Recent Musings:

4 days till Christmas!

Friday, December 21, 2007

The holidays are here. The creative gift ideas, the endless baking, the last minute purchases and the nostalgia are all present in our home and it's nice. Our humbly decorated apartment just looks too cute and too heartwarming and I love the concept of a first Christmas (married) with my husband. The presents are all wrapped and under the tree and look so picturesque, so homey. We've watched Frosty the Snowman at least twice, as well as other holiday movies, and have completed our new tradition of a Frosty the Snowman puzzle. I still want to watch White Christmas (a long-standing tradition of mine - I cry every time!), but after I attempt homemade sugar cookies today I'll be plopping down for a few hours to watch that.

Here's my 'scrooge' moment: a lot of this I think is silly. Buying presents for people, buying them things they don't need or probably don't even want just for the sake of giving them a gift seems silly and wasteful and obligatory. I don't enjoy that so much and it kind of gives me an uncomfortable tension in my gut; I think I'd rather give them something they want when they aren't able to get it rather than burden them with stuff because it's a certain time of year.

I'm a tad moody right now; no, not moody, but lost. This is my first break I think since August 2006 where I haven't been planning a wedding, running between states or doing schoolwork and I'm a litle lost. I've kept myself busy, I've done fun things, I've done things I haven't been able to do for a while (sleep in, clean, bake) and yet overall I'm just lost. Odd.

Finally, a very Merry Christmas to all. The concept I'm most overwhelmed and speechless about this season is "the word became flesh and dwelt among us," I John 1:14. When I really ponder this and try to grasp it, I'm completely overwhelmed and humbled. It's an unbelievably gracious, understanding and loving gesture made by the divinity as an attempt to get to know us.