A Net in Time

Review: This First Christmas Night

Saturday, December 10, 2016

Today I have a sweet little softcover picture book to tell you about.

Entitled "This First Christmas Night" it is written by Laura Godwin and Illustrated by William Low.

A little picture book along with simple verse and delightful illustrations.

See this small gray donkey

This long, dusty road

This promising star.

The whole book is wonderfully illustrated, and conveys well the story of Jesus's birth, the text adding to the story line.

Granted, I do struggle with the biblical inaccuracies, as the wisemen did not arrive when the shepherds did, but I have that struggle with how the Christmas Story is often told now-a-days, even Church programs have the wisemen coming up after the shepherds. :)

I loved this last page.

The illustration, the wonder, the centralness of the Christ child...and the hush.

Oh that hush of Christ quieting his people... Reminded me of the wonder of Christmas.

All the senses are evoked in this 32 page book

"see this small gray donkey"

"feel the frost"'

"smell of sweet hay"

hear "the lamb bleating"

The only sense we miss is taste, but I don't think you really want to taste anything in a stable. :)

It's a nicely written and illustrated book and it would make a fine gift for your little ones to introduce the Christmas story to them.

This First Christmas Night

Author: Laura Godwin

Illustrator:William Low

Published by: Feiwel & Friends
Size: 8.96 x 10.52

32 pages
Ages 2-6 years

Softcover is what I received.

Also available as a boardbook.

Reviewed for Raincoast Books.

Amazon.ca : This First Christmas Night

Amazon.com: This First Christmas Night

My Christmas Village 2016

An Overview of my Christmas Village

One of my favourite pieces.

This was one of my first gifts when we got married.

My Village is up! WOOT WOOT. Admittedly the lad did most of it this year with some placement of the houses by me, but he was very much into helping his mom out this year so it was like "YES!! Let's let him".

Some highlights.

I really like my skating rink. I think it was gifted to me but really can't recall, adding my figures and moving them around daily makes me smile. :) I need to find my son's skating lego figures and add them to the mix. :)

I made the bench area with the trees surrounding it thinking that my lad would put the old man feeding the birds on it, but he turned it into a Photos with Santa area. I thought that was very clever don't you? (Santa is a lego man)

So here we have some folks waiting to go on the carriage, while the cow in the background is trying to sneak some popcorn for herself. "Do you think she'll get some and surprise the guy selling it?" :) Gotta have fun with the figures right? :)

If I could, I would find about 5-8 more sledders for my tobogganing hill. It would be neat to have some skiers, snowboarders and sled riders, even someone on a snowmobile would be cool, don't you think? I currently only have three pieces....I'll look on Monday for some.

I hope you enjoyed the walk through my village. It's a lot of fun putting it up each year. It was neat to see the fun the lad had putting it all together and giving me a hand... even if the old man is feeding squirrels this year instead, and not every building has a light, and my choir is scattered about in three different areas.... it all works..and we'll move things around and lego will show up here and there.. it's part of Christmas at our house. :)

Reviewing our week: Dec 9

This week

We managed to keep ourselves busy. I had big plans for the week since I'm feeling much better than I have been.. .but learned that I still peter out of energy quickly and therefore lose focus and will to push onwards.

Independent learning

The Eastern Chipmunk:

Why we can't ship Nuclear Waste to the Sun.

Monday:

Daily smarts, Veritas History and Bible, and Teaching Textbooks.
Weekly visit with Gramma
1/2 hour reading
continued our reading of Cat of Bubastes.

Tuesday:

Daily smarts, Veritas History and Bible, and Teaching Textbooks.
1/2 hour reading
Out to buy two shelves, and then to find room for them in his room.
Organized lego

Made decision to sell his meccano and lego action figures as well as a few other toys
Look what we made today! (recipe coming next week)

Wednesday

Foodbank
Daily smarts.
1/2 hour reading
Cleaning and organizing the lad's room (did all on his own)

Thursday

Daily smarts, Veritas History and Bible, and Teaching Textbooks.
1/2 hour reading
Working on his story.
Deciding there was more things in his room that needed cleaning and removing.

Friday

Plans were to have an art class...but snow hit.
So we started putting up my Christmas village. We didn't get finished, but we got it started at least. :)
And we had fun watching the birds.