Advent 2012 – The Jesse Tree

 

Advent is almost upon us!  How did that happen?!  I hope you are all more on top of your holiday planning and gift buying/making than I am… oh my.  I’d forgotten just how much time caring for a newborn takes.  Totally worth it of course (but I do miss blogging)!

I’ve had about a dozen emails in the past few days asking about this year’s Jesse Tree packet.  Thank you all so much for reminding me to get this together!  I needed that little push and it is nice to know many of you use it.

Thankfully it was super-easy to put together this year.  Last year Advent had 27 days – the maximum number of days possible for any year.  So this year I am re-publishing the pack of ornaments, prayer cards, and Scripture references we used last year.  You will have 4 extra ornaments, etc. because Advent is only 23 days this year (it begins on Dec. 2nd).

I’ve included a schedule specific for this year (click on the image to download it):

This is the schedule my family will be using.  We have taken out the ornaments for the second, third, and fourth Sundays as well as the ornament for the prophet Daniel.  All the other ornaments will be used in order, showing the lineage of Jesus and the history of his plan of salvation (from the creation of the world to his birth).

However, if taking out 4 different ornaments/cards makes more sense for your family, feel free to make up your own schedule!  I feel it’s important to keep in all the people that were Jesus’ ancestors, so I take out the Sunday ornaments and then begin taking out prophets until we’ve reached the correct amount of ornaments for the particular year we are in.

Click the image below to download the pack of ornaments, prayer cards, and Scripture references.

Have questions about the Jesse Tree?  Please feel free to leave them in the comments.  I will do my very best to answer them!

Enjoy!

Nicole

A Slow Advent

Oh, this poor little neglected blog of mine.

This Advent has not gone exactly as planned.  Not at all as planned, actually.  There’s been a month’s worth of sickness and many, many things have just been laid aside.  I am ashamed to say I’ve turned to store-bought craft kits to keep M busy.  There is nothing wrong with these really, but they aren’t exactly the memory-making activities I had hoped for.  Maybe we will get to them during the actual Christmas season (which lasts from Christmas day to Epiphany), or maybe not.  I am thankful to just be well and functioning again, to be honest.

M was sick the first week of Advent, and then for almost two weeks it was my turn.  I was couch-bound, watching the house get messier and messier through feverish eyes, and not caring.  That nasty flu finally caught up with this anti-flu-shot girl, and gave me quite a beating.  We all had it to a degree, but somehow I was the lucky winner of the worst case.  Poor M was getting his own breakfast and lunch most days!  He felt very proud, but it hurt this mama’s heart a tiny bit to see him taking care of himself like that.  And then I had an awful case of pink eye, you know, just to round things off nicely.  That meant no cuddling or snuggling with anyone, which after being sick for a long time is just incredibly depressing! 

But somehow I was given the grace to realize that Advent is all about waiting and hoping and remembering just exactly where to look for the joy.  I woke up on Joy Sunday (3rd Sunday of Advent), unable to go to church, again.  And I wondered, just what was it I was supposed to be joyful about? None of my plans were actually happening, the house was a disaster, and I was being treated like a pink-eyed leper. 

But time and time again, these past few months, I’ve been brought to a place where I’m gently reminded that fulfillment, joy, etc. are not found in plans, good times, or even health.  Joy is found in placing hope – confident hope – in God and His goodness and love and mercy.  Hoping for what I know is coming… Who I know is coming.  Each evening of this Advent when we’ve managed to have our little devotional time, M places a straw (length of yarn) in our manger and whispers, “Come, Baby Jesus, be born in our hearts.”   The simple and even boring Advent that has been our lot this year has, in the end, become a greater blessing in a way than a lot of fun and good times could ever be (although fun and good times are blessings too!).  Our emptiness is slowly being filled with an amazing sense of anticipation – the joy of knowing that what we truly hope for, what we most need, is coming soon. 

We are better this week, finally getting back to normal.  But we are not going to try to fit a lot in.  We are going to work on preparing our fantastically messy home and our hearts for the Love that is on its way.  I’m just going to go slowly through the days, and savor the sense of anticipation as much as I can. 

