Different doesn't always mean bad =)

This was a very different Christmas. A good different, but still a little challenging. I have never been away from home on Christmas. I have never been without my big sis on Christmas. I have never went to bed without the excitement of waking up to gifts underneath the tree and knowing the day will be full of festivities.

I experienced all of that not happening this year.

And it was probably the best thing for me. As I laid in bed on Christmas Eve I thought about how much we change and our lives change. I realized that sometimes were going to be away for the holidays (Who knows where each of us will be just 5 years from now-Rachel is already a few states away), sometimes the people we most love are not going to be with us on every special occasion or holiday (especially as we get older), and sometimes a present does not come in the form of a perfectly wrapped gold box with a big red bow. Although I "went without" those things, I still had a lot of my family and made memories for a lifetime up in the mountains of Colorado. God really spoke to my heart that night. My family has always set the focus of Christmas to Jesus. We wouldn't have it if He did not come into this world. So what is the point of celebrating if we don't truly remember why it is such an important date? There isn't one. We still do gifts and in the recent years that has been a little different. Last year I explained what we get and why. It is still gifts we like but they have meaning in one way or another. =)

So even though we had a different Christmas the meaning stays the same and after a little struggling I was able to embrace that.