Jennifer Flanders's Blog, page 11

My Top 10 Posts of 2023

It’s always instructive for me to look back and see which of my posts received the most traffic over the past 12 months. And so, in an effort to discover what content most resonates with my readers, I present to you my top 10 posts of 2023.

My Top 10 Posts of 2023

When I look just at the things I published last year, the following posts were the most popular:

1. 10 Things Your Teenager Hates

Lots of changes take place during the teen years! If we want to navigate them smoothly and maintain a good relationship with our growing children, then we’ll need to avoid doing the 10 things our teenagers hate. 

2. A Prayer for the Police

Download a copy of our free printable prayer guide and use it to intercede for specific officers you know or to pray for the police in general.

3. A Prayer for Mothers

I’ve been getting a lot of requests for a Prayer Guide for Mothers (especially after publishing a Prayer for Fathers last year). And since as a mother myself, I appreciate all the prayers I can get! If you feel the same way, you can enlist your family to intercede for you with the following scripture-based requests.

4. A Prayer for My Daughter

Here are some of the prayers I pray most earnestly and consistently for all my girls. I’m sharing it here, in case you want to use it as a guide for praying for your daughter, as well.

5. Dealing with Difficult In-Laws

Are you dealing with difficult in-laws? Do they seem overly demanding or impossible to please? Have you grown weary of even trying to satisfy them? Although I now enjoy a wonderful relationship with my husband’s parents, that has not always been the case. We butted heads in pretty significant ways during our early years of marriage.  Here are the seven strategic steps I took to turn things around.

6. Praying for My Enemies

When it comes to dealing with people who hate me or would seek to do me harm, Jesus has given me very specific (and radically counterintuitive) instructions. Rather than seeking revenge, Christ asks me to invest my time and energy in loving, blessing, and praying for my my enemies. And guess what? He asks the same of you.

7. To the Tired Mom with the Neglected Husband

A few nights ago, I stumbled upon a genre of writing I never before knew existed: Open letters written by tired moms to their neglected husbands. And it wasn’t just one. Evidently, a lot of women ignore their spouses for months or even years on end, then post public explanations rationalizing their behavior. Although I hear where they’re coming from, this is my impassioned response.

8. Bible Memory Tricks & Tips

One of my New Year’s resolutions this year is to make Bible memory more of a priority. Memorizing scripture doesn’t come quite as easily these days as it did when I was a kid, but the following Bible memory tips and tricks have helped speed my progress significantly.

9. 31-Day Prayer Challenge for Parents

A reader recently ran across my list of 31-Day Prayer Challenge for Wives and asked if I had a similar list of scriptures to pray over one’s children. Short answer: I didn’t at the time, but I do now! Follow this link to download my brand new, free printable 31-Day Prayer Challenge for Parents.

10. On Becoming Free Indeed

I recently finished reading Becoming Free Indeed by Jinger Duggar Vuolo. In this post I share what I consider the most important take-aways, along with some crucial balancing truths. A thorough understanding of such distinctions is vital to experiencing true freedom in Christ while avoiding extremes in either direction.

If you examine that list closely, you may notice the same trends I do:

50% of the top 10 posts contain a free printable prayer guide40% of the top 10 posts are related to parenting20% deal with marriage issues and20% are about books I’ve read

If you consider my most popular posts of all time, the list stacks up a little differently, but the underlying themes remain the same:

My Top 10 Posts Overall:5 Must-Read Books for Women Who Think25 Ways to Communicate RespectPray for Your Husband from Head to ToeCan a Married Woman Have Close Male Friends?Praying Boldly for MyselfPraying for Your Children from Head to ToeParents Need Prayer TooWhat If My Husband Won’t Plan Date Nights7 Reasons to Prioritize Sex in MarriageA Sure Fire Way to Wipe Out Whining

These all-time most popular posts touch on all the same topics as the Top 10 list from 2023:

50% are related to marriage40% contain a free printable prayer guide30% deal with the topic of parenting and10% are about books I’ve read

Which means those are the topics I’ll continue to address on this blog. Look for more prayer guides, more posts (and podcasts) on the topics of marriage and motherhood, and more book reviews in 2024.

Anything else you’d like to see me cover? Drop a line in the comment section below and tell me about it! Then subscribe to my weekly email updates to make sure you don’t miss a thing going forward.

Get Sunshine in Your Inbox

Would you like more marriage and motherhood tips, printable prayer guides, and other great ideas for building a strong, happy, healthy home?

Then sign up for my weekly newsletter, Flanders Family Freebies. I’ll send you a different themed link list of free resources delivered directly to your inbox every Wednesday morning!

The post My Top 10 Posts of 2023 appeared first on Loving Life at Home.

EP 25: Making New Year’s Resolutions You’ll Keep

Photo by Estée Janssens on Unsplash

Since today is January 1 , for this week’s episode of the Loving Life at Home Podcast, I’m sharing 7 secrets for making New Year’s resolutions you’ll actually keep. 

Whether you call it goal setting or resolution making or vision mapping or just turning over a new leaf, TODAY is a fantastic opportunity to make some changes for the better! And that’s true whether you’re listening to this episode on New Year’s day or any other day of the year.

There’s no time like the present. So stop putting off for tomorrow what you can — and should — do right now by prayerfully making changes to the glory of God and the betterment of your own life.

Show NotesVERSES CITED:“For precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept, Line upon line, line upon line, Here a little, there a little.” (Isaiah 28:10)“I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” (Philippians 4:13)“Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.” (James 1:2-4)“For with God nothing will be impossible.” (Luke 1:37)“But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.” (2 Corinthians 12:9)“Yet those who wait for the LORD will gain new strength; They will mount up with wings like eagles, They will run and not get tired, They will walk and not become weary.” (Isaiah 40:31)“Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will direct your path.”  (Proverbs 3:5-6)RELATED LINKS:10 New Year’s Resolutions We All Should Make – a short, doable list6 Smart Ways to Start the New Year Right – set yourself up for successNew Year’s Goal Planning Printables – these will help you brainstormBalance  – my book about the art of minding what matters most Don’t Ditch Your New Year’s Resolutions Yet!

Did you make any New Year’s Resolutions this year? How’s it going? Are you sticking with the plan? Or have you already abandoned the idea completely?

A couple weeks into January, the majority of people are ready to give up. Actually achieving New Year’s goals requires uncommon grit. Researchers put the number of resolution-makers who succeed at a scant eight percent.

Giving up is so common, in fact, that we even have a day dedicated to throwing in the towel: Ditch Your New Year’s Resolutions Day. It’s January 17. That’s today!

Yet giving up would be a mistake.

You had good reasons for wanting to make positive changes in the New Year. Don’t lose sight of them. And don’t base your continued efforts on sustaining a success streak free from slip-ups.

Maintaining a flawless record is not what’s most important. If any of us were capable of doing that, we wouldn’t need Jesus. The important thing is to get up, dust ourselves off, and try again when we fail. Hop back on the wagon. Remount the horse. Step up to the plate.

All by the empowering grace of God.

Practice doesn’t make perfect. But practice does make progress, as one wise person observed. It’s all about incremental improvements: Little by little. Inch by inch. Step by step.

So keep chipping away at those new habits you want to establish, regardless what kind of track record you’ve maintained thus far. Keep turning away from the bad habits you want to break, even if you occasionally goof up. One missed day — or a whole week of missed days — is no reason to ditch your New Year’s resolutions completely.

Keep On Keeping On

The more you practice these things, the more ingrained they’ll become into your routines. And eventually, they’ll seem second nature.

Some of the resolutions I used to make annually have become so much a part of who I am, I don’t even have to think about them anymore. In my twenties, getting up early, making my bed, and reading my Bible every morning required a tremendous amount of effort and determination. In my fifties, I couldn’t sleep in if I wanted to.

My goal these days is to maintain the good habits I’ve formed in the past as I work on additional goals for the future. On my list this year? Exercise 5 days/week. Eat more plants and less sugar. Floss faithfully. Memorize more scripture. Enjoy tech-free Sundays. Give my kids and grandkids more of the undivided attention they crave.

If you’re ready to keep working on your own goals instead of throwing up your hands in defeat, try the following tips:

7 Ways to Nail New Year’s Resolutions1. Make it easy to succeed

The more convenient you make your resolutions, the more likely you’ll be to keep them.For instance, in addition to flossing, I want to be more consistent about taking my vitamins and rinsing with mouthwash. To ensure success, I put the Listerine in a tilt-to-pour oil dispenser and store my flossers and vitamins in decorative jars with lift-off lids right next to the sink. Not only does that make everything easy to access, but also provides a pretty visual reminder of my intent.

2. Narrow your focus

Tackle only a handful of habits at a time. It’s better to make consistent progress on a few than to burn out trying to change everything at once.My daughter Rachel came up with a fun way of doing this. She made a resolution box this year. She wrote down everything she wants to work on – one item per slip of paper – and tucked them into the box. Every morning, she draws out a “resolution” and makes that her focus for the day.

3. Break your goals down

Don’t let the magnitude of big goals paralyze or discourage you. How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time. Break big goals into small chunks. No more procrastinating. No over-analyzing. Pick a course of action, set to work, and make any needed adjustments along the way.If my goal is to write a new book in 2020, I’ve got to come up with a game plan. It could be writing for a certain number of minutes each morning. Or churning out a daily quota of words. Or setting myself deadlines for outlining the book, completing a rough draft of each chapter, then proofreading and polishing each section of the manuscript.Having a detailed course of action is vital to success. What particular form those details take is entirely negotiable.

4. Review your goals regularly

Post a list in a prominent place. Put a photo on the fridge. Keep them visible and take time to read through them at least once a week.Otherwise, you may get distracted and forget all about what you originally set out to accomplish. When you’re tempted to ditch your New Year’s resolutions, spend some time thinking about why you set each particular goal in the first place.

5. Put away distractions

When I say stop giving your attention to things that impede your progress, I don’t mean ditch your God-given responsibilities. If you are a wife, your husband deserves a good portion of your attention. If you are a mother, you still need to nurture your little ones. Family members and the life-giving connections we maintain with them are not “distractions” to be avoided.No, I’m thinking more along the lines of putting away our digital devices. I’m all for technology, but have you ever felt that our smart phones and tablets often just free up more time for us to waste?If this is a problem for you, let this be the year you break that addiction. Set down the phone. Turn of the TV. Step away from the computer. Stop the endless scrolling through social media posts. All things in moderation! Don’t let excessive or ultimately meaningless online activities keep you from reaching the goals God puts on your heart.

