Just hanging out today. Taking it easy with two flu-bitten children. Opened our gifts and relaxing with our family and a number of friends and staff dropped by.
Syd and Zach received tons of stuff. Stuff from grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins out of state, stuff from our staff, gifts from supporters, stuff from families we work with here in Compton. Tonya and I got them each one nice present and some small stocking stuffers.
It's hard to know how to demonstrate to our children our concerns with materialism (especially this time of year) and wanting them to feel love from those around them. We know that especially the people in our community desire to share their love to our children. We don't want to take that joy from them.
But they get so much stuff!
We work hard reminding them that today is Jesus' birthday. We adopted a family that had absolutely nothing from Christmas, no food, no gifts. Tonya delivered one of our Christmas Boxes of Love and a box of gifts for all the family members. They were so touched! It was so fun for us to be able to love Jesus that way. We also spent a lot of time with two children in particular that live across the street from us. Since they are basically homeless, we knew that Christmas wouldn't be much for them. We have had a lot of discussions with Syd and Zach about the meaning of today.
We're also going through everything in the next few days. Everything will go into one of four piles; stuff to keep, stuff to give away, stuff to take to the office (kid's room) and stuff to dump.
I believe they get it... and we don't want to over do it either. We don't want them resenting the idea that their parents are always up in their grill about Jesus' birthday.
Finding that delicate balance, the quest of parenting!?!
But a great day overall.
Thank you Jesus and happy birthday!
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