We are "That" family...

Every community, every group, has that one family that does things differently.

• they are vegan
• they do not do anything dairy
• no chocolate
• no gluten
• no soda
• no tooth fairy/Easter bunny/Santa Claus
• etc., etc., etc.

I have come to realize that my family, my little group of four, is "that" family. We do not do cow's milk, we do not allow sugar until age 1, no chocolate until after age 2, and the mythical characters are not apart of our storybook.

And it has taken me sometime to get a stiff upper lip about it. We will do the Easter egg hunts, but if there is any gifts given, my children "know" that a bunny did not bring them but instead it was mom/father and maybe one of the five grandparents. We haven't had to deal with the tooth fairy yet, so I am not sure what we will do, if anything. Santa Claus, that one is a bit tricky.

Abigail will be three this year, and last year she was already asking questions at age two. Obviously she loves Christmas, and that makes my heart happy, being that Christmas is my favorite holiday of the year. And the girl is obsessed with Santa! She isn't old enough yet to realize that some of her peers get gifts from Santa, but that is just around the corner. The plan my husband and I have is to share the story of the original Old Saint Nick, and explain how Christmas is magical, but all her presents are from mom/father, not the old man in the red suit.

This decision has been met with much criticism, and I have been surprised with how opinionated people are about our family choice. People who have no say in our life giving their two cents like they will persuade us differently.

Here is why we do not do the mythical characters as real - it is lying. Plan and simple, it is lying. And when it comes to my children I do not want to lie to them. It goes to their salvation. When I tell my children about Jesus, I am telling them about someone real, someone who died on the cross to save them. If I have told them that the tooth fairy, Easter bunny and Santa are real right now, and they come to an age that they realize they aren't, they can question Jesus as being real because I told them the other three were real too. But if from the beginning we share that the three are magical and a fun idea but not real, and that Jesus is real, the identity is separate.

It really it me though this past week how different we are. I confess, I hate Halloween. I don't like the costumes, my sweet tooth is tempted too much, and honestly the scary stuff is not up my alley. And for good reason too! Fear is not of God, and some decorations and costumes are flat out spine tingling!

“For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of love, and of power, and of a sound mind.” —2 Timothy 1:7

My house is decorated for fall/Thanksgiving - the garish orange is nauseating. In the past few years our church has done a fall festival and we have attended some, but it was a festival. Games and fun - some costumes but nothing scary. This year that flat out did trick-or-treating. Well my daughter cannot have candy - the spike in her sugar causes massive behavior issues that are not needed. I have a garden gnome costume for Abigail (honestly not sure where it came from, but it is in her closet), and if the church had had a festival she would have been that. I really think she would have been adorable doing hop-scotch and ring toss in that little gnome outfit. I did try and get a brown beanie and onsie for Stone so he could be an acorn, but when I found out that there was no festival I stopped looking. Trick-or-treating is all about Halloween, the scary, the evil, the things we are to be set apart from as believers.

“Test all things; hold fast what is good. Abstain from all appearance of evil.” —1 Thessalonians 5:21-22

I am not casting a stone at my church, they were providing a safe environment for families to have some fun, but Halloween is about evil, even if we are in cute costumes. But, as long as it is trick-or-treating, then every Halloween you will find this Shuman household at home, front porch light off, and more than likely watching a family movie together.

And finally remember this:

“Therefore come out from them and be separate from them, says the Lord.” —2 Corinthians 6:17

Being different from everyone else is not a bad thing. We are called to be different. To be a believer is to be different. There should be a noticeable difference in your way of life if Jesus is the center of your life.