6. Pray for endurance

Do the goals you set for the new year seem harder than you thought they’d be? Well, guess what? Building endurance is one of the purposes God has in mind when He allows us to encounter hardships in the first place. (James 1:2-3)Don’t let that discourage you. Slow progress is no reason to ditch your New Year’s resolutions. Instead, pray for strength to press in to the hard, drawing encouragement from verses like these:

Philippians 4:13 – “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.”Luke 1:37 – “For with God nothing will be impossible.”2 Corinthians 12:9 – “But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.”Isaiah 40:31 – “Yet those who wait for the LORD will gain new strength; They will mount up with wings like eagles, They will run and not get tired, They will walk and not become weary.” 7. Leave the Results to God

That being said, we need to pray hard, work hard, and trust God with the results. You can write the book. But you can’t guarantee it will be a best seller.You can eat right and exercise daily. But you can’t dictate how quickly you drop unwanted pounds. (My baby weight is annoyingly stubborn while my metabolism is amazingly efficient.)You can study hard, make great grades, and get glowing recommendations. But it won’t get you into the school of your choice apart from God’s blessing. In all these things, God calls us to “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will direct your path.” (Proverbs 3:5-6)

It may be time to adjust your expectations, to narrow your focus, to hunker down and do the work. You may need to pray for an extra measure of perseverance and set up systems that will make it easier to succeed. But it isn’t time to ditch your New Year’s resolutions — no matter what the date on your calendar reads.

Jennifer Flanders loves the fresh start new years (and new months, new weeks, and new days) represent.

For more goal-setting tips and tricks, check out Jennifer’s (recently updated and expanded) Life Balance Bundle.

The post EP 25: Making New Year’s Resolutions You’ll Keep appeared first on Loving Life at Home.

EP 24: Embarrassing Moments & Tying Strings

Today is Christmas Day, so — like a ghost from Charles Dickens’ classic tale — I’m sharing a couple of stories this week from Christmases past. Stories that entail more than one embarrassing moment, plus some concentrated efforts to re-tie strings that had been broken.

This podcast episode is taken from a blog post I originally published in 2018, which you can read in its entirety below today’s show notes. Here’s hoping you have a very merry and meaningful Christmas. May God bless us, everyone.

Show NotesSCRIPTURES REFERENCED:“Although He existed in the form of God, he didn’t regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.” – Philippians 2:6-8“He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, acquainted with grief. Like one from whom men hide their faces, He was despised, and we esteemed Him not. Surely He took on our infirmities and carried our sorrows; yet we considered Him stricken by God, struck down and afflicted. But He was pierced for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we are healed. We all like sheep have gone astray, each one has turned to his own way; and the LORD has laid upon Him the iniquity of us all.” – Isaiah 53:3-6“For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” – Romans 6:23“In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace which He lavished upon us….” – Ephesians 1:7-8RELATED LINKS:Our Faith – this is the gospel plan of salvation, shared in a few simple Bible versesEmbarrassing Moments & Christmas Decor

About fifteen years ago — and totally unbeknownst to me at the time — my husband used his new smart phone to take a video of one of our babies, fresh from his bath and all dressed for bed.

Little Isaac looked so sweet and rosy toddling around the bathroom in those footed pajamas that Doug couldn’t resist passing the clip around the hospital the following day.

Surgeons, nurses, scrub techs, housekeeping staff — almost everyone he knows had viewed the footage before he bothered showing it to me.

When he finally did, I was mortified.

Talk about embarrassing moments!

Doug had obviously paid no attention to camera angles when filming and had unwittingly captured me in the background.

If you looked closely, you could see me clearly over the baby’s bobbing shoulder — sitting on the toilet with my pants around my ankles!

Of course, I had to forgive him. Doug swore he hadn’t even noticed the background image. “Although,” he mused playfully, “that would explain all the sniggering in the O.R. today!”

I’m just grateful he didn’t post the clip on YouTube.

Fast-forward Fifteen Years

Like almost everyone else we know, our family has spent the past week decking our halls with boughs of holly. We’ve hung stockings on the mantle and wreaths on the doors, put up trees, strung lights, wrapped gifts, and arranged nativity scenes and Christmas Villages on shelves and sideboards and end tables.

My grandkids helped hang the ornaments on our Christmas tree this year. Some of those decorations are ten or twelve times older than they are. And they’re accustomed to being handled more gently than some of their little fingers could manage.

Long story short, I now have a small box full of these forlorn trinkets and treasures in the corner of my closet awaiting repairs. Repairs I’ve been attending to in small snatches of time as I’m able.

I had a few such moments last Saturday evening. My husband and I were scheduled to attend a Christmas party together, and I was dressed and ready to go before he’d even started washing up.

And so I was sitting, hunched over my desk, attaching new hangers to old ornaments, in full view of my husband as he stepped out of the shower and started toweling off behind me.

Water in His Ears

“What are you doing in there, Honey Love?” he asked while swiping at the drips on the bathroom floor.

“Trying to tie strings,” I called over my shoulder, carefully concentrating on the task at hand.

“Trying to live stream!?” he exclaimed incredulously as he darted around a corner to hide. “Can’t you see I’m buck-naked in here?”

Obviously, the man can dish it out, but he can’t take it.

Once I assured him I was not, in fact, broadcasting his bare, buff body to all my Facebook friends, we had a hearty laugh about the misunderstanding.

Although he admits it probably would’ve served him right. Payback time!

Embarrassing Moment Averted

For someone who felt utterly embarrassed to learn, as I did recently, that I’d taught an hour-long co-op class to high schoolers with my pants unzipped, the thought of being completely disrobed in public is almost more than I can bear.

That’s the stuff nightmares are made of.

Have you ever had that dream? The one where you arrive at work or school or church only to realize in alarm that you left all your clothes at home?

Yet every Christmas, we celebrate the fact that Jesus did that for us.

He left the splendor of heaven and arrived on earth as a tiny, vulnerable, naked little babe, whereupon his mother toweled him off, swaddled him snugly, and laid him in a manger.

“Although He existed in the form of God, [Jesus] didn’t regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.”(Philippians 2:6-8)

Not only was Jesus naked when He was born; He was naked when He died. Exposed. Humiliated. Scorned. Rejected. Despised. The ultimate embarrassing moment.

He Died for Our Sin

Jesus took my place and yours, suffering unimaginable torment in our stead. He endured that nightmare so that we wouldn’t have to.

As we celebrate our Savior’s birth this season, let us be mindful of the fact that He was born to die.

Let us accept with gladness the gifts He offers – eternal life and the forgiveness of sin.

And let us be careful, when we’re capturing all those happy holiday moments on film, that there aren’t any naked, unsuspecting spouses haplessly tending to their business in the background.

Keep Reading

Want more embarrassing moments, hard learned lessons, and hilarious family antics? You’ll find it all in Glad Tidings, a compilation of our first 25 years of Christmas letters. It also includes a few favorite recipes, seasonal quotes, time-saving tips, and fun family traditions. Volume 1 is on sale now (we’re hoping to release Volume 2 in the year 2037).

PLEASE NOTE: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase through any of those links, we may receive a small referral fee, at no extra cost to you. Such fees help defray the cost of running this website. This, in turn, allows us to continue offering our readers a wealth of FREE printable resources. So thank you for your support!

The post EP 24: Embarrassing Moments & Tying Strings appeared first on Loving Life at Home.

EP 24 – Embarrassing Moments & Tying Strings

Today is Christmas Day, so — like a ghost from Charles Dickens’ classic tale — I’m sharing a couple of stories this week from Christmases past. Stories that entail more than one embarrassing moment, plus some concentrated efforts to re-tie strings that had been broken.

This podcast episode is taken from a blog post I originally published in 2018, which you can read in its entirety below today’s show notes. Here’s hoping you have a very merry and meaningful Christmas. May God bless us, everyone.

Show NotesSCRIPTURES REFERENCED:“Although He existed in the form of God, he didn’t regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.” – Philippians 2:6-8“He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, acquainted with grief. Like one from whom men hide their faces, He was despised, and we esteemed Him not. Surely He took on our infirmities and carried our sorrows; yet we considered Him stricken by God, struck down and afflicted. But He was pierced for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we are healed. We all like sheep have gone astray, each one has turned to his own way; and the LORD has laid upon Him the iniquity of us all.” – Isaiah 53:3-6“For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” – Romans 6:23“In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace which He lavished upon us….” – Ephesians 1:7-8RELATED LINKS:Our Faith – this is the gospel plan of salvation, shared in a few simple Bible versesEmbarrassing Moments & Christmas Decor

About fifteen years ago — and totally unbeknownst to me at the time — my husband used his new smart phone to take a video of one of our babies, fresh from his bath and all dressed for bed.

Little Isaac looked so sweet and rosy toddling around the bathroom in those footed pajamas that Doug couldn’t resist passing the clip around the hospital the following day.

Surgeons, nurses, scrub techs, housekeeping staff — almost everyone he knows had viewed the footage before he bothered showing it to me.

When he finally did, I was mortified.

Talk about embarrassing moments!

Doug had obviously paid no attention to camera angles when filming and had unwittingly captured me in the background.

If you looked closely, you could see me clearly over the baby’s bobbing shoulder — sitting on the toilet with my pants around my ankles!

Of course, I had to forgive him. Doug swore he hadn’t even noticed the background image. “Although,” he mused playfully, “that would explain all the sniggering in the O.R. today!”

I’m just grateful he didn’t post the clip on YouTube.

Fast-forward Fifteen Years

Like almost everyone else we know, our family has spent the past week decking our halls with boughs of holly. We’ve hung stockings on the mantle and wreaths on the doors, put up trees, strung lights, wrapped gifts, and arranged nativity scenes and Christmas Villages on shelves and sideboards and end tables.

My grandkids helped hang the ornaments on our Christmas tree this year. Some of those decorations are ten or twelve times older than they are. And they’re accustomed to being handled more gently than some of their little fingers could manage.

Long story short, I now have a small box full of these forlorn trinkets and treasures in the corner of my closet awaiting repairs. Repairs I’ve been attending to in small snatches of time as I’m able.

I had a few such moments last Saturday evening. My husband and I were scheduled to attend a Christmas party together, and I was dressed and ready to go before he’d even started washing up.

And so I was sitting, hunched over my desk, attaching new hangers to old ornaments, in full view of my husband as he stepped out of the shower and started toweling off behind me.

