November/December 2011

Hope Fellowship Church

KIDS CHURCH
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Joining Generations Through Christmas Traditions

Its that time of year again when the commercials and television specials portray families sitting around warm fires, enjoying one anothers company as the children gently play with their new wooden puzzle. It is at this point most parents turn off the TV and secretly wonder if its possible to actually relax and enjoy the holidays before the kids have grown up and left to go to college. As a parent of young children one of the most important things you can do to enjoy some seasonal cheer as a family is to establish family traditions. While traditions may not create that perfect Hallmark story, they are the common denominator that brings families of all ages closer together. "Children love rituals," says Martin V. Cohen, Ph.D., associate director of the Marital and Family Therapy Clinic at New York Hospital-Cornell Medical Center. "Children find a certain security and solace in something that gives a sense of belonging and comfort. Christmas traditions remind families to stop the busy cycle of life long enough to reconnect and build bonds. Families can become so busy with gymnastics, piano, little league, and even church activities that little room is left over to enjoy one another.

Ask God:
1. To show you ways to slow down this holiday season and to enjoy time with your family. 2. To instill in your child the love for family and traditions. 3. To help you continue or create traditions in your family that will pass Him on to each generation. 4. To be the main focus of your Christmas this year.

Christmas traditions are also a great way to pass down family values to children, who will in turn, pass them on to their children. When used properly, traditions are a great way to pass down stories of faith and customs through the generations. Perhaps the most important purpose of Christmas traditions is to remind the family of Jesus the real meaning of Christmas. The nativity set placed on the coffee table is a reminder that God came as a man in the flesh to take away the sins of the world. Likewise the songs of carolers help the family recall the angels rejoicing at the good news of the Saviors birth. As your family celebrates the holidays with your personal traditions, be sure to talk to your children about the specifics of your family traditions. Then as they grow older, you can provide more details about how your family traditions got started and why theyre important. These details will help your children understand the traditions so they can carry them on when they are adults or adapt them to their own lives as they get older. Traditions provide each generation with links to the past.

Healthy Parenting
Here are a few examples of traditions that may work for you: * Prepare special foods that honor your familys ethnic, religious, or cultural heritage while having an older relative share Christmas memories. * Spend an evening watching classic Christmas movies. Add some hot chocolate and snuggling on the couch. * Volunteer as a family for a charitable cause such as serving at a soup kitchen or visiting residents in a nursing home. * Attend worship services as a family. * Create a peppermint candy sharing tree. Hang miniature canes and small notes bearing messages of hope and joy for the season on a miniature Christmas tree. * Set aside a special baking day leading up to the winter holidays. Listen to holiday music while you bake.

God also said to Moses, Say to the Israelites, 'The LORD, the God of your fathers; the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you.' This is my name forever, the name by which I am to be remembered from generation to generation. Exodus 3:15 (NIV)
Teachable Moments: Can you imagine what Moses must have felthearing audibly from God? This must have been a very important message for God to speak it to Moses. God specifically stated how He would be rememberedhow his legacy would be passed from one generation to the next. Have you ever stopped to think about the legacy you are leaving for your kids? What are you passing on to them that will with stand the test of time and affect the people your future family members become? Try some of these activities: Have your kids present as you begin dialogue with family members about past family memories. Have your kids come up with a few questions to ask older members of the family about their life or about traditions they have always loved and why. Sit down with your kids and look at family photo albums. Tell them who is in the pictures and tell them all that you know about those people. Ask your kids to think about traditions in your family and have them try to figure out when, where, and why they started.

Kids do love getting presents, but you might be surprised what kids ultimately remember about the holidays! Try asking these questions to determine if you need new, different, or more traditions:
What is your favorite holiday? What do you like about that holiday? Why? When you think of Christmas, what do you think of? What activities do you think of when you think of Christmas and how we Do you have any ideas of new traditions we could start as a family? Allow them

celebrate it? to brainstorm with you to come up with a new special tradition and start it this year.

Healthy Habits: Recycling

Even though it is winter, everywhere we look things are going green. Recycling is becoming very popular right now and is so very important for our environment for two reasons. First, it reduces the inputs (energy and raw materials) to a production system, and second, it reduces the amount of waste produced for disposal. For many adults who are set in their ways, it is a little more difficult to re-learn your methods of waste disposal. Start while your kids are young, teaching them the proper way to dispose of items such as the following: Plastic Aluminum Glass Paper Printer ink cartridges and toners Take your kids to your city recycling office and get recycling collection containers as well as instructions for your citys recycling plan. If they dont have any, get extra large plastic tubs or trash cans and let the kids decorate or label them. Make it fun to take items and put them where they belong. Take advantage of this time to teach your kids about caring for this beautiful world that God entrusted to us.

This page is designed to inform and educate parents and is not meant to endorse any product, music, or movie. Our prayer is that you will make informed decisions on what your student listens to, wears, and sees.

Whats playing at the movies

Movie: The Golden Compass Genre:
Drama, science fiction, fantasy, witches and wizards

Make sure your children participate in the wonder of the story of Jesus birth this season.
Try reliving the story using the following: Pick a night when the whole family is home. Get your Bible, pen, and paper. Read, or have one of the kids read, the story of Jesus birth. After the reading, have everyone make a list of all the characters they can remember from the story. This is including animals and even the actual manger. Now assign each family member to be one or more of the characters. Platform Have someone be the Windows (requires a monthly fee) narrator, and have all the other characters act out their role as their character is read. Encourage them to be Nintendo DS, Wii, PS2, PS3, PSP, XBOX 360 creative with words, sounds, movements, and whatever else they come up with.

Network: New Line Cinema Release Date: Cast:

December 7, 2007

Nicole Kidman, Dakota Blue Richards,

Sam Elliott, Eva Green, Daniel Craig

Warnings:

This movie is based on the first book in

Phillip Pullmans trilogy called His Dark Materials which chronicles the adventures of a streetwise girl who travels through multiple worlds populated by witches, armor-plated bears, and sinister ecclesiastical assassins to defeat the oppressive forces of a senile God. Pullman is an avowed atheist who states, I dont profess any religion; I dont think its possible that there is a God; I have the greatest difficulty in understanding what is meant by the worlds spiritual or spirituality. His critics point to the strong anti-religion and anti-God themes his books incorporate. Beware of this seemingly innocent movie as it is said to promote anti-God views and doctrine. (snopes.com)

Movie: Fred Claus Genre:

Family and kids Warner Bros. November 8, 2007

Network: Cast:

Release Date: Warnings:

Vince Vaughn, Paul Giamatti, Rachel Weisz Rated PG for mild language and some rude humor. This movie also contains

some flirting, language, a slapstick fight, and a few couples kiss. (commonsensemedia.org)

What Games are out Now

Title Rating/Age: Content E/7+: Encourages working together to accomplish goals, fighting involves throwing cream pies and using squirt guns. E/10+: Alcohol reference, animated blood, crude humor, fantasy violence, and language T/12+: Alcohol and Tobacco reference, animated blood, cartoon violence, crude humor, language, and suggestive themes

Toontown Online

Ratchet and Clank Future: Tools of Destruction

PS3

The Simpsons Game

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