Coming Soon: The Christmas Season!

Ramona, when she was about three. 

I'll be on Relevant Radio's Morning Air Monday (tomorrow), December 19th, at 8 a.m. CT, talking about the Christmas season and ideas for celebrating the Twelve Days of Christmas.

Years ago, when we first started doing some of these things, my girls noticed that much of the world was dismantling Christmas Joy just as we were picking up speed at our house. I told them repeatedly (because that's a nagging mother's job, right?), "It's a shame the whole world doesn't realize that the Christmas season is just beginning! They don't know all the fun they're missing!" The harping instruction paid off, and ever since, we have thoroughly enjoyed the many traditions we've built around the seasons of Advent and Christmas.

Some ideas:

• Keep your tree up at least until the Feast of the Epiphany, of course, (January 8th this year), or keep it up until the Baptism of the Lord. (This year, the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord falls on January 9th.) 

• Keep watching Christmas movies and TV shows, and listening to Christmas music. 

• Keep reading your favorite Christmas books. (See this post for links to great picture books.) 

• Post prayers for the Christmas season (I put them up on the wall in our kitchen.) 

• Send Christmas cards during the 12 days. And don't apologize for it -- it's the Christmas season! (This may have started out as a tradition at our house because I am always behind on getting Christmas cards done. But one day I realized that "late" cards fit perfectly into the actual Christmas season.) 

• Celebrate the Epiphany -- have a Twelfth Night party, or make Kings' bread. The St. Lucia bread we make works well, or maybe a "King Cake" -- Google it for endless possibilities. Other ideas are here at Catholic Cuisine. 

• Give Epiphany gifts (as large or small as you want them to be). 

• Have the wise men from your Nativity set travel through the house during the 12 days, making their way to the stable for the Feast of the Epiphany. 

• We always make gingerbread houses during the Twelve Days. 

• This page at Catholic Culture has a new activity and recipe every day.