Water in His Ears

“What are you doing in there, Honey Love?” he asked while swiping at the drips on the bathroom floor.

“Trying to tie strings,” I called over my shoulder, carefully concentrating on the task at hand.

“Trying to live stream!?” he exclaimed incredulously as he darted around a corner to hide. “Can’t you see I’m buck-naked in here?”

Obviously, the man can dish it out, but he can’t take it.

Once I assured him I was not, in fact, broadcasting his bare, buff body to all my Facebook friends, we had a hearty laugh about the misunderstanding.

Although he admits it probably would’ve served him right. Payback time!

Embarrassing Moment Averted

For someone who felt utterly embarrassed to learn, as I did recently, that I’d taught an hour-long co-op class to high schoolers with my pants unzipped, the thought of being completely disrobed in public is almost more than I can bear.

That’s the stuff nightmares are made of.

Have you ever had that dream? The one where you arrive at work or school or church only to realize in alarm that you left all your clothes at home?

Yet every Christmas, we celebrate the fact that Jesus did that for us.

He left the splendor of heaven and arrived on earth as a tiny, vulnerable, naked little babe, whereupon his mother toweled him off, swaddled him snugly, and laid him in a manger.

“Although He existed in the form of God, [Jesus] didn’t regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.”(Philippians 2:6-8)

Not only was Jesus naked when He was born; He was naked when He died. Exposed. Humiliated. Scorned. Rejected. Despised. The ultimate embarrassing moment.

He Died for Our Sin

Jesus took my place and yours, suffering unimaginable torment in our stead. He endured that nightmare so that we wouldn’t have to.

As we celebrate our Savior’s birth this season, let us be mindful of the fact that He was born to die.

Let us accept with gladness the gifts He offers – eternal life and the forgiveness of sin.

And let us be careful, when we’re capturing all those happy holiday moments on film, that there aren’t any naked, unsuspecting spouses haplessly tending to their business in the background.

Keep Reading

Want more embarrassing moments, hard learned lessons, and hilarious family antics? You’ll find it all in Glad Tidings, a compilation of our first 25 years of Christmas letters. It also includes a few favorite recipes, seasonal quotes, time-saving tips, and fun family traditions. Volume 1 is on sale now (we’re hoping to release Volume 2 in the year 2037).

PLEASE NOTE: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase through any of those links, we may receive a small referral fee, at no extra cost to you. Such fees help defray the cost of running this website. This, in turn, allows us to continue offering our readers a wealth of FREE printable resources. So thank you for your support!

The post EP 24 – Embarrassing Moments & Tying Strings appeared first on Loving Life at Home.

EP 23: A Hill Country Christmas

Our extended family (40+ people) just got back from spending a week in San Antonio, Texas. The Texas hill country is a beautiful place to visit almost any time of year, but it’s especially gorgeous when it’s all lit up and decorated for Christmas.

Today, I’m sharing all the fun and budget-friendly things we did while we were there, as well as providing a few tips for finding similar bargains in your neck of the woods.

Show NotesSCRIPTURES CITED:

I didn’t quote a single Bible verse in this week’s episode, but our family’s theme verse certainly fits: “Whether then you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it to the glory of God.” (1 Corinthians 10:31)

That goal should hold in public and private, at home and abroad, in our dealings with each other, with hotel clerks and waitresses and park rangers and valet attendants and cashiers and cleaning ladies and museum docents and fellow travelers. We want to treat everyone we come into contact with in a way that honors and glorifies the Lord Jesus Christ — at Christmas time, especially!

RELATED LINKS:Collin Street Bakery (in Corsicana, TX) – clean bathrooms, 10-cent coffee, free fruit cake samplesPearce Museum (also in Corsicana) – Civil War artifacts, extensive arrowhead collection, Western Art (not free, but well worth the small entry fee)Magnolia Market (in Waco, TX) – quaint shops and beautiful outdoor spaces where kids can burn some energy before hitting the road againWalkway of Lights (in Marble Falls, TX) – free display opens at 6pm every night in DecemberChristmas Travel Bingo – free printables I pass out to the kids and grandkids before going through the walkway of lights; we treat it like a scavenger huntFirst United Methodist Church (in Johnson City, TX) – has been hosting a live nativity for 50 years, also features free hot cocoa and cookies and an impressive collection of nativity setsPedernales Electric Cooperative (also in Johnson City) – magnificent lighted trees, plus picnic tables where our family usually eats a light dinner of fruit & nuts, hummus & veggies, cheese & crackers, and summer sausage that we’ve brought from homeGarden Ridge Farmer’s Market (San Antonio, TX) – huge indoor/outdoor market held monthly on the 2nd Saturday at Northeast Bible Church , all year long; don’t miss the free children’s activities, crafts, and gamesMidday Noels at First Presbyterian Church (San Antonio, TX) – concerts take place every Thursday in December at noonSan Antonio Riverwalk (San Antonio, TX) ( – so colorful! bedecked with beautiful cyclamens and poinsettias by day and Christmas lights by nightThe Alamo (San Antonio, TX) – it is still free to tour the church and grounds; there is a fee to see the new collection of artifactsSan Antonio Missions National Park (San Antonio, TX) – no entry fee; start with the largest, San Jose; try to arrive by 10 or 11 AM to take the extremely informative Ranger tour (free) and pick up a free workbook so your kids can earn a junior ranger badge while they are there; if you have time, visit the other missions on the trail; they are all just a few miles apartUSA Factory Tours – this website is a great resource for finding businesses willing to give tours of their manufacturing plantsSAS Factory ((San Antonio, TX) – make a reservation to take a free tour of San Antonio Shoes while you’re in town (ages 6 and up); and buy some 5-cent popcorn and 10-cent sodas from the general store once you’re doneWitte Museum (San Antonio, TX) – you can get free admission to this amazing natural history museum every Tuesday night from 3-6 PM Japanese Tea Garden (San Antonio, TX) – beautiful sunken garden built in an old stone quaryMcNay Art Museum (San Antonio, TX) – the collections on display are sometimes hit or miss, but the building has some cool architectural features and unique outdoor spaces; they offer free admission the first Sunday (12-5 PM) and second Thursday (4-9PM) of every montTHE SAGA at San Fernando Cathedral (San Antonio, TX) – a free slide show that plays on the outside of this historic building several times a week featuring the art, music, and history of TexasHistoric Pearl (San Antonio, TX) – throughout the month of December, they offer free holiday movies on Mondays from 7-9PM and a fun Christmas Market on Wednesdays from 6-9PMHotel Emma (San Antonio, TX) – this unique hotel shares a parking lot with the Pearl, so walk on over and take a look around while you’re thereSix Flags Fiesta Texas (San Antonio, TX) – we buy our tickets online from the Book of Free; every year they run a special just before Thanksgiving where you can get 8 tickets to Six Flags’ Holiday in the Park plus a $25 gift card plus several copies of their namesake saving book for just $99, which works out to less than $10 a ticket; if you go, be sure to watch their amazing stage production, Night of Miracles. I cannot recommend it highly enough!Fort Sam Houston (San Antonio, TX) – pet the deer that roam free in the quadrangle, then visit the free museum to see how the army has changed over the years.San Antonio Aquarium (San Antonio, TX) – check Groupon for discount tickets; that’s how we got ours Tips for Taking Your Own Family Trip1. Plan Plenty of Stops along the Way

Take time to stop and smell the roses. Instead of making everybody miserable rushing as fast as possible to your destination, make the journey into part of your vacation, as well, by planning interesting stop along the way.

In our case, whenever we travel to San Antonio, we make our first stop in Corsicana. It’s only about an hour and a half down the road, but they have clean, spacious restrooms, free fruitcake samples (try their pine apple pecan fruitcake — yum!), a small display upstairs that detail’s the company’s history with dioramas, news clippings, and photographs, day old bread marked 50% off (and still delicious, especially their jalapeño cheese rolls), and a large selection of freshly baked and reasonably priced cookies, scones, and muffins.

Other stops we commonly make are in Waco to visit Magnolia Silos, in Marble Falls for their Walkway of Lights, and in Johnson City for First United Methodist’s living nativity followed by a picnic dinner at Pedernales Electric Cooperative.

2. Consult the Events Calendar for the Area You’re Visiting

Most places have seasonal events and activities going on all through the month of December, and one of the best ways to find out what is available is through the city events calendar. You can usually find something of that nature posted on their chamber of commerce website — or at least locate a lead as to where you might find it.

That is how we found out about Midday Noels at the First Presbyterian Church of San Antonio. Every Thursday at noon throughout the month of December, they host free hour-long Christmas concerts. This year, we heard an extremely talented soprano sing traditional carols, but in years past we’ve heard string quartets, brass quintets, and an organ recital.

We’ve found free holiday movies in the park and Christmas markets and church pageants and music festivals that way, too.

3. Search Museum Websites for Free Days

In San Antonio, I know the Witte Museum always offers free admission every Tuesday from 3-6 PM and the McNay Art Museum is free on the second Thursday of each month from 4-9 PM, so guess what? That is when I schedule our visits.

If you will be staying in a city for any length of time, research what days the area museums might offer free admission. Such information is usually listed on the museum’s website, so look for it and plan accordingly.

4. Delve into the City’s Unique History

In San Antonio, that obviously means a trip to the Alamo and other historic missions. Check any area you plan to travel to or through for historical markers, battlefields, missions, homes, or other buildings you may want to visit while you are there. State Capitol Buildings are always fun and free to tour and offer a great glimpse at the history of the region.

5. Consider a Factory Tour

Factory tours are often free, fascinating, and educational. Our family takes advantage of these as often as we can. In San Antonio, that means visiting SAS for a 45-minute tour of their manufacturing plant to watch the 100+ steps that go into making their shoes. That will give you a new appreciation for footwear!

But we’ve toured a huge variety of factories all over the country and seen firsthand how guitars, potato chips, glassware, chocolate candy, granite headstones, hand-thrown pottery, and much, much more is manufactured. And most of those tours didn’t cost a cent! To find factory tours in the area you plan to visit, consult the USA Factory Tours website.

6. Visit a Local Garden

In San Antonio, the Japanese Tea Garden is free and open to the public. It is stunningly beautiful in all seasons of the year. Google gardens, arboretums, or botanical societies in the area you’re visiting to see if you might find something equally lovely to walk through.

