Advent, St Nicholas’ Day, and Christmas Activities

Seasonal

Feb 8

Advent

Fruit bread for Stir-Up Sunday: This is an easy fruit-cake. Make sure everyone in the house gives it a stir for good luck! You can freeze it until you want it closer to Christmas. I find some children don’t like the candies fruit on top, so we typically leave it off.

https://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/easy-peasy-fruitcake

A Jesse Tree:
A shoot shall come out from the stump of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots

A Jesse Tree is a fun way for kids to prepare for Christmas through the Advent season. The “tree” can be a real, small tree or branch, or a paper tree attached to a wall. Each day there is a short Bible story or passage that relates to someone from Jesus own family tree, and an ornament that goes with it to hang on the tree. The idea is to help children understand the Biblical and historical context of Jesus’ birth.

This website contains everything you need to make a Jesse tree at home, including printable ornaments and the readings that go with them, as well as devotions for both children and teens or adults.

https://www.faithward.org/jesse-tree/

St Nicholas Day

Usually on St Nicholas Day we have all kinds of Sunday school activities, including cookie baking.

The St Nicholas Center has all the recipes for cookies, colouring print outs, craft ideas, and even online activities you could possibly need. They also offer cookie cutters to buy – I have had good lock in the past making St Nicholas cookie cutters from disposable pans available at the dollar store.