Christmas Ornaments

I love my Christmas tree. I love decorating it every year. It's a red and gold color scheme, with lots of holly berries, pine cones, and ribbons. Nate and I have tried to find or make ornaments that are symbolic of the real meaning of Christmas. I thought I'd show some here, if I can figure out how to do the photos with captions!


I made lots of little scrolls with Scriptures about the birth of Christ or prophesies about Him. I attached red ribbon to them and put them all over the trees.


I made some unopened scrolls too. I thought I was being clever, but someone mentioned they look like two cigarettes tied with ribbon! Not the look I was going for!



"Star of wonder, star of night, star with royal beauty bright!" Around the house I like to sing "Oh little star of Bethlehem, how still we see thee lie..." and Nate will invariably say, "Town! Town of Bethlehem!"


“Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!" So said John the Baptist...and in Revelation Jesus is pictured as the Lamb. So we made this. It was really hard work molding the clay and painting it realistically. Just kidding! We got a toy lamb and put a hook in it's back, which I then covered with ribbon. It took two minutes.


Revelation 5:5
But one of the elders said to me, “Do not weep. Behold, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has prevailed to open the scroll and to loose its seven seals.” We made this the same way as the lamb.


A dove for the Holy Spirit that descended on Jesus at His baptism. "Behold My Beloved Son in whom I am well-pleased."


Not a symbol of Jesus, but a picture of our biggest little blessing!


A little French pride and a nativity scene.


And of course, we needed a cross!
Galatians 6:14
"But may it never be that I would boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world. "

1Corinthians 1:18
"For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God."

Colossians 1:20
"and through Him to reconcile all things to Himself, having made peace through the blood of His cross; through Him, I say, whether things on earth or things in heaven."

1Peter 2:24
"and He Himself bore our sins in His body on the cross, so that we might die to sin and live to righteousness; for by His wounds you were healed."

There you go, a little tour of our sweet little Christmas tree!

Baking Fail, Preschool Win

In Suzy's preschool lesson today, we were going to make Christmas cookies. Nothing elaborate, I thought. Just plain cookies, in circles and hearts, with green icing and multi-colored sprinkles. Just an easy, relaxing Christmas activity or mother and daughter. Except I totally failed, and for the first time in my life, my trusty Fanny Farmer cookbook let me down! There was nowhere near enough flour in the dough to roll it out, so I kept adding it in nervous scoops until it got thick enough. When it was time to roll it out, I had a plan. That also failed. I've read that if you roll out the dough on the cookie sheet, you can cut the cookies out directly in place and simply peel up the scrap dough. So mess-free and simple. Except, of course, that it didn't happen. Suzy and I took turns with the rolling pin to smooth the dough out into the pan. Then She got to work with her cookie cutters. I went to peel up the dough, and it just smushed and smeared. I tried lifting the cookies out with a spatula, and they too were destroyed.
By this time I was seriously frustrated. But I tried to put a positive spin on it for Suzy. "Hey, Suzy, would it be fun to squish up all this dough and pat it out onto the pizza stone?" "YEAH!" "And make one GIANT cookie that you can cover with red sugar?" "YES!" So we did that, and she had a blast. And it was not bad tasting, for all it lacked in looks.