7. Check Out Area Parks and Playgrounds

If you are traveling with young children or even teens, let them burn off some energy playing at local parks and playgrounds. There are several we like to visit while in San Antonio, but my personal favorite is a playground called Yanaguana Garden in Hemisfair Park. It’s fabulous and can keep our kids entertained for hours.

8. Look for Bargains on Anything You Can’t Do Free

Groupon is a great place to find discounted admission to local attractions. We’ve saved as much as 75-80% off ticket prices bought that way, so check their site first.

In San Antonio, we love to go to Six Flags Fiesta Texas (as much for their Night of Miracles stage performance as for the fun rides), but we don’t want to pay $86 a head (summer) or even $45 (winter) to get through the gates.

Fortunately, I found a site called the Book of Free that offers Six Flags tickets at drastically reduced prices year round, but the week before Thanksgiving, they run a special where I can get 8 tickets + a $25 gift card + several copies of their coupon savings book for just $99. Subtracting out the gift card (and the cash back I earn through Rakuten), that means the tickets cost me about $9 apiece, which is a substantial savings over gate pricing!

9. Keep Good Notes for Next Time

Last of all, be sure to write down everything you did in the area you visited, and what you thought of each activity — especially if you plan to return to that part of the country with any regularity. That way, you can re-visit all your favorite places and add to the list as you try new ones.

For us, San Antonio offers far more than we could possibly fit into a single week, so every year, we re-do all our favorite activities and also try several new ones (our Thursday itinerary has remained unchanged for all the years we’ve been going to San Antonio in December, but Wednesday continues to be in flux).

The post EP 23: A Hill Country Christmas appeared first on Loving Life at Home.

EP 23 – A Hill Country Christmas

Our extended family (40+ people) just got back from spending a week in San Antonio, Texas. The Texas hill country is a beautiful place to visit almost any time of year, but it’s especially gorgeous when it’s all lit up and decorated for Christmas.

Today, I’m sharing all the fun and budget-friendly things we did while we were there, as well as providing a few tips for finding similar bargains in your neck of the woods.

Show NotesSCRIPTURES CITED:

I didn’t quote a single Bible verse in this week’s episode, but our family’s theme verse certainly fits: “Whether then you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it to the glory of God.” (1 Corinthians 10:31)

That goal should hold in public and private, at home and abroad, in our dealings with each other, with hotel clerks and waitresses and park rangers and valet attendants and cashiers and cleaning ladies and museum docents and fellow travelers. We want to treat everyone we come into contact with in a way that honors and glorifies the Lord Jesus Christ — at Christmas time, especially!

RELATED LINKS:Collin Street Bakery (in Corsicana, TX) – clean bathrooms, 10-cent coffee, free fruit cake samplesPearce Museum (also in Corsicana) – Civil War artifacts, extensive arrowhead collection, Western Art (not free, but well worth the small entry fee)Magnolia Market (in Waco, TX) – quaint shops and beautiful outdoor spaces where kids can burn some energy before hitting the road againWalkway of Lights (in Marble Falls, TX) – free display opens at 6pm every night in DecemberChristmas Travel Bingo – free printables I pass out to the kids and grandkids before going through the walkway of lights; we treat it like a scavenger huntFirst United Methodist Church (in Johnson City, TX) – has been hosting a live nativity for 50 years, also features free hot cocoa and cookies and an impressive collection of nativity setsPedernales Electric Cooperative (also in Johnson City) – magnificent lighted trees, plus picnic tables where our family usually eats a light dinner of fruit & nuts, hummus & veggies, cheese & crackers, and summer sausage that we’ve brought from homeGarden Ridge Farmer’s Market (San Antonio, TX) – huge indoor/outdoor market held monthly on the 2nd Saturday at Northeast Bible Church , all year long; don’t miss the free children’s activities, crafts, and gamesMidday Noels at First Presbyterian Church (San Antonio, TX) – concerts take place every Thursday in December at noonSan Antonio Riverwalk (San Antonio, TX) ( – so colorful! bedecked with beautiful cyclamens and poinsettias by day and Christmas lights by nightThe Alamo (San Antonio, TX) – it is still free to tour the church and grounds; there is a fee to see the new collection of artifactsSan Antonio Missions National Park (San Antonio, TX) – no entry fee; start with the largest, San Jose; try to arrive by 10 or 11 AM to take the extremely informative Ranger tour (free) and pick up a free workbook so your kids can earn a junior ranger badge while they are there; if you have time, visit the other missions on the trail; they are all just a few miles apartUSA Factory Tours – this website is a great resource for finding businesses willing to give tours of their manufacturing plantsSAS Factory ((San Antonio, TX) – make a reservation to take a free tour of San Antonio Shoes while you’re in town (ages 6 and up); and buy some 5-cent popcorn and 10-cent sodas from the general store once you’re doneWitte Museum (San Antonio, TX) – you can get free admission to this amazing natural history museum every Tuesday night from 3-6 PM Japanese Tea Garden (San Antonio, TX) – beautiful sunken garden built in an old stone quaryMcNay Art Museum (San Antonio, TX) – the collections on display are sometimes hit or miss, but the building has some cool architectural features and unique outdoor spaces; they offer free admission the first Sunday (12-5 PM) and second Thursday (4-9PM) of every montTHE SAGA at San Fernando Cathedral (San Antonio, TX) – a free slide show that plays on the outside of this historic building several times a week featuring the art, music, and history of TexasHistoric Pearl (San Antonio, TX) – throughout the month of December, they offer free holiday movies on Mondays from 7-9PM and a fun Christmas Market on Wednesdays from 6-9PMHotel Emma (San Antonio, TX) – this unique hotel shares a parking lot with the Pearl, so walk on over and take a look around while you’re thereSix Flags Fiesta Texas (San Antonio, TX) – we buy our tickets online from the Book of Free; every year they run a special just before Thanksgiving where you can get 8 tickets to Six Flags’ Holiday in the Park plus a $25 gift card plus several copies of their namesake saving book for just $99, which works out to less than $10 a ticket; if you go, be sure to watch their amazing stage production, Night of Miracles. I cannot recommend it highly enough!Fort Sam Houston (San Antonio, TX) – pet the deer that roam free in the quadrangle, then visit the free museum to see how the army has changed over the years.San Antonio Aquarium (San Antonio, TX) – check Groupon for discount tickets; that’s how we got ours Tips for Taking Your Own Family Trip1. Plan Plenty of Stops along the Way

Take time to stop and smell the roses. Instead of making everybody miserable rushing as fast as possible to your destination, make the journey into part of your vacation, as well, by planning interesting stop along the way.

In our case, whenever we travel to San Antonio, we make our first stop in Corsicana. It’s only about an hour and a half down the road, but they have clean, spacious restrooms, free fruitcake samples (try their pine apple pecan fruitcake — yum!), a small display upstairs that detail’s the company’s history with dioramas, news clippings, and photographs, day old bread marked 50% off (and still delicious, especially their jalapeño cheese rolls), and a large selection of freshly baked and reasonably priced cookies, scones, and muffins.

Other stops we commonly make are in Waco to visit Magnolia Silos, in Marble Falls for their Walkway of Lights, and in Johnson City for First United Methodist’s living nativity followed by a picnic dinner at Pedernales Electric Cooperative.

2. Consult the Events Calendar for the Area You’re Visiting

Most places have seasonal events and activities going on all through the month of December, and one of the best ways to find out what is available is through the city events calendar. You can usually find something of that nature posted on their chamber of commerce website — or at least locate a lead as to where you might find it.

That is how we found out about Midday Noels at the First Presbyterian Church of San Antonio. Every Thursday at noon throughout the month of December, they host free hour-long Christmas concerts. This year, we heard an extremely talented soprano sing traditional carols, but in years past we’ve heard string quartets, brass quintets, and an organ recital.

We’ve found free holiday movies in the park and Christmas markets and church pageants and music festivals that way, too.

3. Search Museum Websites for Free Days

In San Antonio, I know the Witte Museum always offers free admission every Tuesday from 3-6 PM and the McNay Art Museum is free on the second Thursday of each month from 4-9 PM, so guess what? That is when I schedule our visits.

If you will be staying in a city for any length of time, research what days the area museums might offer free admission. Such information is usually listed on the museum’s website, so look for it and plan accordingly.

4. Delve into the City’s Unique History

In San Antonio, that obviously means a trip to the Alamo and other historic missions. Check any area you plan to travel to or through for historical markers, battlefields, missions, homes, or other buildings you may want to visit while you are there. State Capitol Buildings are always fun and free to tour and offer a great glimpse at the history of the region.

5. Consider a Factory Tour

Factory tours are often free, fascinating, and educational. Our family takes advantage of these as often as we can. In San Antonio, that means visiting SAS for a 45-minute tour of their manufacturing plant to watch the 100+ steps that go into making their shoes. That will give you a new appreciation for footwear!

But we’ve toured a huge variety of factories all over the country and seen firsthand how guitars, potato chips, glassware, chocolate candy, granite headstones, hand-thrown pottery, and much, much more is manufactured. And most of those tours didn’t cost a cent! To find factory tours in the area you plan to visit, consult the USA Factory Tours website.

6. Visit a Local Garden

In San Antonio, the Japanese Tea Garden is free and open to the public. It is stunningly beautiful in all seasons of the year. Google gardens, arboretums, or botanical societies in the area you’re visiting to see if you might find something equally lovely to walk through.

7. Check Out Area Parks and Playgrounds

If you are traveling with young children or even teens, let them burn off some energy playing at local parks and playgrounds. There are several we like to visit while in San Antonio, but my personal favorite is a playground called Yanaguana Garden in Hemisfair Park. It’s fabulous and can keep our kids entertained for hours.

8. Look for Bargains on Anything You Can’t Do Free

Groupon is a great place to find discounted admission to local attractions. We’ve saved as much as 75-80% off ticket prices bought that way, so check their site first.

In San Antonio, we love to go to Six Flags Fiesta Texas (as much for their Night of Miracles stage performance as for the fun rides), but we don’t want to pay $86 a head (summer) or even $45 (winter) to get through the gates.

Fortunately, I found a site called the Book of Free that offers Six Flags tickets at drastically reduced prices year round, but the week before Thanksgiving, they run a special where I can get 8 tickets + a $25 gift card + several copies of their coupon savings book for just $99. Subtracting out the gift card (and the cash back I earn through Rakuten), that means the tickets cost me about $9 apiece, which is a substantial savings over gate pricing!

