Advent is here!  Our home is buzzing with the excitement of anticipating our Christmas celebration.  We are excited to add two new ways of acknowledging and enjoying the days until the Big Birthday.  First, we were surprised and delighted to receive our very own advent wreath–complete with candles–from our dear friends, Alice and Lindsey.  It’s beautiful, and it will remind us of the growing light that leads us to the manger.  Secondly, I wanted to enforce the idea that we are preparing ourselves to be more like Jesus each day, so I came up with a sort of “good deeds” bag.  Every evening, we are drawing a “task” from the bag.  We do the task, and we talk about how the job helps us to be more like Jesus.  The first slip of paper read, “Tell the youngest member of the family one reason you love him.”  I wasn’t entirely sure how this would go, but our five-year-old truly rose to the occasion.  Without hesitation, he turned to his little brother and said, “I love you because you’re fun to play with, and you’re cute even when you’re grumpy.”  He was so sincere.  I’ll let you know how we learn and grow on the rest of our journey toward Christmas.