Celebrating Advent: Family Devotions and Activities for the Christmas Season

by Ann Hibbard

From Google Help focus your family on what really matters at Christmastime.

If you ask kids what Christmas is about, you'll get a variety of answers. Presents, decorating, presents, Santa Claus, presents, carols . . . presents. Few will say anything about Christ. How would your kids answer that question?

In a culture obsessed with material things, it can be difficult to help our kids understand and celebrate the true meaning of the Christmas season. In "Celebrating Advent," author Ann Hibbard has created a way for parents to set aside a daily time during Advent to talk with their kids about the spiritual meaning of the season.

Learn practical steps you can take to make Christmas a more meaningful, happy experience for your family. Inspiring and creative family devotions provide a moment of peace and reflection for each evening of Advent, while fun and inexpensive project ideas help you focus your kids' attention on what really matters at Christ.

Genres: Christmas, Christian Living

192 pages, Kindle Edition

First published October 1, 2011

Reviews

[Janelle]

This looks like a wonderful book for families with young children. However, as my kids are now grown, I didn't feel motivated to finish reading it myself.

[Eric · Rating 3 out of 5]

Well, that was a quick read. I don't think I fully understood what I was checking out on my Overdrive app. As expected, the book contains some basic tips for planning out your holiday season, in an attempt to enjoy it more and hate it less. The advice is nothing earth-shatteringly original: prioritize, don't plan too much, and so on. Perfectly nice.

The rest of the book are templates for activities and DIY crafts, and a daily devotional for each day in December up to Christmas. I didn't read this stuff because I'm not going to do the crafts, and the devotionals are intended to be read in December, on a daily basis, and not in a few days in November before Thanksgiving.

I may check this back out, if it's available, come December 1 to try out the devotionals. They looked interesting.

[Go2therock · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was an excellent Advent devotional, suitable for solo reading as I did this past Christmas, as well as for a family. Each day's devotion included a topical heading, a conversational reflection, a scripture reading, discussion prompts and questions, final thoughts of summary, a prayer, a snippet of song (generally a stanza from ones that we are all familiar with), directions for which ornament to place on the Jesse tree, and lastly a bit of further study for adults who want to go a little deeper. This is probably the most user-friendly advent of real substance I have come across. I'll be returning to it next year.

[Julie Barrett · Rating 4 out of 5]

Celebrating Advent: Family Devotions and Activities for the Christmas Season by Ann Hibbard
Story starts out with a frazzled mother of toddlers who are down for a nap and she's just finishing the wrapping of the gifts and it's so much work!
The holidays are so commercialized now that the meaning is lost in the season.
The idea is to spend family time along with the holiday and everybody can participate. Family traditions over the years can be renewed.
A plan and how much you expect to spend are crucial. The advent tree is one of our favorite where you put an ornament on the tree each day til Christmas.
Scripture readings are also included along with instructions on how to make things, music for the season, etc.
Includes sheet music for the Christmas carols and many ideas and templates.
This book covers a lot more than I ever thought it would.

[Misty · Rating 4 out of 5]

Want to make Christmas something special?

This book has a lot of wonderful ideas for celebrating Advent and making the Christmas season fun and meaningful for your family. It will help bring your hearts and minds back to the true reason we celebrate Christmas.