A Christmas Season Away From Home - Changes into Blessings

There's just something about Christmas that I love. Whether it's the chillier weather or drinking hot cocoa (with marshmallows, of course), Christmas parties with ugly sweaters and cute holiday dresses, watching ridiculously cheesy hallmark Christmas movies as well as all the other "staples," or being able to open that playlist entitled "Christmas music" without getting awkward evil glares from the person in the car across from you at the stoplight (what...that hasn't happened to me...), it's just a great time of the year.

For me, however, this year was truly the first without being near my family. 5 months without them has been rather difficult, and this time of year was no exception. Before I moved out here, I cried, night upon night, knowing that this season would be the first without the people I love so dearly. I was lucky enough to snatch up low-priced airfare for Christmas Eve day, but that's so many family traditions I missed during this season.

Blasting Christmas music and decorating the tree, bringing out the ornaments that hold so much meaning and laughing but secretly loving all the "ugly" ornaments I made as a child. Watching "White Christmas" with the family and internally slightly glad that my dad cries when they march out at the end. Baking up a storm with the family...though secretly, I just liked to eat the fudge and andes mints.
And snow. And no, (believe it or not) the midwest doesn't get snow EVERY year. As a matter of a fact, it was 50 last Christmas. But this year there was snow I was missing. The white that falls from the sky, the way it hushes and quiets the land. There's a peace and a gentleness that comes with the snow. 

Dad putting up the Star on the Christmas Tree.
I was able to Skype into the celebrations and watch as they decorated.

I missed a lot this year. 

But through it all, something else shined through. It was something that was always there, but because I've been so focused on holding onto traditions and enjoying the simple things I love, I think in years past I've taken my gaze off of the meaning of Christmas: the birth of Jesus Christ.

Have you ever been in a hospital to meet a brand new baby? Or even just held one in your arms? I'm sure most of you have. Can you remember what that feels like? To have your gaze completely glued to their unbelievably tiny toes and fingers, bopping their little noses with your finger and cooing at them? My gaze has been fixed on Christ this Christmastime like no other.

And this advent season, I have been reminded of that time and time again. I have been reminded that even though there is no snow here, that my family is elsewhere, that I'm missing so many of my traditions...God doesn't change. He is still the same God.  "He is my rock, my fortress, and I will never be shaken." (Psalm 62:2) 

And the entire reason for Christmas doesn't change. No matter where I go, what I do, that doesn't change the fact that it is HISTORY, FACT, that Jesus was born in a little town named Bethlehem some 2000+ years ago just to save the world. 

(Luke 2 is a great place to read this amazing piece of History, by the way.)

I am grateful for this Christmas away from home. Not in a way where I'm grateful to be away from people I love and things I love to do...but in a way I'm grateful God stripped away the things that aren't as important in my life as the Reason for the Season: Jesus.

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The sun is shining, the grass is green. Huh? It's December?

tree tops glisten and children listen to hear sleighbells in the snow

As I'm...oh, I don't know, like too many days behind my Christmas song posting...I figured I'd start back up again with one I guarantee you'll know and love.
Now enter the beautiful crooning of Bing Crosby singing: "I'm dreaming of a White Christmas...."
What a beautiful and glorious holiday song. It is the most covered/recorded Holiday song.
And as Christmas looms closer and closer, we all wish to be "home." This song isn't about anything but simply the longing for traditions, familiarity, a childhood fantasy of the Christmases we were used to before life took us away to a grown-up world.

What most people don't know is the original lyrics to White Christmas included a verse that preceded the main choruses. Irving Berlin, the composer and creator of this Christmas Classic, was away from his family in New York at this time, and simply wishing to be with them instead of Hollywood where he was working on a project. He sat down to his piano, and in the only key he knew how to play in (F# for those musically inclined,) and plucked out the following tune:
"The sun is shining, the grass is green,
The orange and palm trees sway.
There's never been such a day
in Beverly Hills, L.A.
But it's December the twenty-fourth,—
And I am longing to be up North."

Since my recent move to Southern California (I'm just a short drive from Beverly Hills), this verse makes all the difference to me this year. What a testament. Though we've had cooler temperatures than the infamous "July Fry," it still mostly feels like a warm fall day.

The song then goes into the famous chorus.
"I'm dreaming of a white christmas. Just like the ones I used to know. Where the tree tops glisten, and children listen to hear sleighbells in the snow. I'm dreaming of a White Christmas with every Christmas card I write. May your days be merry and bright...and may all your Christmases be white."

If you don't mind, I'm going to indulge myself in a tad bit of storytelling here.

When I was a young girl, I grew up in a small town in Minnesota. I could hardly recall a Christmas without snow. Every year during the Christmas season, my town would host a weekend Christmas celebration. And on that Saturday, they would open up the local community center as a "kids shopping" day. Tables were filled with knick-nacks and tokens as kids would buy their gifts for their family members. And on that day the town also hired a local horesman to hook up a wagon filled with hay behind a couple of his horses. And for that day, all day long, he would drive that wagon around town. Children would race and hop on the back for a ride, and he would drop them off at the community center for their shopping. The ground would be white with mounds of snow, the children would be all bundled up in their winter coats, snowpants, boots, hats, mittens and scarves, and the sleighbells would jingle from the horses necks and around the wagon.

Looking back I realize how blessed I am to have had those memories. Those beautiful white Christmas memories. Where the treetops really did glisten and glitter from the snow's reflection in the sun or the streetlamps. And where children listened to the sleighbells jingle from the horses as it drove by, signaling their time to run out and hop on the wagon.

I may not write Christmas cards, but currently I'm writing this. And I truly do wish that your Christmases be merry and bright...and that your Christmases be white. Because there's just nothing like a White Christmas.

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