The Grinch, part 2

The other day, I was talking to a friend about my refusal to put up a Christmas tree. (I will say again, and again, show me where in the Bible God tells us we need to celebrate His Son's birth by putting up a Christmas tree...until then, I am not a bad mother, Christian, or PERSON for not putting one up!) She mentioned how she has several nativity scenes that she puts out every year.


It got me to thinking. I want my children to understand the real meaning of Christmas. Ryan and I have already discussed that we don't want to put a huge emphasis on presents with our kids (wish we could get OTHER members of the fam on board with that, but oh, well :). We want our kids to be about giving, not receiving, and not just at Christmas, either. I'm thinking that focusing on the nativity scene would be a great way to help keep Jesus as the center, rather than a tree, or presents, or Santa. We still have another year before anything would really need to start as a tradition, so there's still time for us to think about it and figure out exactly what we want to do with it. But I'm pondering the possibilities...