CHRISTMAS JOURNAlLING

If you are seeking something fun and yet educational for this holiday season, below you will find a few ideas on how to start, organize and fill a Journal
-A CHRISTMAS JOURNAL!!

If you haven't made Journals before - they are easy and fun!  There are many ways to Journal and many things to Journal about!  For our purposes for Christmas Journalling - you need the following materials:

A 1 or 1 1/2 " Vinyl 3 ring notebook - found at Walmart or other department stores
One or more packages of Clear Top Loading Page Protectors  for 3 ring Binders
    (these can be found at BJs, Office Supplies stores and some department stores)
Colored pencils, crayons, markers, paints etc
Notebook paper and sketch paper
Construction Paper, Colored Archival Safe paper for scrapbooking photos (optional)
Glue Sticks, doublestick tape, etc
 

I don't know what it is about the Christmas Season, but there is just so much to stuff into each day - that homeschooling HAS to take a backseat.  But with these Journaling ideas - you can take advantages of the richness of the Season and also produce something meaningful and beautiful too.

So what do you do with your Journal - well, that's entirely up to you.  I will give you tons of ideas but . . . basically you pick and choose - or go with your own ideas.  Also at the end of the page there will be links to two great online Christmas Units that you could do in conjunction with these ideas or alone.    Whatever, the Christmas Season holds so much to enjoy not only now - but in the future . . . and that is why I love Journals - they live on - a reflection of not only what was learned but what was loved!!

HERE'S SOME JOURNALING IDEAS TO GET YOU GOING:
for each idea below - slide the finished page or pages into the Clear Page Protector mentioned above and add to your Vinyl notebook.  Try without distressing your child, to have them do their best work.  This will become a very special memory album.

1. Take pictures of family get together or visits from friends and family,  - Make a scrapbook page of a collage of these pictures along with your child's handwritten (or typed, narrated etc) account of the occasion's) - these pages can be decorated with their own drawings or Christmas Stickers.

2.  Write out the First Advent Story from the Bible and draw the scene.  Optional ideas - would be to either dictate part of the verses to your child to write out or to write their own version of it.

3.  Will your church be having any special things to attend - (caroling, Christmas plays or programs, special sermons, parties, food collecting and distribution, etc).  These can be wonderful springboards for Journal pages!

4.  Have you ever helped in a Rescue Mission or other Church supported program for those less fortunate?  It might give your children a good opportunity to put 'christmas' in it's proper setting.  They could help for a few hours and then journal about their experience.  This is always an eye opener.

5.  Write a Thank you letter to Jesus for what He has done for you.  What are the things that stand out in your mind that His Life has meant to you personally.

6.  Read Christmas Stories - and have your child narrate the stories back to you.  If you have never narrated before - it's basically just letting your child "tell you back" the stories you have read to them.  Or your child can write their own synopsis of the book and decorate the page with a border of their own art or rubber stamping or stickers.  Some good stories that our family has come to really love can be found in the  Christmas in my heart Series .

8.  Find a Missionary Family (maybe one that Homeschools) and write them a letter - send them a Homemade Christmas Card and maybe a gift (they can always use good reading materials and money).  Mission Families really need to be remembered.  Make a Xerox copy of the letter to place in your Journal.

9.  Make your own Christmas Cards (if you have time) and put one in your journal.

10. Make a short list of people to pray for during the holiday season and ask God to help you find some way if possible to touch their lives!  - Place this list in your journal.  If there are immediate answers to prayer, record these with your prayer list.  This makes me think of a family (that I do not personally know) who homeschool in our area.  The mother and daughter were in a car accident in early fall.  The daughter died.  Families like this need massive prayer - the holidays for them will be hard with the loss of a child.  Families like this also need "the touch" of God in human form from us - as we reach out to them with letters, cards, visits, etc.  Reaching out to families with loss will also help us put Christmas back in focus - and help us to realize deeper how God reached out to us in sending Jesus!!

11.  Make a list of people to send a short note in a Christmas Card too.  People you wouldn't normally think of - (the  pastor or an older pastor that no longer lives in your area; elderly people in nursing homes, the librarian, the postman, a quiet neighbor, a relative that you haven't seen in years, really anyone - a story that may help you do this is "Special Delivery" by Margaret Sangster and it is found in Volume 8 of Christmas in my Heart.
 

12.  Find your favorite Christmas Song - sing it as a family or listen to it and then either write the words or some background behind the song.  Why does this song mean so much to you?

13.  Make a menu for your Christmas Dinner - Write it out in Fancy Writing and then decorate the page with sticker or artwork.  Another idea is to write out the recipes that you are using.  It might also be fun to write out recipes to other fun things you make as a family (cookies, pies, ornaments etc).

14.  If you have a very creative child that enjoys writing, have them write their Christmas story - this can be something that really happened or something they heard about.

15.  For each Christmas Card you receive (or as many as you choose to do) put the card in your notebook with a prayer for that person/family that sent it.  If they sent a picture - put that on your page too.

16.  Find a nice Christmas poem that your family likes and have your child write it out.  Your Child could also compose their own poetry.

17.  If you go away during the season for a family get together - take pictures!!  Have your child journal something special about the pictures and what they enjoyed on their visit(s).

18.  Visit or write to Grandma or Grandpa and ask them to share with you something that is very special to them about Christmas - maybe it is something that happened to them or something they did - a special Christmas memory.  It might also be something special Christmas means to them.  If you don't have a Grandma/Grandpa that can do this - is there an aunt or an older member in your church who would?

19.  Have your child write each family member's name on a piece of paper and after their name write something they are thankful for in that person.  Your child could also write a short prayer for each member.

20.  Make a newspaper article - make it look like a newspaper article too - on the announcement of the birth of Christ.  The child can do it from a particular perspective (the shepherds, the angels, the wisemen etc) or from a news reporter perspective stating the events that "have" just transpired.  The nice thing is that the child can write this without having to be "politically correct" and leaving out Christ.

21.  Whatever activities your child is doing this season . . . capitalize on them.  Take pictures, ask them what they thought or liked.  If they can't write - write for them.   If you make a gingerbread house or are trimming the tree - take pictures!  If you make your own nativity scene take pictures of the project during and after.  If on a drive you find some spectacular lights, scenes etc that just are special - take pictures!!  If you go some place special - out to eat, to a Christmas program - basically whatever - use it!!

22.  ENJOY THIS SEASON!!  Savor moments reading special Christmas stories, making bread for giving, making pies, sipping tea, cuddling together talking, taking drives to see "Christmas light displays", going to church programs etc.  Don't feel you have to do all or any of these ideas.  Just enjoy each other and the fact that Jesus did come to die for us!  He gave all . . . and He longs for us to die to self and give all too!!!  May this season bless you as you draw just a bit closer to Jesus!!

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