M has recently discovered Johnny Cash, and as I write this, Hey Porter is on (blaring even, you might say), and these particular lines are perfect:

“Go tell that engineer to make
that lonesome whistle scream.
We're not so far from home,
so take it easy on the steam.”

Blessings,

Free Printable jesse Tree ornaments and devotions for advent 2011

Jesse Tree Packet 2011
“But a shoot shall sprout from the stump of Jesse, and
from his roots a bud shall blossom.” – Isaiah 11:1

Since we’ve started having a Jesse Tree during Advent, I can’t imagine not having one.  It has added such focus, and a sense of peace to what can be the most chaotic time of year. 

The Jesse Tree is a small tree (we use a tree cut out of felt, but many families use a miniature tree, or a branch tucked into a pot) that is decorated throughout Advent with ornaments that trace the lineage of Jesus all the way from creation to His birth.  It shows, in a simple way, God’s plan of salvation throughout history.

This tradition has blessed us in ways we never imagined.  And there’s the added bonus of M really getting it.  The cuddled up story time, the hands-on  ornaments, the little Advent box we open each evening (it contains the ornament for the day and the devotional card)… all of this appeals to a child’s heart.  I am amazed when M knows these stories at other times of the year, and realize what an impact the Jesse Tree has had on him.

Sometimes, after a particularly trying day, we light a little votive candle to help set a reflective mood as we prepare ourselves to focus on the “reason for the season”.  As this time for the Jesse Tree is set aside every single evening during Advent, we find that our focus throughout the day is changed too… all the superfluous stuff is more easily set aside because our hearts are in tune with what truly matters.  (Knowing how special this time can be really motivates me to have all my gift shopping done before Advent begins.  Some years I’m better at this than others, but having even some of it done makes for a more peaceful Advent.)

This year, Advent begins on Sunday, November 27th.  There are 4 full weeks – 28 days - of Advent this year.  That’s the maximum number of days Advent can have. 

Because the number of days during Advent changes from year to year, some years all of the ornaments and readings will be used, and other years some will be skipped.  In our family we use the ornaments and readings for the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th Sundays as our “optional” ornaments… these are extra ornaments that relate to the season of Advent (Light, Joy and Hope, Peace) but aren’t directly related to the ancestral line from which Jesus came.  There are some prophets included in the Jesse Tree also, and in years where we need to skip more than the three ornaments mentioned above, we start picking these guys off. :)  For those years, we are most likely to skip Ezekiel, Daniel, or Elijah… we like to include Isaiah each year.  I have nothing against the other guys… we love them too! :)  But someone’s gotta go when there’s more ornaments than days, right? ;)

To avoid all of this change from year to year, some families pick only 24 ornaments and use these same 24 ornaments every year, beginning their Jesse Tree on December 1st and ending it on Christmas Eve.  That is a perfectly fine way of doing it too!  There really is no right or wrong way to do this, and if you search online you will see there are many versions of the Jesse Tree.  The main thing is to show how God’s plan of salvation was unveiled throughout history and how each person in Jesus’ lineage played an important role in this plan.

Take a look at the packet I’ve put together for this year.  You can find it here, or by clicking on the controls in the image at the top of this post.  There is a schedule (specific to this year) for the ornaments and Scripture readings, as well as a word or phrase for each day to reflect on (these lead to some wonderful conversations!) and a short prayer for each day. 

I’ve changed some things this year to make them better suited for us, and I hope they will work well for your family too.  The ornaments can be printed and colored, or use them as templates for felt ornaments, or in any other way you can think of. 

Some of the Scripture references on the cards are different this year – I used some that just made more sense to me, and the Annunciation (when Gabriel appeared to Mary) is included this year.  I know it really happened about 9 months prior to the birth of Jesus, but it’s an important part of the whole story, I think. 

I’m hoping this helps simplify the process of making the Jesse Tree a tradition in your family, and that you will be as richly blessed by it as we have.

As always, feel free to share this link with others (please do!), but do not post it on your own site, sell it, etc.  Thank you!

