavenly peace that we sing about in the hymn “Silent Night.”

I was really proud of Eliot. He had very little fear about getting up in Sacrament Meeting and giving a talk, which, to this day, makes me anxious! He did a beautiful job and was complimented by lots of people. I think his talk perfectly describes my feelings about our Christmas Eve program -- though it's more than a little challenging to get our boys to sit still, we did have some of those magic moments happen where they actually did sit peacefully, and maybe, just maybe, even soaked in a bit of the true spirit of Christmas.

The boys opened their matching Christmas jammies first, and then we did our "Gifts to Jesus" activity. We watched the Church's "Nativity" video (that's then the boys surprised us by sitting still!), and then wrapped things up by singing "Silent Night," thanks to Eliot's accompaniment!  He did amazing! It amazes me how much he is learning in his music class.  

I love this picture of our family on Christmas Eve. We've gone back and forth for years on what would work best for celebrating Christmas Eve. Since both of our families are so close, it's so tempting to want to spend the evening with them. And I really miss my family's traditional program, but circumstances have changed, and it just gets to be too long and too hard on the boys to try to do it all. So we've learned to keep it simple and sweet, at least during this stage of life. For now, this works.

 

After the boys set out milk and cookies for Santa... 

and "magic dust" for the reindeer, it was off to bed.

I need to add here that probably my favorite moment of Christmas Eve was putting Zach to bed. I laid him down in his bed, rubbed his little cheek and said, "Merry Christmas." In a soft, sweet voice, he told me "Mehwy Cwismus" back and smiled up at me with the most angelic little face. There aren't photos to capture that moment, but it will be in my mind and heart forever!

Once the boys were down, mom and dad had to get to work wrapping gifts and filling stockings! 

I always take a few moments before going to bed to soak in the sight my boys will wake up to. I love it so much! And that anticipation is worth every ounce of long, tiring hours of of work, because it brings these faces the next morning:

THAT is pure Christmas joy!

I love them, and I love my Savior so much! I love getting to celebrate His birth and being a mom of little ones. I love that I am such an integral part of forming their happy childhood memories. I am growing to appreciate more and more each year the great sacrifice of my own mother in all the effort it takes to create the little details provide those magical moments my children will look back on and associate with this wonderful time of year. That kind of sacrifice -- the sacrifice of a mother, and the sacrifice our Savior was born to provide -- are what make this time of year so special to me. 

Merry Christmas!

P.S. Lest you mistakenly believe "all is calm" in our house at Christmas, the Band-aid on Zach's forehead is visual proof that life with little boys is always an adventure! Almost exactly a week before Christmas, Zach yanked on one of our stockings and pulled a heavy stocking hanger down on his head. It was very frightening at first, but ended up as only a "two-stitch" repair! Never a dull moment with Zachary! But I am happy to report that his breathing troubles have slowed way down and he's been really healthy. YAY!

Cure for the Holiday Blues

I could easily be called "Mrs. Grinch" this year. I normally LOVE the holidays. Christmas is one of my favorite, if not my favorite, time of year. I'm usually gung-ho about decorating, cookie baking, gift wrapping, event attending, you name it. But this year, not so much. I've heard of people struggling during the holidays, but those were feelings I never quite understood. In my head I would think, "How can you NOT be happy at Christmas?" And now that I'm on the other side of the coin, I don't have an answer to that question, either. That's the frustrating thing about not feeling in the Christmas spirit -- you feel so much pressure to be happy because it is, after all (and as the radio is so quick to remind you) "the most wonderful time of the year."

So what do you do when it doesn't feel so wonderful? For me personally, I've been dealing with a personal disappointment that has left me feeling a little lost in general. Those feelings happened to coincide with the holidays, and the result has been a total lack of motivation. I think most people can relate with struggling to feel motivated to exercise or clean their house (normal!), but you would think I'd be excited to make our year-end photo book or wrap the gifts I carefully selected for the boys, but it all kind of feels like chores this year. Things that add to my pile of stress instead of providing relief from it. I feel guilty for feeling that way, and around and around I go in my basically un-cheery state.

Thank goodness for my kids, because I'm having to put on a happy face for them. They shouldn't be denied a Merry Christmas just because Mom's not feeling super jolly. And honestly, there are plenty of moments when their happiness and excitement is contagious. I just wish I could shake the overall heavy feeling looming over me of stress and guilt. I wish I could just center myself and focus on the real meaning of Christmas and snap out of my Scroogey moments. But it has been a battle this year.

