For our 12 Days of Christmas this year, we started off at the Kannapolis Village Park. This was our first time there and it was so neat! Definitely something we'll have to remember for next year. There's a small train that goes around the whole park and they had lights/lighted scenes all throughout. There were singing bears, and amazing light show set to Transiberian Orchestra-type music, and Santa...for FREE! :) The kids had a blast just running around, dancing to the music, riding the train in the dark through the lights and watching the singing bears.
The next night we created a family Gingerbread house together. Always an adventure to see how much candy actually ends up on the house vs. in someone's mouth or just on the floor!
We did some homemade Christmas gifts the next day and then celebrated a friend's birthday and spent the night with Grandpa and Nanny the next day! Monday was by far my favorite day and something we will definitely be doing more of! We called it "Invisible Angels" day. In the morning, I talked to the kids about the angels in the Christmas story and how Angels help people and take care of them. We also talked about that angels are around us and we can't see them, just like Jesus is always with us and we can't see Him = invisible. Then we talked about celebrating Jesus' birthday and how we can't wrap up gifts to give Him but we could give Him other kinds of gifts... "Loving others and doing nice things" is what Reilly came up with! So, that's what we did! We set out on a mission to be "invisible angels" and to do some "random acts of kindness" for Jesus's birthday presents. Our first stop was the Dollar Store. I gave the kids two $1 dollar bills each and they had to hide them in the toy section so that a little boy/girl would find a $1 one day and be able to buy a special treat while there. The next stop was Chick-Fil-A where we were set to pay for the car behind us. As we were in line and saw a car pull up behind us, we said a prayer that God would bring them joy when we paid for their lunch. When we got to the window, I paid for the lady's order and told the guy to tell her we said "Merry Christmas!". Reilly was so excited and got out of her seat to turn around backwards and watch as the lady pulled up to the window. We saw her hold her money out of the window and then just stare at the guy who was obviously telling her we paid. Reilly got so excited and said, "Mommy! She just looked at our car and smiled!" Precious. Our next stop was Walmart. We had to get a few groceries and then we stopped by the gift card kiosk and got a Walmart giftcard. After we paid, we walked up and down the row of registers, looking for someone to give the giftcard to for them to use to pay for their groceries. I spotted a lady wtih 3 kids and an overflowing cart and suggest Reilly give it to her. Her instructions were to just walk up, hand the card over, say "Merry Christmas!" and walk away. She was a bit hesitant (shy!) and so I took her hand and we walked up to the lady together. The lady took the card, looked very confused, and then smiled so big when we just said "Merry Christmas!" and walked away. The best part of the whole day came next....as we were walking away, I heard one of the little girls say, "Mommy, who was that?!" and the lady just replied, "I think it was an angel." Wow. Priceless. After dinner, Shawn took R and B out for a few more random acts. They went to a coffee shop and bought some hot chocolate and then delivered it to one of the Salvation Army bell ringers outside of Lowes Foods. Then they taped quarters, candycanes, and a Christmas card the R made to the vending machines. And the last stop was to take a candy cane and a card to the ATM machine at B of A. It was such a fun and special day.
(Too bad everytime we go to CFA now Reilly wants to pay for the person behind us :)
I didn't take any pictures to capture this day, though I wish I had!!
The next included our annual light tour around the neighborhood with popcorn. We sure saw some pretty lights in Highland Creek! Yesterday, the kids and I baked and decorated some pretty sweet sugar cookies...as if we didn't already have enough cookies in the house! The rest of our 12 Days celebration include a trip to celebrate Christmas in Greensboro with DeeDee and Poppi and Uncle Brandon and Aunt Angel and our super special family Christmas Eve church service/Jesus Birthday Party night. This has been a really fun season for us....just wish Shawn and I didn't have SO much else going on with work (both of us) and school (Shawn) so we could have enjoyed it even more.
This is such a sweet idea, Lindsey!
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