During Advent, we were blessed with a visit from my brother. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to spend a lot of time with him due to high fevers and coughs, but he did visit for a little bit. He thoughtfully brought the children little bags filled with chocolate and a box of chocolate for me from Rohr. The bags and box of chocolate were reminiscent of the chocolates that my grandparents used to send us each year for Christmas. I was happy to see how much the children appreciated them and hear more than one of them say, “These are the best chocolates that I have ever tasted.” I think that Rohr probably makes the best chocolates in the world.

On the feast of St. Lucia, our oldest son set up our nativity scene and hung up our Christmas lights with a little bit of help from his younger brothers and sisters.

Our outdoor decorations are still lighting up the night sky. Thankfully, our next door neighbor’s lights are doing the same.

During the last week of Advent, my children made and decorated Christmas cookies for friends and neighbors.

We made gingerbread cookies, sugar cookies (adding peppermint extract to our recipe instead of almond extract), snowball cookies (a.k.a. Italian wedding cookies, Mexican wedding cookies and Russian tea cakes), peppermint shortbread, our favorite peanut butter fudge, and a couple of other cookie recipes. The cookies were all placed in Christmas treat boxes and delivered by my husband and/or children.

Kieran decided that the Little People Nativity figures could use a little decorating too.

Kilian learned that there are interesting things to play with in the kitchen cupboards. Kitchen clean up became a little bit harder thanks to him, but I wouldn’t have it any other way. Oh, I love my children!

Hopefully, I will be able to share a few Christmas memories soon.