Have a beautiful day! :)

Preschool Craft – happy little Christmas wreath :)

We are crafting up a storm here.  At least the last 2 projects I’ve posted about have been spur-of-the-moment type things, and this one was too.  I’m realizing that we have more time for this kind of thing when we don’t have any planned preschool activities going on.  It’s been so much fun, and freeing, that it’s causing me to re-think a lot of things right now.  But that will have to wait for another post. :)  (Which, if my track record for that kind of thing counts, means don’t hold your breath for another post, heh.)

My husband snipped a few messy branch tips off our tree and was going to put them in our composter, but I rescued them for craftiness instead. ;)

SUPPLIES for this sweet little wreath person:  snipped ends of pine branches (just a bunch of loose pine needles would work too), glue, green cardstock, googley eyes, pom pom, 1/2 of a red pipecleaner, 1/2 of a white pipecleaner, dyed macaroni, glitter glue, sequins, miscellaneous sparkly stuff (we used glitter foam snowflake stickers and some leftover glitter foam shapes from this project; other ideas are buttons, shiny ribbon, metallic paint pens… you get the idea).

First, cut a circle from your cardstock.  Depending on how many pine snips you have available, you may want a larger circle than ours; our circle’s diameter is about 5 1/2 inches.  You could also use a paper plate, and color or paint it green if you wish.

I drew a smaller circle for the face area, just to give M some idea of where to place the greenery for the wreath.

Next, glue on the facial features before anything else, this helps you get the sense of where you want the pine needles and decorations to go. M used half of a red pipecleaner for the mouth, a pom pom for the nose, large googley eyes, and macaroni pieces to make eyebrows and a moustache (this was totally his idea - I love it!).

Next, glue on the pine snips and needles!  Wherever you want them is where they should go. M felt free to let them go over the edge of the circle, and I like the bushy look of his little wreath guy.  Doesn’t he remind you of a sweet grandpa who has just woken up and needs a shave?  Or is that just me?  He totally reminds me of my beloved grandpa who would “whisker” me every morning. :)

Lastly, decorate your wreath person with all the sparkly, fun things!

M named him, “Mr. Moustache Wreath”, hee hee.  He was so proud of giving him a macaroni moustache!  We hung him up over our Advent calendar, and I love seeing his happy, and a bit crazy, little face all day long.

(I’m not sure why the pine needles look a bit brown in the pictures.  They were fresh, and don’t look brown at all in real life.  It must have something to do with the green cardstock.)

Have a beautiful day! :)

Christmas Books

We checked out several really good Christmas books from our library last week. 

M’s favorite of the week has been Gingerbread Mouse, by Katy Bratun. It’s a pretty simple story about a little mouse living in a gingerbread house until Santa comes along with a beautiful new (and unlikely to be eaten) house for her to live in.  The illustrations are wonderful.  We even made a gingerbread house this week, which fit in perfectly with the story.
M also has really enjoyed Elliot’s Christmas Surprise, by Andrea Beck. The story does a good job of reminding us to be thankful for what we have, especially our friendships.  It also does a great job of showing the fun that can be had with a large empty box. ;)

The Bear’s Christmas, by Jan and Stan Berenstainis hilarious (if you are a 4 year old boy).  Poor Papa Bear tries to relive his youth with Brother Bear’s Christmas gifts.  He gets rolled into a huge snowball, and this is, apparently, the absolute funniest part. :)

We also checked out The Night Before Christmas, by Clement C. Moore.   This is the famous poem many know, but in our version the illustrations are done by Bruce Whatley (his name is familiar to me – any ideas what else he’s illustrated?), and they are amazing. Normally I like classic picture books to have the original illustrations, but this is definitely an exception.  Whatley knows how to bring the story to life, and this may be my favorite version ever.

There was one book that was so sweet (but not too sugary, if you know what I mean), it touched all of us – The Donkey’s Christmas Song, by Nancy Tafuri.I normally love all of Tafuri’s books, but she outdid herself with this one.  It is a very simple and beautiful story about the baby Jesus and the songs of the animals in the stable.  I don’t want to give too much of the story away; I’m hoping you’ll be able to find this one yourself and read it with your children.  I think even babies, as well as older children, will enjoy this one, the text is simple and short, and the illustrations are perfect.  I may have to put this one on our list to buy.

For more reviews of children’s books, check out Mouse Grows, Mouse Learns and Feed Me Books Friday.

