Jesus and Potty Stars

One great, cheap (compared to previous gas prices) early evening activity has been riding and looking at Christmas lights. Truly a joy that makes us squeal and creep through the streets like senior citizens/stalkers, we've headed out most evenings after dark to check out our favorites. There's a Santa train with a penguin in a car that pops in and out of a present, a.k.a. "penguin pop out." There's also a yard with a gigantic cedar tree that has a 3D star on top and six or seven strands of vertical lights that come from the star to the ground. Thomas spotted this one way up the street and immediately recognized it as the "SPIDER!"

Now we're experts at identifying the man in red, snowmen, reindeer, and even the harder-to-find holy family. Because our parents, like most, don't want us to miss these important characters in the story of Christmas, we've done several drive-bys and have even walked over to the Methodist church's nativity behind Cici and Papa John's house. Theirs is big and simple - Mary, baby Jesus, and Joseph. It took us a little while to identify Jesus as the baby and not his dad (as he appears everywhere else in church), but now we know. There's also a large star above the scene and John David, having cemented in his mind that Jesus is the baby, said, "He got a potty star! He tee tee in the potty!"

This was so priceless and hilarious to our mom (who for a second couldn't figure out what J.D. was saying?) because at day care, we get our potty star posted on the bulletin board when we use the potty. (FYI, ours is never on the board, but we're proud of our stars just the same and can point them out among the 15 - we recognize our names by the T and the J...D... Hey, letter identifcation is a life skill, too, right?)

Isn't it so innocent and original and just plain funny the way we toddlers think? Why else would someone hang up this big star above Jesus? Our Savior is perfect. Perhaps he was potty trained at birth :) hee hee (Moms, can you even imagine Mary potty training a little Jesus? Little parenting things like that just leave me in complete wonder when I think about them.)

(Will post a picture of Jesus underneath the potty star later.)