Come, Lord Jesus: Meditations on the Art of Waiting by Mother Mary Francis, PCC is one of my favorite Advent devotionals. When we first moved to the farmhouse, I was heartbroken to find that I had misplaced the book! Everywhere I looked online, the prices seemed astronomical and I thought I’d never find another copy.  But God is so gracious. Randomly, I found myself on a monastery’s gift shop website and lo and behold, they sold it and at a reasonable price! It’s really the little things, isn’t it?  (P.S. I just checked and it looks like they’re all sold out at Clear Creek.  Sad.  It is available on Amazon for Kindle, though!)

Anyway, I’m reading it again this year and wanted to share two little parts about wonder for today’s post:

Let these precious hours of Advent be given to wonder.  When we feel depressed by our faults, let us wonder that God can forgive us so much; let us be filled with wonder and praise that God goes on believing in us, hoping in us, and trusting that we will somehow yet realize his dream of us.  I love to watch the flower bulbs in the community room putting their little shoots through what looks like a dark tangle of mulch.  If these were sentient bulbs, I think they might say, “This is too hard.  How can I push through such a tangle of things?”  Yet out of this rather depressing-looking tangle come up these tiny, pure white heads.  We can learn so much from the bulbs.  We are like sentient bulbs and we cannot say, “I cannot push through; it’s too hard.”  We who have grace, who have power given us by God, we can push through.  And so I think it is a very solid Advent practice to pray, “God, grant me the grace to push through.  Grant me the grace to realize my own possibilities, to realize your dream of me.” – PAGE 36-37

In these Advent days, let us wonder more than ever before that God should have chosen such a way as he did to save us.  Who could have dreamed that the almighty, omnipotent God would enter into humanity in such a way and in such circumstances?  According to our human reckoning it was all wrong.  The place was wrong; the situation was wrong.  There were no human worshipers at first, and the angels themselves quickly disappeared into the night.  Be filled with wonder at God’s way of doing things!  And then be full of wonder at the way he lived.  With all his miraculous powers, with all his infinite love, he was rejected by so many and yet he went on.  He was not thanked, but he went on.  By some he was not loved, but he went on.  We are filled with wonder above all at the pinnacle of redemption, the triumph of his love.  Again we would say that this was all wrong, to be reduced to such a condition, tortured and bleeding to death on a cross.  But it was the triumph of his love.  Let us be filled with wonder at God’s way of doing things and apply this to our lives. – PAGE 38

May your Advent season be filled with wonder, especially at God’s unfailing love for us.

As I’ve worked on our Advent plans the past few weeks, I found myself making a mental list of new Christmas decorations to buy.  Ultimately though, I just decided to create a cozy, festive home with the work of our hands instead.  Simple and homemade is the name of the game for us this year!

The first project we tackled was decorating around our front door.  We used this awesome tutorial and the only thing I bought was a new pack of coffee filters – 200 for $1.48 and we obviously have a ton leftover.  I loved how the designs were so ornate and unique.  A fun afternoon activity with my middle kids!  I think they’re going to work on the windows in the school room next.

On Youtube, a lot of creators participate in a monthly project called Vlogmas, where they try to post a video each day before Christmas.  I always enjoy watching them, so I decided to try my own version here on the blog.  (Just Monday through Friday, with weekends off for catching up!)  My goal is for these posts to be a little respite from the daily craziness of this month, filled with simple ideas and encouragement for a peaceful Advent season.

For Day One, I thought I would share one of my favorite Advent books, Room for a Little One: A Christmas Tale by Martin Waddell (affiliate link), and an activity we do that helps my kids prepare for baby Jesus’s birth.

From Catholic Culture: “Preparing the manger is the practice of preparing a soft bedding in the manger for the Christ Child by using little wisps of straw as tokens of prayers and good works performed through the penitential season of Advent. This is originally a French custom that quickly spread to other countries. Every night the child is allowed to put in the crib one straw for each act of devotion, good work or sacrifice performed. ‘Thus the Christ Child, coming on Christmas Day, finds an ample supply of tender straw to keep Him warm and to soften the hardness of the manger’s boards’ (Francis Weiser, Handbook of Christian Feasts and Customs, 1958).”