So why share this? Especially given that I haven't blogged in months? Because maybe someone else relates and could give advice, or maybe someone has felt or will feel this way, and it's always nice to know that someone else can relate. I always feel validated knowing that someone's been in the same boat. It helps me feel normal in the moments where I'm questioning my sanity. :)

But I don't want to just leave this on a gloomy note. That would be truly Grinchy of me. Instead, let me offer up a list of things that HAS helped me feel merry and bright this season. Here are the things have reminded me why I really do love this season, including a couple new traditions we just discovered this year:

Elf on the Shelf.  This is our first year doing this with the boys, and it has been magical! I knew Eliot would love it, but Zach has really gotten into it, too! I've heard all kinds of extremely elaborate ideas people use for this, but ours has been very simple. Our elf, "Chippy," just finds a new place to hide every night. No pranks or gifts or anything fancy. But it has really captured the boys' sense of wonder, which is one of the best things to watch as a parent at Christmas.

Christmas from Heaven. Grant's parents gave us this book this year. I was excited about it because the "Candy Bomber," Gail Halverson, came and spoke to my Primary when I was a little girl. I remember him speaking to us in our chapel and being mesmerized by his story. So fun that it's now a picture book. But our favorite part about this is the DVD that's included. The story is told in a Mormon Tabernacle Choir Christmas program, and the presentation is very touching. Eliot has watched it several times for his bedtime story, and I'm sure I've cried every time. My favorite take-away message from the story is that from small things come big things.

Preparing Family Names for the Temple. We live in a pretty amazing ward and stake as far as Family History work goes. Our Stake President has an incredible vision for the work, and has used the youth to make it happen. There are youth in our ward that are Regional Family History Representatives! They go around to Stake Conferences and major Family History Conventions in Salt Lake City to give presentations. They have met with members of the Quorum of the Twelve and talked about their experiences getting the youth involved in Family History work. Church units around the world are benefiting from the knowledge and experience of these amazing TEENS, and the adults in our Stake have been encouraged to follow their lead! We've been given Family History challenges in the past, but Grant and I always justified our lack of participation with being busy raising kids, or Zach's health, or Grant's demanding work schedule, etc. But this year, our hearts got pricked, and we joined in on the 40-day challenge issued to our Stake in November. The idea was to have every baptized member of our ward prepare at least one family name for a temple ordinance, so that we would have done the work of the equivalent of another "ward" in heaven. There were temple dates set up for the youth and adults in our ward, but the main goal was to complete at least one temple ordinance for an ancestor before Christmas. Doing so would be our gift to the Savior. Grant and I finally let go of our fears, asked for help from ward family history experts, and, quite easily, found five names and a total of nine ordinances to be completed. I know that's no big deal for people heavily involved in Family History, but it was a HUGE deal to us! We had never done anything like that before! I was lucky enough to get to go with the youth on their baptisms trip. Our ward showed up with stacks of names (our bishop's wife literally had a stack an inch thick of cards!), and almost every single youth performed baptisms for their own family members. It was awesome. The next week, the youth provided babysitting for the adult temple night, and Grant and I got to perform the sealings for our family members. Most of the names were for a family in my paternal grandfather's (McEuen) line.  They were sealings for three children to their parents, and one of the sons to his spouse. It was a very simple and yet meaningful experience for me. The greatest part was feeling the gratitude of that mother, whose personal ordinances were completed in 1982, but now she could be sealed to her children! I couldn't imagine not having my babies sealed to me. It was a sweet experience and added so much to our holiday season. What a wonderful goal to have every year. And honestly, now that I've got the bug, I can't really imagine going to the temple without my own names. It's just too special!  We'll see how I do ... 

"Redneck Christmas Caroling" That picture isn't actually our ward, but it pretty well depicts the "Redneck" version of Christmas caroling we did this week for mutual. One of our many neighbors with a big truck and a trailer took the youth around to the elderly members of our ward. Our toes froze, we sang off key, we giggled a lot and acted pretty obnoxious at a few points, but I told Grant when I got home that it was just what I needed. I hadn't wanted to go, but I was so glad I did. Nothing like "singing loud for all to hear" to lift your spirits at Christmas time, especially when it's to gladden the hearts of those who truly are lonely and need to be remembered.

There you have it. Maybe I'm not the Grinch I think I am. I'm sure Christmas will be happy and magical, as it always is with little ones. I look forward to it. But please forgive me this year if I don't bring you a plate of goodies or send you a Christmas card. I just didn't have it in me this year. And that's okay. From small things come big things. This year I'm having to take a step back and zero in on the small things. And trying to be okay with it. :)