The Reason for the Season

Nativity scenes are one of the only pieces of Christmas decor that have a direct correlation with the birth of Christ (the reason we started celebrating Christmas in the first place, in case all the commercialism has distracted you). This is the one my mom bought me as a little girl and I display it each year.

I remember always wanting to play with the figures which are breakable. One of the wise men has a glued-on head which I assume occurred when I was playing with him as a child. Kyler is too little this year to have much interest (unless I bring him to the figures and then he tries to grab them and put them in his mouth) but I know by next year this will be something he really wants to get into. So I decided for his first Christmas season, I would get him a toy nativity scene.

I gave it to him as sort of an Advent gift rather than waiting until Christmas (since I will be packing all the Christmas stuff away by the time we get back home in January from our visits to family and friends). He was way more interested in the nativity set than I thought he would be. I thought he would want to play with the packaging more than this toy but I was wrong. Kyler was very excited about his new toy.

 

I got it down for him to play with and right away the pieces started going right to his mouth. I think the sheep is his favorite because of the texture. He also liked the angel's wings and is fascinated by the stable for some reason.

As he picks up the different people and animals I tell him what each of them is. It means nothing to him now but hopefully this will be a way to teach him what Christmas is really about. When he puts Baby Jesus in his mouth, I tell him that he is giving the baby kisses (seems more appropriate than eating or chewing on Jesus). The only one I struggle with is what to call Joseph. He isn't really the Daddy but Brett thinks we should just tell him that for now since Joseph helped raise Jesus. We can explain to him later that God is really the Father of baby Jesus. I agree since the other option is to say he is married to the Baby's mama. ;)

And here is a picture where you can see the stockings hung from the chimney with care. Yes, the dogs have stockings and Brett and I do not. The important thing is that Kyler does have a stocking and it will be STUFFED this year. Oops... it is just too hard not to buy things for this little guy. And he has been a very very good baby so Santa should be good to him too.