Epiphany

Happy New Year to all of you! We welcome 2008 with great joy and excitement for whatever may come.

As I had mentioned before, we were waiting to decorate our tree until Christmas Eve. So, on Monday night, before we went to Mass, we decorated. The kids loved hanging the ornaments on the trees, and even Rebekah had her little hand in it. Granted it was mostly with UNdecorating the tree, but she was still participating.

Ethan really enjoyed seeing all of his ornaments. Being 5 years old, he has received one from us every year of his life. However, he also has some on the tree from his godparents, friends and relatives. He was quite content trying to hang them all in one place. He kept calling it "Ethan's branch". Good thing it's an artificial tree, otherwise it many not have held up under the weight!

Anyhow, we are now at the end of our Christmas celebration as today is the Epiphany of the Lord. We have been able to light our tree and enjoy it's beauty for the past 12 days, and even though I'm sad that we have to take it down, it's nice to be able to do a little winter cleaning.

Ethan is having a hard time with not only putting the tree away, but also with putting the advent wreath away. We've been using it up until last night, but with 4 white candles to help him understand that we've still been celebrating Christmas...that it isn't just one day. (We put away all of the decorations yesterday except for the tree, which will come down today after Mass) I think he enjoyed the lighting and blowing out of the candles more than the meaning behind them, but we hope to continue the tradition to instill in him the true meaning of the season.

"Epiphany Day itself commemorates the arrival of the Magi in Bethlehem to worship the Messiah and bring Him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh (Matthew 2:1-12). Since the earliest days of the church, these wise men have been considered to be representatives of all the peoples of the earth. By means of a miraculous star, God showed them that Jesus was born to be not only the King of the Jews, but the Lord and Savior of all nations." - www.stpaulskingsville.org/epiphany.htm

I have a hard time grasping a lot of the meanings of the season, and am still learning myself. It's been a blessing to have the opportunity to learn more about our Catholicism while homeschooling Ethan. Most children can grasp the unimaginable pretty easily, I think. However, someone with Asperger Syndrome may struggle with the abstract more than others, and instead can deal much better with the literal world. So, Mike and I have been trying to find ways to teach Ethan many abstracts in a literal fashion. It's a challenge to say the least, but it's so rewarding. For example we always say grace before our meal, but during these past 12 days we've been adding a prayer in celebration of Jesus birth. Even though our Advent wreath has been put away, Ethan still shouted out at the end of grace last night, "Rejoice, Jesus is born!"