26/11/2021
🌟ADVENT Sunday 28th November -Friday Dec 24th 🌟
Dear friends,
We begin to wave goodbye to Spring and look forward to a hopefully benign and golden Summer.
We have indeed been living through times that have caused great disruption to the world, to the social realm in which we live, and to our inner life and it’s healthy expression. The ramifications of this are bound to continue and are unknown and so more than ever it seems important to build into family life traditions that are strengthening, beautiful and hopeful.
We can create within our homes a festival that connects us to the seasons, the world around us and to one another.
Children in particular love making preparations! They have such open hearts, imagination and enthusiasm for all the components.
The four week festival of Advent (Latin “to arrive, to become“) begins this Sunday 28th where we can start to prepare for Christmas.
We begin slowly.
An Advent festival table -
Centrally located on a bench or sideboard, or a dedicated table. This can be the centrepiece upon which one can build a tableau. The colour for Advent is blue, so a cloth laid out or draped provides the perfect holding space. You can build up this Christmas festival table over time.
Week 1 The mineral world - enjoy a walk and collect some small rocks or pebbles, you may have crystals, wash and dry and polish. Place on the cloth.
Week 2 The plant world- gather gum nuts, seed pods, pine cone, even a stick or grasses.
Week 3 The animal world - shells, felt or wood animals, fleece, feathers.
Week 4 The human world - a small figurine, a silk angel.
A beautiful post card or a small vase of flowers can be ever present, or gold stars (stickers!) to provide a backdrop canopy. This scene may benefit from some discreet tidying up at times (Avoid Lego dinosaurs).
Nearby can be the Advent wreath.
Four beeswax pillar candles stand inside a wreath that is bound in fresh pine needles (smelling beautiful), or native eucalyptus, and can be lit at dinner time.
On the 1st Sunday light a candle (sing a song, continue lighting the same candle each night), on the 2nd Sunday light the next candle and so forth, and thus we can see the approach of Christmas in the growing fullness of light. Have attention around the burning candles and perhaps blow out after dinner!
Food is a loved and important element of any celebration and children will adore baking the special food that belong to the occasion.
Read carefully selected Christmas picture books - avoid cartoon type illustrations as children look deeply into the images, sing traditional carols, make simple presents/cards, paper garlands, tell children about your memories of Christmas, decorate a tree (but not too early).
There is so much wonder and magic in participating in a family festival, a golden thread that connects us to one another, to the passing of time, and to the sublime and mysterious wisdom of the cosmos.
Blessings.
🌸
