Monday, December 8, 2008

Waiting For Christmas

The Waiting for Christmas basket was full this morning with goodies for making a Christmas creche using this book, and an advent wreath (which we are behind in making). Waiting for Christmas is a story about the advent calendar. The history of this great family read-a-loud is interesting. The book is based on the story of the first Advent calender. It wasn't until 1851 that the first Advent calendars came into being in Germany. Gerhard Lang, the son of a Protestant minister and his wife, is credited with making the Advent calendar available to the public. This first printed Advent calendar was published in 1908. The calendar spread throughout the world.

What really pulled my heartstrings was that this delightful worldwide tradition evolved from the creativity of a German mother seeking a way to help her young son count down the days until Christmas.

"Yet the Lord longs to be gracious to you;
he rises to show you compassion.
For the Lord is a God of justice.
Blessed are all who wait for him!"
Isaiah 30:18

4 comments:

Sweet Blessings said...

I love your Waiting For Christmas Baskets! They just seem so special and a reminder of what the true gift of Christmas is. Thank you for sharing the pics and your ideas with us. It takes a lot of thought! I hope to incorporate some of these ideas next year.

Brenda @ Tie That Binds Us said...

Thank you, friend. The kids are finally gettin excited to see whats in the basket! I put stuff in there tonight before they went to bed thinking they wouldn't notice and I saw 2 of them spying on it. Yipee!

Molly said...

This basket is such a great idea! I love it! I'm finding lots of inspiration on your blog, and I just love your heart to make this a truly special, Christ-centered season for your family.

Thanks for sharing, and thanks for participating in the blog carnival. When you write your carnival post about music, please put a link back to my site so that your other readers can participate in the carnival, too, if they'd like to! The more the merrier! I'm planning to post a new "Celebrating the Season" topic later this week.

Blessings,
Molly @ Counter-cultural Mom

Brenda @ Tie That Binds Us said...

I'm looking forward to your next Celebrating the Season post, Molly. I did add a link already so that others could join while I put my music post together. It may be a shocker, what I come up with.