Have a beautiful day! :)

 

Advent in our Home

 

I want to remember our family time this Advent, so this post is really just for me (but you are still welcome to read it. :) ).

First of all, a shot of our “Thankfulness Tree” before I took it down to put up the Jesse Tree:

Putting the first ornament on the Jesse Tree:

Daddy reading the first Jesse Tree story (the creation of the world):

Our Advent wreath (which obviously is going to need new candles if we don’t want to send the whole wreath up in flames with candle #2 next week):

Our little winter carousel – M had a great time helping to put this together, and carefully set all the little people in their spots.  He spends a lot of time in the dark with this, watching the lights and mirrors as the carousel goes around:

Our Advent calendar – this is our first year with this; it was given to us by a cousin who didn’t want it for her family any longer.  Hm.  I’m not sure about the whole Noah’s Ark thing for Advent.  Noah’s Ark is one of the Jesse Tree stories, but still… the flood, the animals, the ark, the rainbow… I like them all, but I think I’d prefer a manger scene or something a bit more Christmassy.  This may not make it into next year’s Advent.

We will buy a tree soon (we get a real one), and I just realized I need to get out our nativity set.  Normally we set the tree up a week and a half or so before Christmas, so it’s still in good shape during the 12 days of Christmas, which begin on Christmas day, and end on January 5th.  I so dislike hearing about people celebrating the 12 days of Christmas before Christmas even begins, hee hee.  Ah well, to each his own (honestly it doesn’t bother me that much, but I do wonder why they seem to be in such a hurry to get it over with). 

January 6th, by the way, is the day after the 12th day of Christmas and is Epiphany – when we celebrate the coming of the wise men and their gifts.  It’s fun to play this out with our nativity set, having the wise men move a little closer to the star and the stable each day.  After all the waiting and hoping during Advent, it feels good to celebrate Christmas for a nice, extended period of time.  I’ll save a little gift to give to M on Epiphany, as the wise men finally end their journey and find the stable and the sweet baby.  We may also use the day to offer gifts to some nearby charities (we do this before Christmas also, but it’s nice to have something special and loving to do on Epiphany in honor of the wise men’s gifts to baby Jesus).

On another note, I see I’m going to have to figure out this new camera business.  Apparently I need to change a bunch of settings every time I take a photo.  It is sensitive to the type and level of lighting, and has about a billion settings.  Maybe I’m not cut out for the fancy photography stuff. Hopefully the pictures will improve as I get more used to it!

Have a beautiful day! :)

A note about the Jesse Tree

Well, here I sit – gathering all of my advent stuff, and organizing it, and I find myself wondering why the Jesse Tree ornament for Isaiah is a rose (I know I knew this once upon a time). 

And then I realized that I left a scripture reference off the prayer card in the Jesse Tree packet.  SOOOOO – if you are using the packet, you may want to jot down Isaiah 35:1-2 in addition to what is already on the prayer card for that day, and the rose ornament will make a lot more sense. :)  These verses are all about how the desert will bloom with the coming of the savior – thus a blooming rose as the ornament. 

It’s not a huge Oops!, but something I thought I’d share in case anyone else was wondering the same thing!

Have a beautiful day! :)

 

Advent Reminder!

Just a reminder that Advent begins tomorrow!   Don’t forget to print out Jesse Tree ornaments and prayers to help prepare your home, heart, and family for Christmas this year.

Have a very blessed Advent. :)

Advent 2010 – Printable Ornaments and Prayers

***NOTE*** THIS POST WAS WRITTEN FOR ADVENT OF 2010.  FOR A CURRENT JESSE TREE FILE (2011), PLEASE SEE THIS POST.

November is here!  While we are getting ready for Thanksgiving, it’s a great time to remember that Advent is just around the corner!

A photo of our Jesse Tree last year.
Apparently it’s fun to place ornaments in the “sky” too! ;)

Last year I wrote a bit about what a Jesse Tree is and how we use it in our observance of Advent each year.  You can read that post here.  I can’t say enough wonderful things about how using a Jesse Tree has added a sense of hope, expectation, focus, and peace to our home during Advent.  It is one of those things that “work” even better than I had first hoped.  I find myself wanting to share this with everyone I know and am always encouraging other families to adopt the Jesse Tree as an annual tradition in their homes.

