I Believe

My sister is a dance teacher and works with children that are at the age where they begin to question if Santa is real and over the past month she began to get the questions, “Is Santa real?” and “Do you believe in Santa?” My sister then asked me how I would respond to these questions and I told her.

I believe in the magic of Christmas and Santa Claus. I believe in encouraging my children to let their imagination run free. I believe in excitement over something you can only see in your mind and I believe in the pure anticipation of Christmas eve and sparkling joy of Christmas morning. All of these things can only come from a belief in something you can not see.

There is a fabulous quote from one of my favourite Christmas Movies, ‘The Santa Clause’; “Seeing isn't believing, believing is seeing”. Believing in something good that I am unable to see has only ever kept the Christmas magic and my general faith in good, alive and I believe that is at the root of my inner child. 

As I get older and experience disappointment and the everyday challenges of life, I have become at times a little less willing to trust and be hopeful. At Christmas time I am reminded of the strong ability that I once had to believe in something I had never seen with unfaltering excitement. We do live in a world that can be scary and at times when people are asking where is the good, I want to respond hopefully that there is good in our world, even if we can't see it. When we believe in the magic of Christmas, the good in our world and let our minds be joyful over something we can't see, we become that joy and beacons of hope ourselves, we become the actuality of what we hope for and therefore bring hope to those around us. 

Now that our family has young children, Christmas has become about the magic again. Parents, grandparents aunts and uncles are excited to once again experience Christmas through a child’s perspective and we are taken back to our own childhood memories.  We revisit our favourite movies, traditions and memories and work on creating unique memories for the little ones in our lives. Children are happy to believe in something they can not see and that is inspiring to me. I will always come to Christmas like a child, believing in something I can not see and having faith that the magic of Christmas is real. I believe that if we have faith in the good we will be filled hope, which will breed positivity, something our world can never have enough of. 

I believe in the magic of Christmas and Santa Claus, do you?

Come As You Are With What You Have - Little Drummer Boy

We borrowed a board book from the Library with the lyrics for Little Drummer Boy that has beautiful illustrations and I have been singing the song to Luke every morning before I pull him out of bed. You know when you know the words to something, you sing them and they don't really register because you have said them or heard them so many times before, today they registered while I sang.

I am always trying to wrap my head around The Christmas Story of Jesus birth but there is so much to comprehend. God has been breaking it down for me in little pieces this year. The more I seek to learn about The Christmas Story, the more I begin to understand the many facets of this amazing event. The Little Drummer Boy song is where I learned a little lesson today.  

God loves me and you just as we are, in such an amazing way that He sent His Son to earth to save us, to teach us, to walk as one of us, understanding the hurt we experience in our sometimes scary world. God didn't have any conditions for sending His Son, He sent Jesus for me, an imperfect sinner.

The Little Drummer Boy wanted to meet Jesus but he didn't feel worthy as all he could bring was himself and a song on his drum. He went anyways, playing his song and it made the baby smile. You and I have been given so many unique gifts from God, gifts that we can use right now to be a blessing to someone. We were created with a purpose. My life mission is to find out what my purpose is and live it out, its a pretty exciting adventure even if its in the smallest of tasks. 

I use to go through phases of my life where I would mess up and then stay away from God because I felt so bad and unworthy to speak to Him and be in His presence. What I learned from The Little Drummer boy is that I can come to God and bring Him just me and whatever I have at this very moment and it will please Him because our Heavenly Father just wants us to be with Him. We are His children, don't you just want to be with your children no matter what?! Its the same with God and us.

This Christmas I invite you to be unafraid of what you have to offer our King, just come and bring what you have and maybe thats just yourself in gratitude of the amazing gift we have been given in Jesus! 

Merry Christmas

Holiday Style Makeup Tutorial by HAL

Get ready with me as I create a dramatic and sparkly look using my new Too Faced Holiday Palette. I always enjoy doing my makeup but I especially have fun with sparkle and drama during the holiday and winter season. I used the Too Faced Holiday Palette to create this look but I would love to hear from you about what your favourite Christmassy makeup products are, please comment below.

Thank you for watching and Merry Christmas!

Christmas Book Advent Week 2

This advent is definitely an adventure and last weekend we had a few fun filled nights that left us going right to bed when we got home. We missed a few books but on Monday we caught up on a few days and I recorded our little book time for fun.

We have opened a few books by Helaine Becker and Werner Zimmerman and these are my favourite so far. I love the ilustrations and their focus on Canadian treasures. "A Porcupine In a Pine Tree" is a take on the classic "12 Days of Christmas" song. Check out Tyler and I trying to sing our way though in this vlog post.

My advent books are a mix of thrifted, books from my childhood and some new books from The Book Keeper. The Book Keeper and I would love you to join in the Christmas story fun by snapping a picture of you and your family reading a Christmas book and tag The Book Keeper on Facebook. They will be running a contest from Friday December 18 to Sunday December 20 and drawing for a $50 gift card from all the people that share their Christmas story moment.

We can't wait to see your Christmas story pictures, check out The Book Keeper on their Facebook to connect and take part in the contest.

Merry Christmas