The true Christmas Story IS exciting enough for my 3 year old

So I am preparing Micah for Christmas again.  Last year I told him so much about Jesus birth, the angels singing glory to God in the highest, peace goodwill to all men!, the wise men, the whole story.  He really liked it and this year his understanding has developed even more.  So I started this year with a Happy Birthday sign left over from my Mum's party.  Then Micah, Lucy and I coloured, a Jesus sign together which together proudly reads "Happy Birthday Jesus".  We walked past a neighbours house who had decorated with the angels blowing trumpets and I told Micah " Look it is the angels singing about Jesus being born!"  Christmas means it is Jesus's birthday!  SO that was all I had gotten to for this year so far.  Then the other day I was impressed and proud when a neighbour asked him if Father Christmas or Santa was coming to his house.  He looked a little confused thought quite hard and looked back at the neighbour and confidently informed her with his big blue eyes "Christmas means Jesus birthday"!  She looked surprised and said why yes it does.  I do not think she is a Christian but she sure knows we are and that Micah knows the real meaning of Christmas.

Micah standing in front of our drawn / collage tree, below our Happy Birthday Jesus sign in his super hero PJ's.  

I decided not to do a real tree as we are still waiting for our 2 boxes to come from America with our special family ornaments in them.  I was also feeling a little homesick for America as a summer Christmas is rather strange to me now.  Although it is so far a pretty cool summer minus a few hot days in Nov, so I am stoked it is not very hot.   So I decided to embrace Australia and stick gum leaves and gum nuts on it.  The kids had a blast with this tree, and Lucy can not pull it on herself.  So this tree is a good fit for our family this year.  Also to help with missing America and to embrace Australia again I put an American flag decorated Hershey bear next to an Aussie flag beanie baby bear.  

We have decided not to do Santa in our family and focus only on the true meaning of Christmas.  It is not that we are against Santa.  Micah knows who Santa is.  But we do not tell him Santa brings him presents.  We tell him we celebrate Jesus birthday by giving presents to each other as God gave Jesus as a gift to us.  It is just that we do not want Santa to be the main focus or take away form the true meaning of Christmas which is the birth of Jesus.   We have told him the story of Saint Nic, who was a man who gave money to the poor and needy to those less fortunate than himself.  A man who was said to have performed miracles and told others about Jesus.  I just read his story again and I got goose bumps, what a man of God!  Who gave in secret so God would get the glory and nobody would know it was him!  Which is exactly how we are supposed to give.  Matthew 6: 3,4 But when you give to the poor, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving will be in secret; and your Father who sees what you have done in secret will reward you.

Jeremy grew up without believing in Santa and was ok with it.  His Dad read the gospel of Luke to him and his 3 siblings on Christmas Eve and they did give each other presents, but no Santa.  It was his idea to not introduce Santa originally and I happily agreed.  I grew up with Santa, but even though I went to church as a little girl the biggest thing about Christmas for me was Santa.  I remember trying not to winge as a little girl, I think I was around 5, when my brother was putting up the Christmas tree as he told me Santa would not bring me any presents.  My whole focus for Christmas was getting presents.  It was all about me and what I would get.  I was also devastated the Christmas Eve my 2 friends told me Santa was not real.  They told me it did not make sense.   I thought about it with them and they were right Santa's existence did not make sense.  So I went to bed that night looking out the window at the moon waiting for Santa's sleigh to ride past hoping they were wrong as now I had no more joy in Christmas.

He really enjoyed 'The very first Christmas' book

SO tonight I really enjoyed reading a book called 'The Very first Christmas' to Micah.  He asked about the animals at the stable and if King Herod would be mean to them too.  I told him that King Herod was only going to be mean to Jesus but it was ok because an angel told the wise men to go a different way home and not tell the King where Jesus was.  I told him King Herod was the villain and that the angel was the hero.  I could see his face light up.  Now I was talking his almost 4 year old language.  He was even more interested in the story from this perspective.   We lay there together on his bed talking about the book.  It was a precious time and I am enjoying his greater understanding in Christmas this year.  I am enjoying how much he is still excited about Christmas without Santa!