9. Keep Good Notes for Next Time

Last of all, be sure to write down everything you did in the area you visited, and what you thought of each activity — especially if you plan to return to that part of the country with any regularity. That way, you can re-visit all your favorite places and add to the list as you try new ones.

For us, San Antonio offers far more than we could possibly fit into a single week, so every year, we re-do all our favorite activities and also try several new ones (our Thursday itinerary has remained unchanged for all the years we’ve been going to San Antonio in December, but Wednesday continues to be in flux).

The post EP 23 – A Hill Country Christmas appeared first on Loving Life at Home.

EP 22: Why We Still Send Christmas Cards & Letters

Don’t you love all the extra mail the month of December normally brings with it? It’s fun to open all the pretty Christmas cards and see the family photos, but I especially enjoy reading the newsy letters that are often included.

Sending such newsy letters is one of our family’s longest standing holiday traditions. Not only do our annual Christmas updates help us keep in touch with distant family and friends, but they also provide an easy way to chronicle our family history and to share Christ/give testimony to God’s faithfulness.

Show NotesSCRIPTURES CITED:“Bless the LORD, my soul, and do not forget any of His benefits.” – Psalm 103:2 “Remember the wonders [the LORD] has done, His marvels, and the judgments He has pronounced.”  – 1 Chronicles 16:12 “We will not hide them from their children but will declare to the next generation the praises of the LORD and His might, and the wonders He has performed. – Psalm 78: 4 RELATED LINKS:Episode 19: Amazing Stories of God’s ProvisionGlad Tidings: my book, which includes the first 25 Years of the Flanders Family Christmas letters, along with a few favorite family recipes, traditions, quotes, and ideas for fully celebrating the seasonHow to Write a Christmas Letter People Want to Read: includes tips, patterns, templates, samples, and even free printable stationeryMore of our Family Christmas Letters: a full listing of all the annual updates we’ve sent family and friends in years pastOur Christmas Card Assembly Line: a listing of all the various “jobs” each child does to helpSTAY CONNECTED:Subscribe: Flanders Family Freebies -(weekly themed link lists of free resources)Instagram: follow @flanders_family for more great contentFamily Blog: Flanders Family Home Life (parenting tips, homeschool help, lots of free printables!) Marriage Blog: Loving Life at Home  (encouragement in your roles as wife, mother, believer)Transcript: Why Our Family Still Sends Christmas Cards & Letters

We’ve been mailing our annual Flanders Family update for 36 years now. I’m the one who actually puts pen to paper and drafts the letter (which some people on our list don’t realize, since I normally write it in third person). But the whole family is involved in the process.

They make suggestions as to which stories need to be included each year.They don coordinating clothes and pose for family portraits to send with our updates.They help get all the letters ready to mail (more on that later)And they listen as my husband re-reads all our old family Christmas letters aloud every December, one or two years per night.

We all love to reminisce in that last way. The anecdotes trigger all sorts of fond memories which are in turn relived and discussed at length.

It’s a great way for our younger kids to learn their family history. It allows them to glimpse what their older siblings were like growing up. And it cements into their hearts and minds stories of God’s provision and faithful watch-care over our family for decades.

So that is one of the reasons I write these letters in the first place:

Not only do our annual Christmas updates help us keep in touch with distant family and friends, but they also provide an easy way to chronicle our family history and to share Christ/give testimony to God’s faithfulness.

That last point is something believers are commanded by Scripture to do:

Psalm 103:2 tells us, “Bless the LORD, my soul, and do not forget any of His benefits.”

1 Chronicles 16:12 implores us to “Remember the wonders [the LORD] has done, His marvels, and the judgments He has pronounced.”  

And Psalm 78: 4 declares, “We will not hide them from their children but will declare to the next generation the praises of the LORD and His might, and the wonders He has performed.

I’ll include a link in the show notes, but do you remember all those amazing stories of God’s provision I shared in Episode 19? The reason I could so easily recall most of those stories is because they were written down and recorded in our past Christmas letters.

Interestingly, as our family grew, my reasons for writing our annual Christmas letters changed. I found myself writing not so much to inform, but to remember. Although I continued to share what I’d written with our family and friends, I was really writing for myself.

The letters allowed me to freeze those moments in time that I wished never to forget–significant milestones, everyday graces, hard-learned lessons, crazy mistakes, funny remarks. I wrote down the things that made me think or smile or laugh or cry, the things I wanted to treasure in my heart and to ponder for years to come.

It was a subtle shift, really, but it elicited an unexpected response. This willingness to share our foibles, to laugh at ourselves, to be sincerely vulnerable, allowed others to connect with us in a way that a brag sheet could never do. I guess it made our family more real and more accessible, because we began to get requests for extra copies of our updates.

Never mind that most of our letters were four pages long–people were passing them around the dinner table, forwarding them to friends, saving them in three-ring binders. I had one friend tell me that her husband insisted on reading the entire thing aloud at his office party one Christmas. We even received postcards from complete strangers, asking to be put on our mailing list.

It was really bizarre.

But it explains why, when I decided to publish the first twenty-five Flanders Family Christmas letters in a book to give our kids and grandkids, my husband urged me to make copies available to people outside our family, as well. Interested? I’ll include a link to that book in today’s show notes.

If you’ve ever thought about sending such a letter to your own friends and family at Christmastime, but haven’t known where to start, this podcast is for you!

I’d like to share some helpful Tips for Writing Your Own Christmas Letter. And I’ll put a link in the show notes to a blog post I’ve written on the topic that includes:

Samples – Pick a style that suits your family’s personality!Patterns – Follow any given example to create a letter all your own.Stationery – Print out our papers out to make it pretty.Encouragement – Writing Christmas letters is one holiday tradition you’ll be glad you adopted!

Of course, the style or pattern or stationery you use doesn’t really matter in the long run — the important thing is just to write something every year. If you’ll do this consistently, before you know it, you’ll have a detailed family history, just like we do.

The lengths of your letter might vary from a few phrases to a few pages. Some may feel too short, other may seem too long, but keep trying, and (like Goldilocks) you’ll eventually find a style that’s just right — and suits your family perfectly!

Christmas Letter Styles & Patterns

My husband insists I could save a lot of time by simply creating a fill-in-the-blank template, then shifting all our children’s names up a space every year:

“This year, baby ­­­­­­_____ joined the family. ___ learned to ride a bike. ___ broke a bone and/or got stitches. ______ won the best competitor award at the East Texas State fair, ______  graduated from high school, ____ finished college, and ___ got married.”

While I admit that could be a great time saver, it would also be a boring and monotonous read. So instead, I normally write a Month-by-Month Christmas Letter.

Month-by-Month Christmas Letter

It’s a pattern I’ve followed for 36 years now. I’ll be posting this year’s letter on our blog later this week, but I’ll include a link in today’s show notes in case you’d like to read samples of our Christmas letters from previous years.

Basically, I just pen one paragraph for each month, detailing the highlights of our year. 

Although I don’t begin writing my letter in earnest until October, I’ll occasionally jot notes to myself about funny stories or significant events I want to be sure to include. I keep all such notes in a single file in Evernote and add to it as the year progresses.

But sometimes I make it all the way to October and that Evernote file is still empty. In that case, I just look over my daily calendar for the past 12 months and browse through all the photos I’ve taken on my phone during that same time. Both these practices are a great way to jog your memory when the time comes to write about what your family has been up to for the past year.

Since I pack a lot of information into our annual updates, they are consistently four pages long. Keep in mind that I’m writing about a LOT of people, though (2 parents, 12 children, and 5 daughters-in-law, plus 20 grandkids who often warrant at least a mention).

If your family is much smaller, your letter will probably be much shorter.

I print our letters on plain white copy paper, two double-sided sheets, and mail them in embellished envelopes — more on that in a minute.

These days, I usually order Christmas cards with photos printed on both sides – a shot of our whole family on the front, and individual photos of each of our married children with their families on the back plus one of Mom & Dad with the kids who are still single and/or are living at home.

But when we first started sending our annual updates, I just used self-sealing business envelopes along with a 4×6 copy of our most recent family photo (which I order through snapfish for a penny a piece.

Since we usually mail our Christmas letters over Thanksgiving weekend, my month-by-month account normally runs from December of the previous year through November of the current year (rather than January through December). Here’s a sample month from last year’s update:

“Most of our grandkids joined us for our annual trek to San Antonio last December. In addition to making many sweet memories together, Jennifer got a refresher on the importance of staying alert to one’s surroundings when she found herself alone in an elevator with a big burly dude built like a linebacker. He seemed friendly enough as they made small talk, but she grew increasingly nervous when he stepped off the elevator behind her and followed her to the far end of the hallway. There, still chatting away, she fumbled with her key and found it had quit working. “Ummm,” the linebacker hesitated, perplexed, “I think that’s my room.” And so it was. Jennifer had accidentally gotten off on the wrong floor! “Well,” he laughed good-naturedly once she explained her mistake, clearly relieved to learn he wasn’t being stalked by some crazy lady, “thanks for seeing me safely to my door.”

Excerpted from the 2022 Flanders Family Update

If trying to arrange the year’s memories in chronological order, month-by-month, is too much to ask or stresses you out, no worries! I several simpler ideas you cam try.

Person-by-Person Christmas Letter

Devote one paragraph to each member of the family and describe the highlights of the year from that person’s perspective. If your children are old enough, you might even ask each of them to pen their own paragraph, then string them all together to make your family’s annual update.

Christmas-Themed Acrostic Letter

This is the pattern my sister has always followed, and I love it! She’s a schoolteacher, so her acrostic spells CHRISTMAS and usually has an overarching theme, with an introductory “C” paragraph and a closing “S” paragraph, but that’s just her meticulous personality shining through.

You can easily adapt this acrostic pattern to suit your own style, and even change the vertical word to something besides “CHRISTMAS” if you’d prefer. It’s short and to the point, but packs a lot of information in those few brief paragraphs. If you’d like to see a sample of what her letter looks like – or any of the other patterns I’ve mentioned – I’ll include a link in today’s show notes where you can compare all the different styles and even download free printable stationery for making your own acrostic update.

Multiple-Choice Christmas Letter

Of all the Christmas letters our family receives each year, one of our favorites to read is from some friends who structure their letter like a pop quiz.

