Thanksgiving.Christmas Eve.Christmas.New YearsThis time of year…it’s my favorite.
But whenever I think about pulling out our sparkly blue and silver Christmas decorations with the pop of classic red, my heart sinks hard and fast.
Last year, Christmas seemed like a dream. Like just an in-between year. Like we somehow skipped “real” Christmas and were simply waiting for the next year to do it right. But we didn’t skip it. We had Christmas. It was just a Christmas so unlike any I had ever had before…
All the excitement over the new and strange of Christmas living in Florida is gone this year. The fresh and different is somehow looking a bit cold and scary instead of bright and exciting.
But last year’s Christmas…that was normal
This is normal
Maybe I never let it burrow down deep in my heart.
Or maybe I never fully embraced the new traditions.
Or maybe I tried at the time, but now, a year later, they’re still so new a fresh and unused that it’s hard to really pick them up and use them again with anticipation. These new traditions still feel fresh and unused and unsettled. All the warm and familiar of Christmas is gone and I just have these little baby traditions sitting in my lap feeling so odd and funny and unfamiliar.
I guess that’s how it is with traditions…
They take time
They take patience
They take heart and commitment and love
And our new traditions…they only have a year.
And this year is the second.
And this year is the time to sit down with these little baby traditions in all their newness and evaluate which are worth keeping and which are worth ditching and what new ones we should make and what old ones we should bring back. This year is the time to start loving these traditions that we began last year and to start letting this new home become home on a whole deeper level. To let the homeyness of our home take root even deeper.
This year is the time to realize that Christmas away from our parents isn’t pushing pause, it’s making new traditions together that we’ll love and cherish and that will make our home special.
It’s the time to mourn being so far away and to rejoice in the new of here.
It’s the time to open my heart to the newness and wonder of now.
It’s the time to rejoice in the precious gift of life together.
It’s the time to embrace the heart of Jesus instead of the joy of familiar.
It’s the time to deal with the hard and the new and give thanks for it all because if it’s from His hand then I know it is best.
And I’m learning that the second time around can be harder than the first.
The second year…
The second Christmas…
The second time means its not just different and exciting, but it’s here to stay.
And I’m clinging hard to the truth…He is just as faithful the second time around.
Be blessed
<3
