Happy New Year! No, I haven’t started celebrating too early and this isn’t a practice run for January 1^st. Yesterday was the First Sunday of Advent and for liturgical churches that’s the beginning of the new liturgical year. Our weekly Gospel readings are ordered on a three-year cycle–Year A, Year B, Year C–each year focusing on a different Evangelist. Year A we hear primarily the gospel according to Matthew, Year B is Mark. We just entered Year C with Luke. John gets his turn throughout each year and during the seasons of Lent, Christmas and Advent. And so here we are in Advent. Again. Already.

Advent arrived ‘early’ this year. Or at least it feels like it with Thanksgiving being so late. The Sunday after Thanksgiving is often the feast of Christ the King, the last Sunday of the liturgical year. Then we have a week of transitioning between then and the First Sunday of Advent. A week when I take one afternoon to de-decorate the house of pumpkins and scarecrows and put everything away, then begin pulling out the snowmen, Santas, and the Holy Family. This year they collided on my dining room table.

We kept busy doing post-Thanksgiving activities over the weekend: supporting local businesses on Friday and Saturday at a local craft show, a gift shop, and of course an independently-owned bookstore. We bought our Christmas tree from a family-owned farm from Western North Carolina. We’d been concerned how or even if they’d survived Helene (notice we don’t even have to identify it with ‘hurricane’ because everyone knows) and were relieved for them when we saw their pop-up forest planted in a bank lot where it’s been for the last several years. (They did lose about 1500 trees, a barn and a couple trucks, and their road and bridge to the farm were washed away. And yet, they had these huge smiles on their faces and were filled with gratitude that none of the family lost their homes and no one was hurt.).

And we attended our community Christmas tree lighting.

Instead of having that one afternoon of erasing one season, in-between going out, returning to drop off packages, heading out, returning to drop off a tree, bundling up for standing in the cold, I’d steal a minute or two and gather Thanksgiving signs, pluck fall foliage, or round up scarecrows. Everything’s cozy in one place, even if that place isn’t in the boxes where it belongs.

I’m lucky to have a main floor guest room closet where I store all the Christmas décor so there’s no trudging up and down attic or basement stairs with boxes of baubles, trinkets, and lights. Spreading Christmas cheer throughout the house will be a gradual event, but it’s started.

The first item I always bring out is my Advent wreath. In my closet of décor, it’s front and center, easily and quickly reached. My kids and I made it years ago during a parish family Advent day so it’s not fancy but it’s perfect. The nativity sets I put out symbolize the blessing of Christmas, but the Advent wreath is the daily visual reminder this is the time to prepare and yet wait for that blessing. To wait can at times be active, and at others restful. I don’t always create space to restfully wait, the wreath is the gentle nudge or tug I need to do that.

The wreath still isn’t set up correctly with all the candles in their proper order (the place where I put it still has the family tree photos from November’s ‘remembering our deceased loved ones’. Like I say, I’m still transitioning between seasons!), but it didn’t have to be perfectly placed to light the first candle and read my Advent meditations last night. Each year the books I choose back in October seem to perfectly fit by the time Advent begins in December.

Considering the state of my dining room table and my living room floor, The Mess in the Messiah from the United Church of Christ seems appropriate. My sister Trudy shared this one. Yesterday’s meditation wasn’t about the messy state of one’s home, but the messiness we find our world in at the moment. The scripture passage from Amos and its promise of things being shaken up are still true; Jesus didn’t come to bring peace but a sword. Flipping through the booklet I notice reflections on our personal messiness and inner turmoil, and also the messiness of our homes as we fill our days with activity–not just during this season but all year long–and chores that don’t always get finished. And like the readings from St. Luke, there’s a social justice theme in these daily meditations. The Messiah is in all that mess.

Waiting in Joyful Hope follows the daily liturgical readings. Each day the author connects the scripture passage with a typical life situation–playing with one’s children, receiving a college acceptance letter, enjoying winter’s first snowfall, comparing the fear of today’s school shootings with the biblical slaughter of the innocents. These reflections are grounding, a reminder the Bible continues to hold insights, lessons, and the four pillars of Advent–Hope, Peace, Joy and Love.

Which brings me to the final book I have for Advent, Anne Lamott’s, Somehow: Thoughts on Love. This isn’t a book specifically for Advent but a book of 10 essays on love by one of my favorite writers. Somehow was my Rowdy Readers book for last month, but I didn’t get it read. I think it was meant for me to rest and read them during this time of waiting and preparation. Love being an anchor in my mess and daily-ness of life.

How is your transition between Thanksgiving and Christmas going? Do you read special Advent meditations–if so, do share!

You may have noticed my use of the word ‘perfect’ throughout this post. It wasn’t intentional, but it turns out to be ‘perfect’. I plan to have my home decorated, cookies and gingerbread houses baked, presents made or bought by December 21st. But I’m also selected to be in the jury pool the week our family arrives from Ohio for our family Christmas … we’ll see what all gets done. Perfection will be in the love and desire of being around family and friends–as it always is.

I hope you have a wonderful week and I’ll be back at my window on Monday! Now to put the fall stuff away …