Christmas is my MOST FAVORITE time to go to church. There are CAROLS and LIGHTS and STARS and ANGELS and CHILDREN SINGING and… I could go on.

One year, I felt particularly removed from God, until my mom dragged me to the Christmas Eve service. I weirded out my 10-year-old sister by spontaneously crying through “The First Noel.” I’ve been hooked on Christmas church ever since.

On Sunday, I joyfully dressed and pulled out the button-down-Sunday-appropriate attire for my boy-child angels. And stalked them with their toothbrushes to begin herding them out the door.

Mornings are not my strong suit. Things went askew. Big brother threatened to pee on little brother. Which led to shrieks of protest from little brother.

And little brother ate big brother’s breakfast leftovers. Which led to a big brother #bigly meltdown (because big brother is anti-sharing). I turned into Mommy Dearest and threatened to cancel Christmas. This meant nothing to the 2-year-old: He’s still trying to pronounce the word, and Santa scares him. But it did give the 4-year-old pause before he marched off to torment the dog.

And, hey, my logic was brilliant: screaming at children always motivates them to get dressed super fast to GO PRAISE JESUS.

I canceled church

I took another tack. I canceled church.

This seemed like a more appropriate way to teach consequences. Because in our world, church equals candy. We basically have social hour with treats every Sunday. And my children have noticed the pattern.

Small child: “Mommy, can we go to church today?”
Me: “No, it’s Tuesday. We go to school on Tuesday. We go to church on Sunday.”
Small child: “But Mommy, I really want to go to church today. To get chocolate.”
Small child: “Mommy, I’m the church candy man. Do you know what that means?”
Me: “No, what does that mean?”
Small child: “That I go to church for candy, man!”

(His first joke — I’m so proud.)

Thus, canceling church. If you don’t put on your clothes and brush your teeth right this minute, you, sir, get no candy.

I went on to tell them no church TODAY, but that Mommy LOVES Christmas so we are going NEXT WEEK. No matter what. (Famous last words.)

I put on my bang-around clothes and started folding laundry. Five minutes passed.

Church is back on

Big brother found me: “Mommy, is it next week yet?”

“No. It’s still today. Go play.”

Another five minutes went by.

Big brother was back: “Mommy, are you sure it’s not next week yet?”

Suddenly, I got it. He wanted to go to church! (For candy?) And I wanted to go to church, too. (For candy!)

I gave him a big hug and said, “We can go to church TODAY if you go get dressed.”

Off he went, lickety-split. I didn’t even care when he came back fully clothed sporting an orange jack-o’-lantern shirt. Decorum be damned. We’re off to praise the baby Jesus!

Share your tips for getting the kiddos out the door – below or on Facebook at MothersRest.

ADDITIONAL THOUGHTS

I’m excited to share that the Greensboro News & Record featured this story on their site: “Canceling” church pays off for mom.