Finding Christmas

I had so many plans for this Christmas.

So few of them have panned out in any way, and the few that have, have been in the blessed hands of Grandma.

This year, I have had to scale back/give up plans for making gifts for my girls.  There has been no rush of Christmas baking for friends, no caroling at doors.  Halls have not been decked.

It’s been a month of letting go and accepting.  In more ways that just with Christmas.

Matt put the tree up the other day, and with it, somehow, it is Christmas.

Though everything will be remarkably simple this year, somehow, excitement and joy have filled the girls, and Christmas is in the air.

As I sat looking at the tree the other day, my mom reminded me that the first Christmas wasn’t “perfect,” either.

Mary probably dreamed of giving birth amidst loving women and clean linens, rather than in a humble stable.  Joseph probably felt the utmost agony at creating for his young wife a bed of straw to give birth in.

But that was the most perfect Christmas of all.

“Shepherds would soon arrive and later, wise men from the East.  Later yet the memory of that night would bring Santa Claus and Frosty and Rudolph—and all would be welcome.

But first and forever there was just a little family, without toys or trees or tinsel. With a baby—that’s how Christmas began.”

-Jeffery R. Holland

With a baby.

That’s what our Christmas is, this year, too.  All about a baby.

I find myself being grateful for this Christmas.  I have been in pain.  I have been sad.  I have been a little lost.

But more than anything, this time of slowing down and humbling myself has brought me closer than ever to that baby for whom we celebrate Christmas, in addition to my own sweet gift, coming soon.

Blessed am I.

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