Christmas Magic

I love Christmas. 
But no matter how much I love it, anticipate it and idealize it, it always stresses me out . . . a little more every year.
Everything that I have to do, everything that I need to be and every need that I have to meet is all accentuated at Christmas.

Every year its a little bit more overwhelming. 

There's all the decorating and the organizing and the cookie-baking and the grocery shopping and the menu planning and the gift-thinking-up and the gift buying and the budget balancing and the detail-perfecting so that on Christmas your loved ones and family can be happy, can eat yummy food, can receive gifts that will make them feel special, and experience the physical warmth and celebration that is Christmas. 

Then, weighing perhaps even more heavily on one's shoulders, is the job of making sure that the true meaning of Advent is conveyed to your children, and the meaning of Christmas, of providing spiritual helps and enrichments in both seasons that nourish and delight your children and husband's souls and help them to know Jesus a little better, of choosing traditions to bless and aid your family.  As a mother, you are the bearer of the torch of the domestic church.  You are the provider of an environment that echoes the eternal truths of our faith. 

That is alot of work sometimes.

Especially when your baby is not sleeping well and so neither are you, when  the money is tight and so is the time, when something you look forward to and try to make lovely and "Christmas-y", such as picking out a Christmas tree as a family,  turns into a mess involving freezing temperatures, a policeman pulling you over, a selection of trees so tightly bound you have to go fish a knife from your car to cut them open, and then shrug and guess if it'll look nice, a red-fingered baby who screams from the cold but won't keep her mittens on, a  2 yr old flopping on the floor and  using a cart as a climbing apparatus, a 4 year old who cries when the tree she picked is rejected, a dinner that is late and short tempers all around.

Sometimes the "magic" of Christmas that seems like your job to facilitate is just not there.  Sometimes the wonder of the whole season feels lost in mundane things like to-do lists and unbalanced checkbooks and dustpans full of flour and broken manger scene figures.

But then, if you ask Him (or even if you don't, because He just loves you that much), God will give you a moment of grace.  One moment your kids are fighting over the Mary and Joseph figures and the baby is throwing a tantrum because she wants to nurse (again!), the floor is covered in needles and artificial moss, and the next, Breath of Heaven is playing in the background, the baby is nursing quietly in your arms, the smell of the Christmas tree is filling the room, the children are repeating the nativity story to themselves while working peacefully and happily with the figures, snow is falling outside the window and all is peaceful.  Your eyes are surprised by sudden tears and your heart with sudden love.  And Christmas is what it is without you doing anything.  The joy of a Baby is there whether or not you are able to find it.  And then you remember that the magic of Christmas is not brought into your home by you, but by Him.    He, and not you, will make it a good Christmas for your family. 

Christmas is about how much He loves you.  And if you let Him, He will show you the magic too. 

Yes, even you.

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ETA:  I found this article You Cannot Steal My Joy not long after I posted the above thoughts.  I found it spoke to some of what I have been experiencing.