Advent and traditions

A couple of years ago I read Noel Pipers book, "Treasuring God in our Traditions". If you havent read it, I heartily recommend it. It has helped us to think through why traditions are important, and how to make them meaningful.
"How much more of God there is to find when we are on the lookout, when we shape our 'everyday' and 'especially' around him. God will show himself in special and new ways when we celebrate him. He will use our celebrations, our traditions, to stoke our heart's fire for him."
Noel Piper

I was thinking back to our first Christmas season together as a married couple. We talked about the traditions we wanted to carry on with our children, and those we wanted to create together. Our small group in Grand Rapids gave us a small wooden nativity set, made from cedar trees from the holy land. We had a small Charlie Brown Christmas tree, and only the few ornaments from AJ's childhood given to me by his mother.
We decided we wanted our kids to wake up Christmas morning in their own beds.
We wanted Christmas to be simple, and didnt care to make a big deal about Santa.
We planned to celebrate the beautiful season of waiting called Advent.
We hoped that Christ would be the center of all those plans....

Since then we've collected quite a few decorations. We have a second nativity set, a plastic Little People version. We've had big beautiful trees, and sometimes small table top varieties. Early on I picked up an advent wreath at the Goodwill which is still our table centerpiece during December. I made the kids stockings, and though the kids are intrigued by Santa, they know the real star of Christmas is the one who was "born in a barn."

This year we added a new tradition to our Advent celebration. Check it out here:
Jesse Tree Journey

Some of the readings are a bit too long for young kids, but they are easy to modify or scale down. Its a really beautiful devotional. Next year we'll get the ornaments laminated and add them to the small tree, The Jesse Tree.

Again this year we made a paper chain with verses on the back of each link. Starting with the first day of December, the verses tell the simply story of Christ's coming. The kids love to take one off at breakfast....and see the wait is getting shorter each day. A sense of hope and expectation for the promise is nurtured.

Im sure every year we'll think of new ways to make our traditions more meaningful. Its fun to learn from the wise parents who have gone before us, to see how other families celebrate, and to watch our kids start to grasp what is truly important. We're still trying to figure out how best to navigate the gift-giving part so that material possessions become less and Christ becomes more. So hard in our culture of more more MORE!

Ideas anyone?