Advent Day 1 - 1st Sunday of Advent

I feel like I am not quite as prepared for Advent as I would like to be this year.  We did manage to do some light cleaning and decorating today although not as much as I had hoped.  Here's what we did!

Our Advent Tree

This is a new tradition for us this year.  We put up our Christmas tree and decorated it with purple ornaments in honor of Advent.  I have a set of wooden Jesse Tree ornaments that I made with my Saint peg doll swap group that we will be adding daily to the tree.  I also will be adding an ornament for each major Advent saint.  The plan is to take down the Advent decorations on Christmas Eve and replace with our normal ornaments, which will stay on until Epiphany (or Baptism of the Lord depending on how motivated we are to clean!).

Advent Wreath

We use a magnetic Advent wreath.  It is easier for us and takes less room to store.  I thought about putting together a more complex wreath this year, but this works well and the children enjoy it.  I also love that it explains the meaning of each candle.  

I also bought some cheap candles from the dollar store for our bookcase.  We are using the reflections from Family Feast and Feria when we “light” each new candle on Sundays.

Advent Reflections

We have and LOVE the booklet Welcome Baby Jesus.  It has neat reflections, prayers, and activity ideas for each day of Advent, as well as the 12 days of Christmas.

Advent Service Chain

I am always torn between the various traditions available out there to spread joy and kindness throughout the Advent season.  This year we decided to take the easy route and print off the Advent prayer chain from Catholic Inspired.  We'll simply remove a link each day and add that day's prayer to our intentions.

Advent Fun Calendar

This is the "secular" part of our Advent celebrations.  Every day I pick something festive for us to do - although I tie it in to the liturgical calendar whenever possible!

Nativities

We also put up our Nativity set with an empty crib!

And of course had to set up the kid's version to play with.

How did you get ready for Advent?

Thanks for reading!