“It’s 4 AM and somebody is screaming. Is it (a) the baby, who still hasn’t learned to sleep through the night, although she has finally moved to her own crib after eight months in bed between Mom and Dad. (b) Mom and Dad, who were rudely awakened when a pipe unexpectedly burst upstairs and dumped multiple gallons of cold water on them in their sleep. (c) Beau, who woke up in the night for a drink of water and saw what looked like an alien standing on top of the barn peering through her window. (d) Rebekah, whose pet squirrel — the one she’s been feeding every two hours around the clock — just broke her heart by dying in her arms. Would you believe God sent a replacement within 24 hours?”

Each paragraph details what’s going on at a different time of day:

“It’s 8 AM, and someone is rushing out the door…”“It’s 10 AM, and someone is dancing for joy…”“It’s 12 PM, and somebody’s feeling nervous…”

And so it continues, front and back of a double-sided print on red or green colored paper. And the answer key is always the same: all of the above. I’ve included a sample done in this style in the aforementioned link, so check today’s show notes if you’re interested.

Bullet Point Christmas Letter

And, simplest of all, you might want to try a Bullet Point List.

We have a few friends who are able to pack a whole year’s worth of news into a handful of bullet points. Their updates are so brief, in fact, that they fit on the back of a postcard — which also saves on postage.

If you plan to mail this kind of Christmas card in an envelope, you can include more photos on the reverse along with your brief update, or choose a two text box layout and leave the right side blank for addresses if you want to mail them as postcards.

However you choose to do it, I do hope you’ll make sending annual updates a part of your family routine — but don’t feel like you have to send them at Christmas. We have friends that send their yearly letters out before Thanksgiving, and others whose updates don’t roll in until New Year’s, Valentine’s, or even Easter.

The important thing is that you take time to write down your family’s history. When and with whom you share it once it’s written is entirely up to you.

And for a fun way to put it all together once you’re through? Check out our ideas for staging a Christmas card assembly line. Our kids look forward to doing this every year.

Our Family Christmas Letters

Need some more concrete examples of Christmas letter written in a style that keeps a reader’s interest? Then get a copy of Glad Tidings, a compilation of our first 25 years of Christmas letters. It also includes a few favorite recipes, seasonal quotes, time-saving tips, and fun family traditions. Volume 1 is on sale now (we’re hoping to release Volume 2 in the year 2037).

Our family sends out a lot of Christmas cards each year, and getting them ready to mail is a joint effort. We set up shop at a long table and churn them out in fast order. Every member of the family is given a task.

As our family has grown, we’ve had to manufacture extra “jobs” for the assembly line, so that even the youngest members can take part.

Most of our little ones are now in charge of stamps and stickers. One will put large stickers on the back of the envelope, another will put small stars on the front. One will rubber stamp with red ink, another will use a different stamp with green, and yet another will use a tiny, self-inking stamp that says “Merry Christmas.”

We usually listen to Christmas music while we work and have hot cocoa once we’re done. Even our college kids still love to help and ask us to assemble on a night they can participate — usually over Thanksgiving break.

This year, we were about two weeks later than usual getting our cards in the mail, due to an unforeseen delay at the printers. And our assembly line didn’t have quite as many participants as normal, thanks to the fact a couple of our kids were sick at the time, and my husband banned them from handling the letters we’d be sending to family and friends so that we didn’t unwittingly pass along any nasty germs or viruses along with our annual updates.

Several years ago, I smiled to hear one of my children say emphatically, “It’s a good thing we have so many helpers in this family. Can you imagine how long it would take one person to do all this alone?”

He was too young to know that there was once a time (over 35 years ago) when Mom did do the job alone (minus the stars, stickers, and ink stamping). I stuffed and addressed all the envelopes by hand and sent them unembellished.

But the task is a lot more fun now that we do it together!

Christmas Card Assembly Line Tasks

Here’s how our job assignments are currently broken down:

Put return address labels on envelopesAffix postage stamps to envelopesEmboss envelope flap with Monogram sealPut small stickers on front of envelopePut large sticker on back of envelopeRubber stamp envelope with red inkRubber stamp envelope with green inkUse small self-inking stampsAffix foil stars to the envelopeAdd a strip or two of washi tape to front of envelopePut labels on backs of photosFold Christmas lettersStuff letters and photos into envelopesAddress envelopes (we print out recipients’ address labels, too)Add handwritten notes as desired – this has always been my jobSeal envelope (we normally use self-sealers, so nobody gets stuck licking 200+ envelopes) and place finished letter in mail bucket

We rotate jobs several times during the course of the evening, and we always pray for the recipients when we drop the letters at the post office.

Our Christmas card assembly line is still one of my family’s favorite traditions. Our adult children often plan their visits home to coincide with this annual envelope stuffing event — bringing grandkids with them (who also want to help). So our envelopes keep getting more and more elaborately decorated with every passing year!

So, that wraps up today’s podcast. To sum it all up, our family still sends Christmas letters every year for three main reasons:

To chronicle our family history.To keep in touch with distant family and friends.To share Christ/give testimony to God’s faithfulness.

The post EP 22: Why We Still Send Christmas Cards & Letters appeared first on Loving Life at Home.

EP22 – Why We Still Send Christmas Cards & Letters

Don’t you love all the extra mail the month of December normally brings with it? It’s fun to open all the pretty Christmas cards and see the family photos, but I especially enjoy reading the newsy letters that are often included.

Sending such newsy letters is one of our family’s longest standing holiday traditions. Not only do our annual Christmas updates help us keep in touch with distant family and friends, but they also provide an easy way to chronicle our family history and to share Christ/give testimony to God’s faithfulness.

Show NotesSCRIPTURES CITED:“Bless the LORD, my soul, and do not forget any of His benefits.” – Psalm 103:2 “Remember the wonders [the LORD] has done, His marvels, and the judgments He has pronounced.”  – 1 Chronicles 16:12 “We will not hide them from their children but will declare to the next generation the praises of the LORD and His might, and the wonders He has performed. – Psalm 78: 4 RELATED LINKS:Episode 19: Amazing Stories of God’s ProvisionGlad Tidings: my book, which includes the first 25 Years of the Flanders Family Christmas letters, along with a few favorite family recipes, traditions, quotes, and ideas for fully celebrating the seasonHow to Write a Christmas Letter People Want to Read: includes tips, patterns, templates, samples, and even free printable stationeryMore of our Family Christmas Letters: a full listing of all the annual updates we’ve sent family and friends in years pastOur Christmas Card Assembly Line: a listing of all the various “jobs” each child does to helpSTAY CONNECTED:Subscribe: Flanders Family Freebies -(weekly themed link lists of free resources)Instagram: follow @flanders_family for more great contentFamily Blog: Flanders Family Home Life (parenting tips, homeschool help, lots of free printables!) Marriage Blog: Loving Life at Home  (encouragement in your roles as wife, mother, believer)Transcript: Why Our Family Still Sends Christmas Cards & Letters

We’ve been mailing our annual Flanders Family update for 36 years now. I’m the one who actually puts pen to paper and drafts the letter (which some people on our list don’t realize, since I normally write it in third person). But the whole family is involved in the process.

They make suggestions as to which stories need to be included each year.They don coordinating clothes and pose for family portraits to send with our updates.They help get all the letters ready to mail (more on that later)And they listen as my husband re-reads all our old family Christmas letters aloud every December, one or two years per night.

We all love to reminisce in that last way. The anecdotes trigger all sorts of fond memories which are in turn relived and discussed at length.

It’s a great way for our younger kids to learn their family history. It allows them to glimpse what their older siblings were like growing up. And it cements into their hearts and minds stories of God’s provision and faithful watch-care over our family for decades.

So that is one of the reasons I write these letters in the first place:

Not only do our annual Christmas updates help us keep in touch with distant family and friends, but they also provide an easy way to chronicle our family history and to share Christ/give testimony to God’s faithfulness.

That last point is something believers are commanded by Scripture to do:

Psalm 103:2 tells us, “Bless the LORD, my soul, and do not forget any of His benefits.”

1 Chronicles 16:12 implores us to “Remember the wonders [the LORD] has done, His marvels, and the judgments He has pronounced.”  

And Psalm 78: 4 declares, “We will not hide them from their children but will declare to the next generation the praises of the LORD and His might, and the wonders He has performed.

I’ll include a link in the show notes, but do you remember all those amazing stories of God’s provision I shared in Episode 19? The reason I could so easily recall most of those stories is because they were written down and recorded in our past Christmas letters.

Interestingly, as our family grew, my reasons for writing our annual Christmas letters changed. I found myself writing not so much to inform, but to remember. Although I continued to share what I’d written with our family and friends, I was really writing for myself.

The letters allowed me to freeze those moments in time that I wished never to forget–significant milestones, everyday graces, hard-learned lessons, crazy mistakes, funny remarks. I wrote down the things that made me think or smile or laugh or cry, the things I wanted to treasure in my heart and to ponder for years to come.

It was a subtle shift, really, but it elicited an unexpected response. This willingness to share our foibles, to laugh at ourselves, to be sincerely vulnerable, allowed others to connect with us in a way that a brag sheet could never do. I guess it made our family more real and more accessible, because we began to get requests for extra copies of our updates.

Never mind that most of our letters were four pages long–people were passing them around the dinner table, forwarding them to friends, saving them in three-ring binders. I had one friend tell me that her husband insisted on reading the entire thing aloud at his office party one Christmas. We even received postcards from complete strangers, asking to be put on our mailing list.

It was really bizarre.

But it explains why, when I decided to publish the first twenty-five Flanders Family Christmas letters in a book to give our kids and grandkids, my husband urged me to make copies available to people outside our family, as well. Interested? I’ll include a link to that book in today’s show notes.

If you’ve ever thought about sending such a letter to your own friends and family at Christmastime, but haven’t known where to start, this podcast is for you!

I’d like to share some helpful Tips for Writing Your Own Christmas Letter. And I’ll put a link in the show notes to a blog post I’ve written on the topic that includes:

Samples – Pick a style that suits your family’s personality!Patterns – Follow any given example to create a letter all your own.Stationery – Print out our papers out to make it pretty.Encouragement – Writing Christmas letters is one holiday tradition you’ll be glad you adopted!

Of course, the style or pattern or stationery you use doesn’t really matter in the long run — the important thing is just to write something every year. If you’ll do this consistently, before you know it, you’ll have a detailed family history, just like we do.

The lengths of your letter might vary from a few phrases to a few pages. Some may feel too short, other may seem too long, but keep trying, and (like Goldilocks) you’ll eventually find a style that’s just right — and suits your family perfectly!

