Meant Green: Christmas for two

Cody and I celebrated with just the two of us this holiday. It was incredibly peaceful, but just a little lonely since we're used to being with family this time of year. I've always wanted my holidays to be crowded-and-fun-filled, though I've been known to creep away with a book on the third day of it or so. I'm never sure when my introvert or extrovert side will make an appearance! We used our time together to make lots of gifts, finish writing thank you notes and ship our first-ever Christmas cards :)

We embraced this chance to think of the coming of the savior of the world with more mindfulness than I feel I've done in the past. The church we go to here is a contemporary service, and we began Christmas week with a very awesome reading of the Christmas Story with song breaks in between each - it's one of our favorite ways worship services are sometimes done. It certainly got us in the spirit of what it means to have God himself come down and become human.

On a side note, we're currently reading through Sarah Young's Jesus Calling devotional right now, and it's a simple way to connect with the word of God for a little while every day, and just get you in a mindset of peace - something I constantly need. Young writes in the voice of Jesus speaking to her and adds scripture reading to supplement. Something she penned about Jesus' birth spoke to me from an angle I'd never thought of before. She writes:

"I set aside My Glory, so that I could identify with mankind. I accepted the limitations of infancy under the most appalling conditions - a filthy stable. That was a dark night for Me, even though angels lit up the sky proclaiming "GLORY!" to awe-struck shepards.
When you sit quietly with me, the process I went through is reversed in your experience. As you identify with Me, heaven's vistas open up before you-granting you glimpses of My Glory.
I became poor so that you might be rich."

I became poor so that you might be rich. That stuck with me through Christmas this year. We had a beautiful Christmas day full of presents sent from family that we opened in the light of our tree and spent the day around a backyard fire with a glass of tasty Christmas cocktail we made up.

We hope yours was beautiful too and that you found new meaning in this incredible holiday. We're off to central PA this morning to visit great friends for New Years :)

See you in 2015! Here are a few pics of our Christmas week.

Cards for the gift boxes on how-to with the simple syrup and homemade moisturizer :)

Making Spruce simple syrup from our tree to send home for Christmas gifts.

Finished product!

Lemon + Lavender moisturizer samples - I'll share this recipe soon too.

Pumpkin bread for neighbor gifts using Cody's mom's recipe.

Ordered our Xmas cards from paper culture, they plant a tree for every order and have quite a few eco-options (besides just sending an e-card I guess), and I got this adorable seed pack, too bad I can't plant in the dead of winter.

Meeting Ariel from the Little Mermaid!!! She was the star at one of Cody's Christmas concerts. Felt my adult life come full circle watching her sing the timeless, "Part of Your World"