The Jesse Tree is a way of seeing God’s love for us and His plan for salvation as shown throughout history.  It is basically one Bible story per night, beginning with creation and ending with the birth of Jesus – a way of waiting and hoping for Christmas, and really living Advent by focusing our hearts on what Christmas is truly all about. 

Each Bible story is accompanied by a symbol taken from the story which is made into an ornament for the Jesse Tree.   Each evening the Bible story is read (directly from Scripture, or for younger children you may want to use a Children’s Bible), and the ornament for the day is placed on the tree. 

The name “Jesse Tree” comes from Isaiah, chapter 11, which says:

“But a shoot shall sprout from the stump of Jesse, and from his roots a bud shall blossom. The spirit of the LORD shall rest upon him: a spirit of wisdom and of understanding, A spirit of counsel and of strength, a spirit of knowledge and of fear of the LORD, and his delight shall be the fear of the LORD. Not by appearance shall he judge, nor by hearsay shall he decide, But he shall judge the poor with justice, and decide aright for the land's afflicted. He shall strike the ruthless with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips he shall slay the wicked. Justice shall be the band around his waist, and faithfulness a belt upon his hips. Then the wolf shall be a guest of the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; The calf and the young lion shall browse together, with a little child to guide them. The cow and the bear shall be neighbors, together their young shall rest; the lion shall eat hay like the ox. The baby shall play by the cobra's den, and the child lay his hand on the adder's lair.” – verses 1-8

Many people use a large branch placed in a pot of dirt to hang their ornaments on.  Some use a miniature artificial Christmas tree.  We use a simple felt Christmas tree, tacked onto our flannelboard.  Our ornaments are made from felt also (decorated with markers and glitter glue).

In the attached printable below, I’ve included the ornaments that we use.  If these do not appeal to you there are numerous others you can find by doing a simple Google search.  I chose these for their simplicity – young children can color or paint them, or they can be used as a design for felt ornaments like our family has done.  (Some of these were designed by myself, and as far as I can tell the others are all public domain images.)

I’ve also included the prayer cards that I made for our family, with the Scripture reference for the day printed on it, the ornament of the day, and a short prayer.  There is also a simple word or phrase to meditate on for each day, which oftentimes leads to a nice family discussion about the beauties of our faith.

To simplify things a bit, many families begin their Jesse Tree on Dec. 1st and finish on Dec. 24th, and therefore have the same ornaments and Bible stories on the same days every year.  We do things a bit differently, and try to begin our Jesse Tree on the actual first day of Advent.  Since this date varies from year to year, the number of ornaments and the order of Bible stories changes a bit.   I’ve included a schedule of dates, ornaments, and readings specific to this year’s Advent season.  (If you want to do this, and have any questions, please feel free to email me or leave a comment with your specific question.  I’ll do my best to give you a good answer!)

2010 Jesse Tree Packet:
We also have a little felt Jesus doll and a “manger” (for a tutorial, see here).  M puts a piece of yarn “hay” in the manger each evening as we end our Jesse Tree time, and we say simply, “Come Baby Jesus, be born in our hearts.”  On Christmas Eve he places the felt baby Jesus in the manger on his soft bed of hay.  So sweet.

It’s a beautiful and meaningful tradition, and if you haven’t done a Jesse Tree in the past, I hope you’ll try it this Advent!  If you have had a Jesse Tree in the past, leave a comment and let us know the impact it had on your family’s Advent!

I am linking this post up to Kylie's blog:


Have a beautiful day! :)

Tot School, Christmas-style – Dec. 20, 2009

**M is 39 Months Old**

This post will be some of the Christmas-themed activities we’ve done in the past couple of weeks. We’ve had a productive, relaxed, insightful, and just plain fun time on my “blog-break” (more about that in future posts).

First, this is how I’ve been finding M first thing many mornings:(sorry for the blurry photo… these old hands of mine aren’t very steady before my coffee, heh) – he’s been sitting in front of the tree, all lit up in the dark, playing with toys so sweetly and quietly. I think he is really soaking up the magic of Christmas and those Christmas lights – remember how special they were when we were children? :) I’m loving this stage with him.