Christmas Letter Styles & Patterns

My husband insists I could save a lot of time by simply creating a fill-in-the-blank template, then shifting all our children’s names up a space every year:

“This year, baby ­­­­­­_____ joined the family. ___ learned to ride a bike. ___ broke a bone and/or got stitches. ______ won the best competitor award at the East Texas State fair, ______  graduated from high school, ____ finished college, and ___ got married.”

While I admit that could be a great time saver, it would also be a boring and monotonous read. So instead, I normally write a Month-by-Month Christmas Letter.

Month-by-Month Christmas Letter

It’s a pattern I’ve followed for 36 years now. I’ll be posting this year’s letter on our blog later this week, but I’ll include a link in today’s show notes in case you’d like to read samples of our Christmas letters from previous years.

Basically, I just pen one paragraph for each month, detailing the highlights of our year. 

Although I don’t begin writing my letter in earnest until October, I’ll occasionally jot notes to myself about funny stories or significant events I want to be sure to include. I keep all such notes in a single file in Evernote and add to it as the year progresses.

But sometimes I make it all the way to October and that Evernote file is still empty. In that case, I just look over my daily calendar for the past 12 months and browse through all the photos I’ve taken on my phone during that same time. Both these practices are a great way to jog your memory when the time comes to write about what your family has been up to for the past year.

Since I pack a lot of information into our annual updates, they are consistently four pages long. Keep in mind that I’m writing about a LOT of people, though (2 parents, 12 children, and 5 daughters-in-law, plus 20 grandkids who often warrant at least a mention).

If your family is much smaller, your letter will probably be much shorter.

I print our letters on plain white copy paper, two double-sided sheets, and mail them in embellished envelopes — more on that in a minute.

These days, I usually order Christmas cards with photos printed on both sides – a shot of our whole family on the front, and individual photos of each of our married children with their families on the back plus one of Mom & Dad with the kids who are still single and/or are living at home.

But when we first started sending our annual updates, I just used self-sealing business envelopes along with a 4×6 copy of our most recent family photo (which I order through snapfish for a penny a piece.

Since we usually mail our Christmas letters over Thanksgiving weekend, my month-by-month account normally runs from December of the previous year through November of the current year (rather than January through December). Here’s a sample month from last year’s update:

“Most of our grandkids joined us for our annual trek to San Antonio last December. In addition to making many sweet memories together, Jennifer got a refresher on the importance of staying alert to one’s surroundings when she found herself alone in an elevator with a big burly dude built like a linebacker. He seemed friendly enough as they made small talk, but she grew increasingly nervous when he stepped off the elevator behind her and followed her to the far end of the hallway. There, still chatting away, she fumbled with her key and found it had quit working. “Ummm,” the linebacker hesitated, perplexed, “I think that’s my room.” And so it was. Jennifer had accidentally gotten off on the wrong floor! “Well,” he laughed good-naturedly once she explained her mistake, clearly relieved to learn he wasn’t being stalked by some crazy lady, “thanks for seeing me safely to my door.”

Excerpted from the 2022 Flanders Family Update

If trying to arrange the year’s memories in chronological order, month-by-month, is too much to ask or stresses you out, no worries! I several simpler ideas you cam try.

Person-by-Person Christmas Letter

Devote one paragraph to each member of the family and describe the highlights of the year from that person’s perspective. If your children are old enough, you might even ask each of them to pen their own paragraph, then string them all together to make your family’s annual update.

Christmas-Themed Acrostic Letter

This is the pattern my sister has always followed, and I love it! She’s a schoolteacher, so her acrostic spells CHRISTMAS and usually has an overarching theme, with an introductory “C” paragraph and a closing “S” paragraph, but that’s just her meticulous personality shining through.

You can easily adapt this acrostic pattern to suit your own style, and even change the vertical word to something besides “CHRISTMAS” if you’d prefer. It’s short and to the point, but packs a lot of information in those few brief paragraphs. If you’d like to see a sample of what her letter looks like – or any of the other patterns I’ve mentioned – I’ll include a link in today’s show notes where you can compare all the different styles and even download free printable stationery for making your own acrostic update.

Multiple-Choice Christmas Letter

Of all the Christmas letters our family receives each year, one of our favorites to read is from some friends who structure their letter like a pop quiz.

“It’s 4 AM and somebody is screaming. Is it (a) the baby, who still hasn’t learned to sleep through the night, although she has finally moved to her own crib after eight months in bed between Mom and Dad. (b) Mom and Dad, who were rudely awakened when a pipe unexpectedly burst upstairs and dumped multiple gallons of cold water on them in their sleep. (c) Beau, who woke up in the night for a drink of water and saw what looked like an alien standing on top of the barn peering through her window. (d) Rebekah, whose pet squirrel — the one she’s been feeding every two hours around the clock — just broke her heart by dying in her arms. Would you believe God sent a replacement within 24 hours?”

Each paragraph details what’s going on at a different time of day:

“It’s 8 AM, and someone is rushing out the door…”“It’s 10 AM, and someone is dancing for joy…”“It’s 12 PM, and somebody’s feeling nervous…”

And so it continues, front and back of a double-sided print on red or green colored paper. And the answer key is always the same: all of the above. I’ve included a sample done in this style in the aforementioned link, so check today’s show notes if you’re interested.

Bullet Point Christmas Letter

And, simplest of all, you might want to try a Bullet Point List.

We have a few friends who are able to pack a whole year’s worth of news into a handful of bullet points. Their updates are so brief, in fact, that they fit on the back of a postcard — which also saves on postage.

If you plan to mail this kind of Christmas card in an envelope, you can include more photos on the reverse along with your brief update, or choose a two text box layout and leave the right side blank for addresses if you want to mail them as postcards.

However you choose to do it, I do hope you’ll make sending annual updates a part of your family routine — but don’t feel like you have to send them at Christmas. We have friends that send their yearly letters out before Thanksgiving, and others whose updates don’t roll in until New Year’s, Valentine’s, or even Easter.

The important thing is that you take time to write down your family’s history. When and with whom you share it once it’s written is entirely up to you.

And for a fun way to put it all together once you’re through? Check out our ideas for staging a Christmas card assembly line. Our kids look forward to doing this every year.

Our Family Christmas Letters

Need some more concrete examples of Christmas letter written in a style that keeps a reader’s interest? Then get a copy of Glad Tidings, a compilation of our first 25 years of Christmas letters. It also includes a few favorite recipes, seasonal quotes, time-saving tips, and fun family traditions. Volume 1 is on sale now (we’re hoping to release Volume 2 in the year 2037).

Our family sends out a lot of Christmas cards each year, and getting them ready to mail is a joint effort. We set up shop at a long table and churn them out in fast order. Every member of the family is given a task.

As our family has grown, we’ve had to manufacture extra “jobs” for the assembly line, so that even the youngest members can take part.

Most of our little ones are now in charge of stamps and stickers. One will put large stickers on the back of the envelope, another will put small stars on the front. One will rubber stamp with red ink, another will use a different stamp with green, and yet another will use a tiny, self-inking stamp that says “Merry Christmas.”

We usually listen to Christmas music while we work and have hot cocoa once we’re done. Even our college kids still love to help and ask us to assemble on a night they can participate — usually over Thanksgiving break.

This year, we were about two weeks later than usual getting our cards in the mail, due to an unforeseen delay at the printers. And our assembly line didn’t have quite as many participants as normal, thanks to the fact a couple of our kids were sick at the time, and my husband banned them from handling the letters we’d be sending to family and friends so that we didn’t unwittingly pass along any nasty germs or viruses along with our annual updates.

Several years ago, I smiled to hear one of my children say emphatically, “It’s a good thing we have so many helpers in this family. Can you imagine how long it would take one person to do all this alone?”

He was too young to know that there was once a time (over 35 years ago) when Mom did do the job alone (minus the stars, stickers, and ink stamping). I stuffed and addressed all the envelopes by hand and sent them unembellished.

But the task is a lot more fun now that we do it together!

Christmas Card Assembly Line Tasks

Here’s how our job assignments are currently broken down:

Put return address labels on envelopesAffix postage stamps to envelopesEmboss envelope flap with Monogram sealPut small stickers on front of envelopePut large sticker on back of envelopeRubber stamp envelope with red inkRubber stamp envelope with green inkUse small self-inking stampsAffix foil stars to the envelopeAdd a strip or two of washi tape to front of envelopePut labels on backs of photosFold Christmas lettersStuff letters and photos into envelopesAddress envelopes (we print out recipients’ address labels, too)Add handwritten notes as desired – this has always been my jobSeal envelope (we normally use self-sealers, so nobody gets stuck licking 200+ envelopes) and place finished letter in mail bucket

We rotate jobs several times during the course of the evening, and we always pray for the recipients when we drop the letters at the post office.

Our Christmas card assembly line is still one of my family’s favorite traditions. Our adult children often plan their visits home to coincide with this annual envelope stuffing event — bringing grandkids with them (who also want to help). So our envelopes keep getting more and more elaborately decorated with every passing year!

So, that wraps up today’s podcast. To sum it all up, our family still sends Christmas letters every year for three main reasons:

To chronicle our family history.To keep in touch with distant family and friends.To share Christ/give testimony to God’s faithfulness.

The post EP22 – Why We Still Send Christmas Cards & Letters appeared first on Loving Life at Home.

EP 21: Favorite Family Christmas Traditions

This week on the podcast, by special request, we are discussing favorite family Christmas traditions: Why they’re important. What counts as a family tradition. How to establish a few new traditions. And what to do if an old tradition no longer serves you well.

That’s because I got the following special request from a listener this week. She writes:

“Hi, Jennifer!

I absolutely love your resources: the emails, your podcast, and your website. 

I’m so excited you started the podcast. I love listening to it! Will you please do an episode on your family’s favorite Christmas traditions? Then do one on traditions for the rest of the year?

Thank you! ‘

Celestia 

Well, I thought that was a great idea, so I’m sharing an outline of my response to this listener below today’s show notes.

