We Three Kings

Matthew 2:1-12

Having celebrated Advent so thoroughly, we now enjoy the "coming" we anticipated for so long. Christmas is its own season in our home, beginning with our family, really, on Christmas Eve and continuing until about a week after the traditional Epiphany date of January 6. We keep up our tree, now fully decorated. We get together with family and friends. We listen to Christmas music and sing it during our family prayer time. But what really sets apart this time in our children's memories is the journey of the 3 kings around our house, arriving at the nativity set on January 6. (The following week isn't quite the same "Christmas" celebration, but since it took the kings so long to arrive we hate to take down the nativity and send them home without even a night's rest. And since it took a full month to decorate the house, it takes a few days to undecorate it...)
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In our home, we've printed a few copies of the song "We Three Kings" (neither my husband nor I would remember all the words otherwise--although our children might!). Three of us hold the three wise men and we sing a verse (more if we have time) as we traipse to whatever room the figures are in that day and carry them to the next room. If we don't happen to be home on a particular day, the kings get to rest an extra night wherever they happen to be. Our children would never let us forget such an important tradition now. Such activities are so simple and take only a couple minutes to prepare for, yet they are the memories that stick with the children from a very early age and remain for the rest of their lives.
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Linked with Simple Lives Thursday