Music:
We have been singing and making music quite often now that his instruments and song book are out and accessible all the time: (Don’t let the blank look on his face fool you, he really does LOVE doing this!)

Fine Motor Skills:
This was a great post from Allie at No Time for Flashcards. However, I really didn’t feel like making one on my own so I gave M some yarn (instead of wire) and some felt I had cut into squares and cut a slit into the middle of – M strung the felt pieces onto the yarn, then we formed it into a wreath and hung it on the tree:
I made these fun rubbing plates using cardboard from a cereal box:I used a cookie cutter to trace the tree, star, and angel and free-hand drew the snowflake. Then I went over the drawings with hot glue. M used them with newsprint and crayons: This was a little tough for him because the paper slid around quite a bit. Here are the best samples of what he did: I plan to make more of these for other holidays – they were fun and really held his interest. He must’ve done dozens of these in the past two weeks.

Sensory:
I filled a large pan with “pretend snow” (shaving cream) one day and M played in it with his little cars for TWO HOURS. I am not kidding. TWO HOURS. There was a mess to clean up, which took me a good 15 minutes. But it was worth it for TWO HOURS of him being involved and interested in something. :)He asked for it again another day and played with it for 20 minutes, sigh. (ugh, look at that kitchen floor. So old and ugly. If anyone wants to give me a Christmas present, a new kitchen floor would be perfect. :) )

Math Skills:
M has really taken off with his understanding of patterns recently. He is really getting it. We did our pattern Christmas lights again, this time in an ABCABC pattern. At first he insisted that it could only be red, green, red, green, etc. Then I talked to him about how we sometimes play games with Daddy and we each take a turn, even though there are three of us. We ended up naming the green lights M, the red lights Daddy, and the blue lights Mommy, then strung them up – he really got it! At the end we were calling them by their colors again and he understood perfectly. We even did some AABB patterning and he picked up on that too! Yay!!

We did a quick counting game with some cardstock Christmas trees and pom poms. I drew little spots for 30 pom poms to go on each tree, then we simply took turn rolling the number cube and putting that many pom pom “ornaments” on our trees to decorate them. The first one to have all the spaces filled won.
I found some Christmas pattern mats here, and printed them in black and white. M was really into this, so I went back and printed a lot of the non-Christmas ones from the same site. The fact that they were black and white instead of colored like the ones we normally use provided just the right amount of challenge to M to make it interesting. He enjoyed “coloring” them with the pattern blocks.

Literacy:
M practiced spelling his name with this ornament stringing activity I made for him. You can read more about that here.
Religion:
We’ve really been enjoying our Jesse Tree stories every evening. I switched to a green felt Christmas tree to see if M would actually hang the ornaments on the tree. He has put some on the tree, but some are still in the “air” too. Such a silly boy sometimes. :) He has really learned a lot from this project, and is always so excited when it is Jesse Tree time!

Nature Center Time:
We are enjoying our Nature Center classes so much, and they just keep getting better and better. I’ve decided to start adding these into our Tot School posts so we’ll be able to remember how much fun we’ve had!

A couple of weeks ago we talked about what animals do when it snows. Did you know weasels turn white (except for the tips of their tails, which turn black) in winter? Or that frogs dig down deep into the mud and turn into frog ice cubes? :) The kids had a snowball fight inside with cotton balls, made candy cane animals,

(It’s a reindeer!)

and went ice-skating on wax paper:M had a ball. We are out of wax paper or we’d be doing this every day. I even tried it and it was fun for me too!

The next week “Nature Santa” visited and read a story about Christmas trees in the forest to the kids:
His glasses were fogged up here because he had just come in from a zero degree day.

M got to make bird feeders with bagels and seeds, and one with fruit loops on a pipecleaner: These are hanging in our yard waiting for the hungry animals to discover them.

We even got to eat a pancake breakfast with Santa! M had the time of his life until….
it came time to actually meet Santa and talk to him: He was suddenly very shy and completely forgot to say all the things he had planned on saying. :) It’s ok though because Mommy has Santa’s phone number and will be giving him a call to let him know what M would like. ;)

For more Tot School posts go here.

Have a beautiful Christmas with your families! :)