Show NotesRELATED SCRIPTURES:“And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us; and we saw His glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.” – John 1:14“Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus: Who, existing in the form of God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to death—even death on a cross.” – Philippians 2:5-8“For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counseller, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.” – Isaiah 9:6“But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” – Romans 5:8“Thanks be to God for His indescribable gift!” – 2 Corinthians 9:15RESOURCES MENTIONED:Christmas Countdown Calendars: scripture chain, candy kisses, bucket and book-a-day lists5 Things that Would Make Christmas Better: a bucket list for minimalistsA Christmas Carol: the BBC audiobook we listen to with Miriam MargolyesThe Best Christmas Pageant Ever: another chapter book to read aloudJoy to the World: my personal advent journal (I work on it every December)Luke 2: the memory passage we read and/or quote every Christmas before opening giftsGlad Tidings: another book we read aloud every year–our own family historyEpisode 20: Home Shows and Show Homes – on extending unselfconscious hospitalityPennant Banners for Christmas: we hang these colorful homemade signs from our mantleHomemade Ornaments & Felt Stockings: a glimpse into our home all decorated for ChristmasChristmas Movie Trivia Tests: for Elf, It’s a Wonderful Life, While You Were Sleeping, and moreShoebox Stuffing Party: even more fun with family and friendsBell Ringing for the Salvation Army: another fun service project for families to do togetherChristmas Caroling Song Sheets: helps all the singers stay on the same pageCandy Cane Gospel: to hand out to neighbors or nursing home residents while we singChristmas Games: lots of other fun challenges for ChristmasScripture Memory Challenge: my best tips for hiding God’s Word in your heartSTAY CONNECTED:Subscribe: Flanders Family Freebies -(weekly themed link lists of free resources)Instagram: follow @flanders_family for more great contentFamily Blog: Flanders Family Home Life (parenting tips, homeschool help, lots of free printables!) Marriage Blog: Loving Life at Home  (encouragement in your roles as wife, mother, believer)

Before I delve into all our family’s favorite Christmas traditions, I want to clarify Celestia’s compliment a bit. In addition to my podcast, she mentioned my emails and website (linked above).

The emails Celestia is talking about is a weekly newsletter I send out every Wednesday morning called Flanders Family Freebies. It is simply a list of links to free resources we offer through our blogs, all centered around a theme.

Last week’s list was full of various Advent Calendars, which I’ll tell you more about here in a minute. A couple of weeks before that, I sent free resources for celebrating Thanksgiving: pennant banners, conversation starters, games, coloring pages, Thanksgiving hymn booklets, etc. A week before that, it was resources for celebrating Veteran’s Day. So if you enjoy that sort of thing, be sure to subscribe through the link in today’s shownotes.

Then I’m assuming the website Celestia mentioned is our family website, Flanders Family Homelife. It’s especially popular this time of year because we offer so many free Christmas resources: party games, coloring pages, paper crafts, bucket lists, planning charts, calendars, discussion prompts, and much, much more.

That’s a different website than the marriage blog you’re currently reading, Loving Life at Home, which shares the same name as my podcast. But now, on to Christmas traditions….

Our Favorite Family Christmas Traditions

Christmas traditions are valuable because they bond families (and communities) together and foster a sense of belonging, stability, and continuity.

They create memories and give us all something to look forward to. They offer us an opportunity to remember and celebrate God’s blessings – which for us, at Christmas time, center on the Lord Jesus Christ’s taking on flesh and being born as a man.

And they teach history and reinforce important character traits – like generosity and gratitude and love and joy and patience and peace and a sense of wonder.

Some of our family traditions, we do the exact same way every single year and someone would probably protest if we tried to change anything. Others traditions fluctuate and morph according to the ages and interests of our children. And that’s okay, too.

It only takes doing something two or three times for it to become a tradition. Chances are, you already have several family traditions yourself, whether you recognize that fact or not.

I’ll group our family’s favorite traditions in broad categories to help you recognize traditions you already have in place or choose some you’d like to adopt.

Advent Calendars

These are just fun ways to help your children count down the days until Christmas. Have you ever noticed how, as a child, it felt like Christmas took forever to arrive, but as an adult, the time flies by? You blink your eyes, and it’s Christmas morning.

Over on our family website, we offer lots of free resources for creating your own advent calendars, including.

Instructions for making a candy kiss countdown calendar: “Do something sweet to get a treat.”A scripture chain with 25 Bible verses that tell the story of Jesus’s birth, from OT prophets foretelling the coming of the Messiah, through Gabriel’s visitation of Mary, Augustus Caesar’s decree, the angels announcement to the shepherds, and the wise men’s gifts, culminating with Isaiah 9:6 on Christmas Day: “For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counseller, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.”Several long bucket lists filled with fresh ideas for celebrating the seasonAnd even a minimalist list for folks who feel overwhelmed looking at lengthy ones Books

We re-read many of the same holiday stories every year, including a variety of Christmas picture books, Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, Barbara Robinson’s The Best Christmas Pageant Ever, the story of our own family history in Glad Tidings, and Luke 2 on Christmas morning before opening our gifts.

I also have a Christmas devotional called Joy the the World I pull out every December to re-read and work through a few more pages. It has word studies, writing prompts, related Bible verses on nearly every page, and some of the most beautiful vintage artwork to color that you will ever see.

Decorations

Lots of our decorations are homemade: ornaments on the tree, stockings on the mantle ( although ours are way too numerous to fit there any more, pennant banners and paper snowflakes and wreaths for the door.

My mother made sequined felt stockings for me and my sister when we were little, and I’ve continued that tradition myself. In our current house, I hang them all on an empty, 14-foot long curtain rod that hangs over a huge picture window in our den.

Some of the Nativity sets we set up are made with painted wooden pegs and felt scraps. Others were gifts. Others we bought after Christmas when stores used to sell holiday merchandize for 90% off the day after Christmas.

But we normally also put up several trees – including a couple of smaller ones I bought at garage sales for as little as 25-cents a piece. Twelve kids + twenty grandkids + multiple handmade ornaments every year equals way to many to fit on just one tree, so we group them according to color or theme: brightly colored ornaments go on the den tree… fancy, gilded ornaments on the old fashioned tree… blue and white ornaments on the tree in the dining room… etc. You get the idea.

We also have a Christmas village that my mother bought me at a garage sale for $1 a piece that I set up on the buffet in our entry way. It is beautiful.

Movies

Rewatch the same handful of movies every year, including It’s a Wonderful Life, White Christmas, Holiday Inn, Elf, Miracle on 34th Street (the old one), and While You Were Sleeping.

I’ve even created trivia quizzes for many of them, which you’ll find linked in today’s show notes.

Cards & Letters

Sending and receiving Christmas cards is definitely one of my favorite things to do in the month of December, and our family has a lot of traditions surrounding the Christmas letters we send to family and friends each year.

We have so many, in fact, that I plan to dedicate an entire podcast to that topic, hopefully next week. So we will talk more about it then.

Acts of Service:

Serving together as a family is a great way to keep the spirit of Christmas alive and thriving, whether you are stuffing shoeboxes for Operation Christmas Child, buying gifts for Angel Tree, stocking food pantries, ringing the bell for Salvation Army, or playing instruments or singing carols at a local senior living home.

(That’s all I have time to transcribe right now. You’ll need to listen for the rest.)

The post EP 21: Favorite Family Christmas Traditions first appeared on Loving Life at Home.

The post EP 21: Favorite Family Christmas Traditions appeared first on Loving Life at Home.

EP 20: Home Shows and Show Homes

One of my favorite Christmas traditions is attending holiday home shows, but having a show home oneself is not a pre-requisite to extending hospitality, which is something all believers are called to do.

The topic for this week’s podcast comes from a post I wrote over a decade ago, which you can read in its entirety below today’s show notes.

Show Notes:RELEVANT SCRIPTURES:“Offer hospitality to one another without grumbling.” – 1 Peter 4:9“When God’s people are in need, be ready to help them. Always be eager to practice hospitality.” – Romans 12:13“Do not forget to show hospitality to strangers, for by so doing some people have shown hospitality to angels without knowing it.” – Hebrews 13:2“We ought therefore to show hospitality to such people so that we may work together for the truth.” – 3 John 1:8RELATED LINKS:6 Fun Christmas Countdown Calendars – a few more of our family’s favorite holiday traditions50 Christmas Carols to Sing this Season – more of the songs I love to belt out all year long Home Shows and Show Homes

I once walked into a house I thought was on a holiday tour of homes and wandered through several rooms before realizing in embarrassment that I was at the wrong address. Fortunately, the home owners were hosting a party at the time, so I was was able to slip away quietly without making too much of a scene.

Is this the right place?

The reverse has also happened: Another year I visited a home that really was on the tour, but I had a hard time shaking the feeling that I’d come to the wrong place. It was almost as if the owners weren’t expecting us: “You’re here for the Open House? Tonight? I thought that thing was next week!”

Not that the home wasn’t lovely — it was. But, unlike most of the private residences I’d toured during these holiday fund-raisers, this house had dirty dishes in the sink, newspapers scattered on the floor, and sticky little handprints all over the bathroom mirrors.

In other words, this house looked lived in.

Moreover, the folks who lived in it were still there. They had not been spirited away for the duration of the tour, as was the usual custom. The owners of all those sticky little fingers spent the evening sprawled across three sofas watching television, seemingly oblivious to the steady stream of people parading through their home.

Come on in!

I’m not sure where their mother was that night, but had I spotted her, I would have shaken her hand. Because she did me a huge favor (and possibly many of the other ticket holders, as well): She demonstrated unselfconscious hospitality.

If she were worried about what others might think of her housekeeping, it didn’t show, and it certainly didn’t keep her from opening her home for a good cause.

I used to get really uptight whenever I was expecting company. I’d clean and scrub and polish and organize (and sometimes even sew and paint and landscape) for weeks in advance, snapping at anyone and everyone who got in my way or undid my work.

I was much more of a Martha than a Mary, and I consequently missed out on many opportunities for sweet fellowship, joyful service, and gentle encouragement.

Learning a better way

But over the years, God has changed this attitude. Maybe that home show assured me the world would not come screeching to a halt if I opened my house to guests when it was less than picture-perfect. Maybe adding eight or nine more children to the mix convinced me that having a picture-perfect home is not my highest goal, anyway.

I still love to entertain. Or maybe I should say I love to extend hospitality. And I still love to tackle big projects before I do, racing the clock to see how much I can finish before the big event.

The difference is that now I do it with a smile on my face and a song in my heart — and a lot of helpers, young and old, at my side. And if the guests arrive before we finish loading the dishwasher (or planting the pansies or painting the baseboards), we leave the work for another day, grateful for what we got accomplished, but happy to take a break and fellowship with good friends who, after all, have come to see us, not our house.

The post EP 20: Home Shows and Show Homes first appeared on Loving Life at Home.

The post EP 20: Home Shows and Show Homes appeared first on Loving Life at Home.