Lily Grace's ADVENT-ure...O Little Town of Bethlehem

Good Morning EVENING! all my friends out there!! I hope you are having a wonderful "ADVENT-ure" during this Advent season as we are getting ready for Christmas!!

(We started writing this post this morning, but Mommie was busy and had to wait until tonight to finish. She went to a UMW Christmas Luncheon and didn't take me! I guess she'll tell you all about it later in another post!)

I've had quite the "advent-ure" this week, as maybe you already saw on my Mommie's post the other day when they set up the village and the train under the Christmas tree, and I got to drive the choo-choo train around the track!!  That was quite exciting! I've never seen a choo-choo train before, let alone be able to "drive" the train...well, I moved the switch on and off so the train could run around the track!  Our family had so much fun setting up the little village and the train, and now I get to play with it every day!

I love to be the "engineer" and make the train go around the village, stopping to let people get on and off the train in the different places around the village.

There's the depot where people get their tickets and get on the train.

And there's a little park next to it, with a skating pond and I see Santa and a Snowman too!

There's the Village Church and the house next door is the "Parsonage", where the Pastor and his family live. Someone is shoveling the snow! I see a little house up on the hill behind the church, and there is a kid making a snowman in the yard. I wish I could do that too.

Oh, here's the hospital, where people go if they are sick or hurt. I hope I don't ever have to go there.

And around the bend there is a farm, with cows and pigs and horses...oh, and I see another little church over there, and there is a house beside the barn, where I guess the farmer and his family live. Up on the hill is a little log cabin. I wish could go visit there too!

I love the pretty red barn and wish I could go inside and play with the little calves and baby lambs and other animals.

I just love this whole little town, don't you?  I asked Mommie why do we put a village under the Christmas tree anyway? 

Mommie said she doesn't really know how that idea started originally, but she thinks it kind of has something to do with us thinking about the Little Town of Bethlehem, where Jesus was born on Christmas day.

Oh, here's another one of those special Christmas Carols that tells us about that Little Town of Bethlehem!

Mommie said some people have asked about these little caroling books, so she wanted you to know where they came from. These all belonged to Mommie's parents, and they kept them in the bench of their electric organ that was in their house, and their family would sing from them at Christmas time. When my Mommie's parents died, my big brother Scotty wanted that organ to keep for his own, because he remembers playing it when he was a little boy at their house and he still loves to play it. So he got the organ and he keeps it in his bedroom at our house. He loves to play it and says it is good "therapy". He mostly makes up songs, but some of them are really pretty, and some them, well, only Scotty could love them Mommie says. But anyway, these books were still in the bench and so we keep them there and use them at Christmas time still. She said some of the them are really really old, or "vintage", whatever that means! She said most of you would understand what "vintage" means, because she said most of her friends are all kind of "vintage" too, like she is!  

But back to the Little Town of Bethlehem.  Mommie said it probably wasn't as modern as our little village, but it might have had a kind of church called a Synagogue, or a Temple. 

And they did have a kind of a motel, called an "Inn", but for the weary travelers, Joseph and Mary, there was no room in the inn.  

So the innkeeper told them they could stay out in his "barn",  also called a "Manger", where the animals stayed. (I wonder if it was as nice as our little red barn in our little village?)

I also wondered why didn't they go to the hospital since Mary was going to have a baby? Mommie said they probably didn't have a hospital like our little village. Only the Inn.

Our little village has a little manger scene that shows Joseph and Mary and the shepherds and sheep, and oh! I think those are the Wise Men, bowing down to worship the Baby Jesus, who was born in the manger. Mommie says that really the Wise Men didn't get there quite that soon...they were riding on their camels for a long time,  maybe two years from the time they saw the big star shining in the east that led them directly to Bethlehem. But by then the young boy Jesus was living in a little house in town in Bethlehem with his parents.  Maybe it was that little house up on the hill? 

But that's a later story. For now, Mommie says at Christmas we find the Baby Jesus, lying in a manger with the cattle and the sheep and the donkey his Mother Mary had to ride on all the way to Bethlehem. But He was warm and cozy in the little manger, all wrapped up in swaddling clothes and surrounded by nice warm, clean hay.

Here's another special Christmas Carol about the Baby Jesus, "Away In A Manger".

Mommie says that's one of her favorite  songs, and that she used to sing it to her babies when they were little and they loved to hear it when she sang it to them.  She said it brings back sweet memories.

Mommie showed me this very special manger scene in our Christmas tree. She said it is a replica (copy) of one just like her mommy and daddy had in their Christmas tree all the years she was growing up. She found this one just like it on a place called eBay, and she bought it because it reminded her of the one her parents had.  So it's very special.  I love it too.

Do you have any special Christmas ornaments or manger scenes that you love? Mommie says we have a lot more Manger Scenes,  also called "Nativity Scenes", but she will save them for another time to show you.

I hope you enjoyed this little visit to the "Little Town of Bethlehem" . Maybe we should name our little village Bethlehem. That would make it extra special, don't you think? 

This story gives me some things to think about...how about you?

"O holy Child of Bethlehem,

descend to us we pray.

Cast out our sin, and enter in,

Be born in us today.

We hear the Christmas angels,

the great glad tidings tell,

O come to us, abide with us,

Our Lord Emmanuel."

Amen.