Intentional Traditions: Home for the Holidays
By: Kristen Neighbarger Published on: 13/12/2023When I was a kid, I knew what to expect every Christmas. We had very specific traditions that followed me into adulthood: On Christmas Eve, we went to my grandparents’ house on my mom’s side with my mom’s entire family. We had pizza, read the Christmas story, Santa came with gifts, and my mom passed out pans of cinnamon rolls to each family. On Christmas Day, we woke up, opened presents, and ate cinnamon rolls before going to my grandparents’ house on my dad’s side for lunch and presents. On Christmas evening, we went to my aunt’s house to celebrate with her family (the same family we had just spent Christmas Eve with!) There was little to no deviation in these Christmas Eve and Christmas Day traditions throughout my adolescence and into my early adulthood. There was comfort in these traditions–comfort in the fact that my family seemed to genuinely get along, liked spending time together, and was committed to continuing these long-established rituals.
Intentional Connections: Home for the Holidays
By: Kristen Neighbarger Published on: 06/12/2023When I was growing up, the Christmas traditions ran rampant. The Christmas season wasn’t complete without the candlelight service, the Christmas Cantata, the obligatory Christmas Carols, and the little boxes of candy each of us would receive after said Christmas Cantata and singing of those obligatory Christmas Carols. Because it was standard practice in my house to attend church every time the doors were opened, we were all part of all of the festivities–my brother and I were forced to be in the kids’ Christmas program, my mom sang in the choir, and my dad ran sound because he sang in the choir one time and says they asked him to run sound after that…allegedly. I don’t remember having much choice in any of these commitments, and I would venture so far as to say my parents probably didn’t feel like they had much of a choice either. That was the world we lived in then–a world of unspoken rules and heavy expectations.
Summer Expectations
For seven years, my life was consumed by sequins, tights, leotards, bobby pins, and hair spray. From the time my daughter was in 2nd grade until she was in 8th when the pandemic closed the world down, my daughter, Kate, danced competitively. Just to be clear here–I am not your quintessential dance mom. I would have been much better suited to be a sports mom, but somehow my daughter found herself in the world of dance. Ugh. It was a very busy, time-consuming lifestyle that involved her spending 20+ hours a week at the dance studio throughout the school year, regional competitions in the spring, a week of recitals, and national competition in the summer. She would have two weeks off at Christmas, a week off for Spring Break, two weeks off after recital, and then a few weeks off after nationals before the new season started. It was exhausting, all-encompassing, and expensive! We didn’t have much time for anything extra beyond dance. Fun-filled summer adventures were never on our agenda because dance filled our agenda. Now that Kate has chosen not to dance, we have time again, and what I’ve noticed is that there is an incredibly unrealistic push from our culture today to fill all that free time! Open Pinterest, turn on the tv, get on any social media platform, and you are inevitably inundated with posts, advertisements, articles, pictures, and mom experts who are declaring that since we only have 18 summers with our kids, we have to make them these amazing, adventure-filled, exceptionally full experiences.
Church Boundaries: Healthy Relationships
By: Kristen Neighbarger Published on: 31/05/2023My name is Kristen, and I’m a recovering serve-aholic It’s taken me several years to be able to unravel the threads and get to the roots of my serving addiction, but I finally arrived at these core beliefs I’ve spent the last few years attempting to unlearn: If I didn’t do it, who would do it? If I didn’t do it, someone would be disappointed in me. If I didn’t do it, it wouldn’t get done well. If I didn’t do it, I would be letting people down. If I didn’t do it, my church would suffer. If I didn’t do it, God would be disappointed in me. If I didn’t do it, God would punish me. If I didn’t do it, I wasn’t being like Jesus. If I didn’t do it, people would think I was lazy, not committed, and selfish. Honestly, this list could go on and on. As I think back over the years I spent killing myself through serving, it’s almost laughable to me now because, seriously, what the heck was I even thinking?
