Happy Advent Sunday! Advent marks the start of the Countdown to Christmas Eve and the arrival of our Lord Jesus.
To celebrate, each Advent Sunday we read scripture and Bible verses, bake something to go with it and do our Advent candles.
Since it’s the first Advent, we will be making our Advent Wreath and the 3 purple candles.
Here’s a quick overview:
Sunday 1 — Hope: Prophecy Candle (purple)
Sunday 2 — Peace: Bethlehem Candle (purple)
Sunday 3 — Joy: Shepherd’s Candle (pink)
Sunday 4 — Love: Angel’s Candle (purple)
Christmas Eve — Christ’s Candle (white)
Let’s get started!
Sunday 1 — Hope: Prophecy Candle – purple
God’s people -The Candle of Hope.
Hope is like a light shining in a dark place. As we look at the light of this candle we celebrate the hope we have in Jesus Christ.
Hope is a reminder that light overcomes darkness. It reminds us to have patience with ourself and others, to give grace and mercy and forgiveness. It’s about the anticipation of the birth of Jesus who redeems us from brokenness. It’s the hope of a better future. God sends His Son into the world to redeem His people, and gives us Hope for His return.
Today’s Song is: O Come O Come Emmanuel
Today’s Food is: Fruitcake — we are making (and enjoying) Old Fashioned Fruitcake Loaf
Today’s Prayer: Father, let your hope arise in our hearts! Lift our eyes up to see that you alone are where our hope comes from. Help us to shake off the anxiety, discouragements, and distractions that have filled this year.
Activity One – Making Candles
We decided to make all of our purple candles at once. It is easier to melt the candles ax once than each week! I enjoy making dipped candles – it is so neat to see the candle go from just a piece of wick, to hardly any wax on the wick to a small candle to a larger candle! It’s actually quite simple to do and so much fun!
First, melt wax in hot water. We are using a soy-paraffin wax blend. We were hoping to do beeswax, but our supplies did not arrive in time so we are using our leftover wax. I put quite a bit of water in my large pot I use for soap making. Place wax in and let it melt. Do not boil because the wax will foam and it’ll have to be skimmed which is simply wasting wax. Once wax is melted, turn the burner off. It’ll stay hot for a while. For the purple, we added some purple crayons to the wax as it was melting.
Since we have so much purple wax leftover from last year, we are using that wax. We decided to add a bit more purple crayon to it to darken it a bit.
Now that the wax is melting, cut the wick to the desired length. Since these are meant to burn during each advent Sunday, we cut the wick at 8” so hopefully they’ll last to Christmas Eve! We just leave it burn from 30 minutes to an hour while we do our readings. If you’d like to burn it longer each Sunday, cut the wick at about 12”.
Once the wax has melted, turn off the burner. It’ll stay hot for a while. It’s now time to dip. Dip the wick into the wax, leaving the top half inch not dipped (so we will be able to light the candle), then dip into cold water. Straighten the wick with your fingers, lightly squeezing excess water out, then dip into the wax and repeat. Dip into wax, dunk into water and straighten. Continue until you get the desired size of candle you want.
Three Sunday’s will have purple candles, so we made all of our purple candles for Advent today.
Once you are done, leave the wax cool. You’ll be able to lift the wax out the water – let cool completely before putting it away. If you did not melt too much wax, you can make extra candles until the wax is done.
Activity Two – Making Our Wreaths
Now that the candles are cooling and hardening (they will become more firm as they cool), it’s time to make our wreath.
Each year we do our wreaths different. Some years my girls made clay candles with removable clay flames to “light” the candle and glue the candle into a terracotta pot base/saucer and decorated it all festive. Other years they made candles with perler beads and glued it into a terracotta saucer. Last year we made dipped candles and the wreath was a small wreath we purchased from the craft store. This year, we changed it up again! The wreaths seem to be expensive this year, so I came up with an alternative!
We are using a 16.5cm/6.5” terracotta base/saucer, 9’ pine garland (the most plain and cheapest!), and some berry cluster picks to create our wreaths. To set the candles in, we are using 7.6cm/3” terracotta saucers and 3.8cm/1.5” terracotta pots. Some of these items we had leftover from other projects. We are using acrylic paint.
First, we are painting our terracotta. You can paint it any color! We gave it a few coats. My wreath base, I gave two coats of paint. The terracotta saucers for my candles, I gave one coat and the white pot I gave three coats. ‘H’ gave hers about the same amount of coats but the pink did need a few extra coats. ‘L’ dry brushed hers.
Once the paint has dried, we can hot glue the garland pieces on and decorate it so it’s more festive. This is the best part because everyone can make their own wreath with their creative flair!
Luckily, this pine garland was easy to untwist and even slide the pieces out to remove the pine pieces from the garland strand. Arrange the pine garland pieces on the terracotta however you like. My daughter ‘L’ left hers more plain whereas my daughter ‘H’ twisted the pieces to make a more full wreath. I glued pieces around the edge and then cut other pieces to stuff it in and around the clay saucers to make it more full.
I suggest attaching felt on the bottom before you start decorating. We forgot, so we attached the felt with hot glue after we were done!
You can attach the words Hope, Peace, Joy and Love if you like. I stamped and placed the words in the garland until I decide what I actually would like to do for this part. I may stamp in polymer clay and bake to use that instead – I have not quite figured it out. ‘L’ left hers plain and ‘H’ wrote on the saucers.
We attached the Hope candle using wax that’s meant to attach candles to their holders. It’s pliable and you warm it in your hands before attaching it. It actually works quite well!
Here’s our wreaths with our Hope candle – I think they all look amazing!
Here are the Advent Wreaths lit:
Today’s Hope Scripture:
In the sixth month of Elizabeth’s pregnancy, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendent of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. The angel went to her and said, “Greetings, you who are highly favored! The Lord is with you.”
Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be. But the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary; you have found favor with God. You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over Jacob’s descendants forever; his kingdom will never end.”
“How will this be,” Mary asked the angel, “since I am a virgin?”
The angel answered, “The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God. Even Elizabeth your relative is going to have a child in her old age, and she who was said to be unable to conceive is in her sixth month. For no word from God will ever fail.”
“I am the Lord’s servant,” Mary answered. “May your word to me be fulfilled.” Then the angel left her.
Today’s Bible Verses:
Isaiah 9:2-6 and 40:31
Matthew 24:36
Micah 7:7
Galatians 4:4-8
Jeremiah 29:11
And that’s the 1st Sunday of Advent. We especially enjoy this time of year. We reflect on the past year, let go of things that simply do not matter and remember what is truly important.
enjoy from Our City Homestead to yours