It is December! The days are shorter, the nights are colder, and the magic of Christmas is in the air! Usually by December 1 there are Christmas displays in yards, lights shining every night, and gifts being purchased and stashed away under trees. These images usually appear around October 15 in your local shopping center!
One of my favorite parts of Christmas is the cookies. At this time of year the frosting always seems to get a little bit thicker. I have always said "Forget about Santa"...those cookies are mine!
I do have a theory that cookies eaten during the Christmas season do not count in my constant battle with calories. My scale disagrees. My favorite cookies at Christmas are the peanut butter cookies with a Hershey's kiss in the middle. What is your favorite kind of cookie?
One of t
he traditions that I don't really get into is decorating a Christmas tree. I enjoy seeing the finished 
product, I just don't like to help with the decorating. I suppose that puts me into some sort of Grinch category. My wife, however, seems to really enjoy the idea of decorating trees. Her and my daughter put on Santa hats and Christmas music and create a beautiful piece every year. On top of that, my wife can tell you where each decoration came from and when we got it.
Maybe the reason I don't like to decorate trees is that I know they are just going to come down in a couple of days. Like all Christmas decorations they are destined to be boxed up and stored until the next Christmas season.
One thing that should never be boxed up or forgotten is the real meaning of Christmas. Too often I think we get the wrong idea about what Christmas was really like. The songs and decorations make us think that the first Christmas was kind of magical...a whimsical tale where drummer boys and happy animals sat around drinking hot cocoa and adoring the savior of mankind. The truth is that a single mom gave birth to the son of God in a stable. A stable at the time would have been not much more than a dirty, disgusting cave. They put Jesus in a manger, which in reality is a trough for animals to eat out of. The meaning of Christmas is that Christ took everything demeaning, evil, and hateful that this world could throw at him and came out on top. He prepared a way for us to live forever in the presence of our loving heavenly Father. That is something we should remember every day!
