Our Family's Jesse Tree

I received a copy of this e-book in exchange for my honest review. No other compensation has been exchanged.

One of my resolutions this year was to be more intentional with our family prayer time. My stated goal was to teach my kids new prayers and to encourage them to learn how to pray on their own. As a related goal, I want to make sure that my kids understand the intricacies of our faith and grow up with a firm foundation to build upon later. Henry received his First Communion this year and he's becoming more and more reverent as time goes on. I can actually see the Holy Spirit at work within him!

Benjamin may complain about the length of Mass from time to time...loudly...during the quieter prayer times, but he also gets excited for the Kyrie and the Gloria. He belts them out at the top of his lungs, surprisingly on pitch for a five year old wiggling around the pew.

When it comes to the crucial holidays of the Christian calendar such as Easter and Christmas, I want my kids to understand that there is much more involved than just the popular cultural practices. We do Santa and the Easter Bunny at our house, but we also celebrate and honor Jesus' birth, death, and resurrection. This year I am excited to do a Jesse Tree project with my kids.

If you are unfamiliar, a Jesse Tree is artistic representation of the family tree and history of Jesus Christ. It starts in the literal beginning, with the creation of Earth and progresses through history highlighting people from Adam and Eve, through Jacob, Moses, David, Jonah, John the Baptist, Mary, Joseph, and finally Baby Jesus.

The Jesse Tree project we will be completing this year was created by my new friend Jen Frost at Faith and Fabric. She has generously given me a copy of her eBook "Our Family's Jesse Tree" in exchange for this post.

"Our Family's Jesse Tree" includes step by step instructions for how to make your own Jesse Tree. Each day has a template for an art project to represent the person or event of the day. You can make the project as simple or as complicated as you like. The simplest way would be to cut the pieces out of paper, color them and glue them together. You could make them from fun foam pieces glued together, felt hand-stitched together, or go BIG and use your sewing machine to make quilted pieces. This project is meant to be a personal family project, so do it the way that works best for your family!

The book also has family activities, Bible readings, prayers and reflections for each day Dec. 1 -25. My favorite element here might be the "Jesus connection" that highlights how this person or event is a part of Jesus' fulfillment of scripture. What a great way to help kids understand salvation history and to link all those pieces together!

I'm not one to hurry my holidays, but I'm really excited about this project and I can't wait to get it started with the kids on December first.

How cute is Joseph's Coat?!

If you want your own copy of the eBook, you can find details on Jen's website here. You can purchase your own copy of the eBook there as well. It's on sale for only $5 until November 7th, so hurry! It will return to it's normal price of $7.50 after that, which is still a great deal! You can also check out her Instagram or Facebook page for a chance to win your own copy.

What your favorite part of the Christmas story? What holiday traditions are you looking forward to starting or continuing this year?

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