12 Days of Nativity

About a year and a half ago, after we cleaned mom’s house, I reclaimed my nativity mentioned here and learned that it was just too large for my small house and my less-than-tidy family.  Last year was the only year I put it up.

My family had sent me a wooden nativity the first Christmas I was on my mission.  The nativity consisted of five pieces: Mary, Joseph, two lambs and the baby Jesus.  My brother Patrick had painted each of the figures. 

Two years after I had returned from my mission, I had purchased a bunch of Christmas items that went on clearance following the holidays.  One of the items I purchased was a three-piece wooden set with painted camel, the three wisemen and a shepherd.  I added those to my existing nativity.  That is what I used for several years after Roland and I were married.

My mom had given me a small nativity sometime before we had moved to West Valley.  It was smaller than my wooden set, and often I displayed both sets.  I hope that they are still in the shed, but it dawned on me that since I haven’t run across either, that they may have been in the same box with my dip n drape nativity – never to be seen again.  Except for a wooden lamb that somehow drifted from the rest of the set, and a small Mary from the other.  

Randy said he wished I had given him the nativity – which is odd, because of all my children, I figure that he really wouldn’t want it.  Thus I thought I would give him one of the missing nativities, should I have come across them. But alas, it is still not discovered.

Last year Roland purchased another nativity set and put Biff in charge of picking out the figures.  I have Mary, Joseph, three wisemen, a donkey, a lamb, a camel, an angel and surely you’ve heard of the Christmas rooster – which by the way is almost the same size as the sheep.  And so this year I added Ooki’s elephant to the set.  The rooster actually looks more out of place than the elephant does.

Well, somebody has decided to give each of our activity girls a nativity set – one piece at a time. Jenna received Mary on the 16^th I believe.  I noticed one of her friends had taken a picture of her Mary and posted that someone had left it along with the scripture.  The scripture that came with the first nativity figure was Luke 1:26-31.

The following day Jenna received Joseph who came with a verse from the children’s songbook.  The third day was a donkey.  The forth day was the Stable.  The fifth day was a cow.  And the next three days were wisemen.

         Jenna had diligently taken pictures.  The last she took was of the cow.  She had borrowed my LG cell phone – which I had to replace as it cut the conversation.  I still use it as a directory and had told Jenna that she could borrow it to take to school for a brilliant idea she had wanted to make as a gift for her teachers.  Unfortunately it did not work out.  I had forgotten I would need a chip to transfer pictures, but did not have a chip on hand nor do I want to invest in another after losing two chips already.

Unlike the nativity that I received last year, Jenna’s includes a shepherd – which came next and was followed by a sheep.  We’ll have to see what the next two days bring.  I imagine that Christmas Eve will come with the Christ Child.  Pics will come – eventually.