It seems like every year it gets harder and harder to have decorating the tree as an advent activity.  I like taking out the ornaments from the box and reminiscing making the ornaments or finding the ones that fit my theme, the fleur de lis or the Eiffle towers.  The kids say "I remember this or that."  Then there is placing the ornament in a secret spot so the others have to "find" it on the tree.  The problem is that as they get older, their attention span for it diminishes.  Isaac placed three ornaments on the tree and then he had "homework".  I place that in quotes because his homework wasn't going to last three hours.  He may have had 1 1/2 hours and the rest of the time was looking at football stats and video.  Then there is the fact that the boys are in school and John's at work so decorating as a family has to wait until it's dark.  Couple that with the fact that there are activities every night so someone is gone, means that decorating has to be done on the fly.  We had about 30 minutes to place decorations on the tree before heading out the door.  We could do it on a weekend but there are other activities that are planned for those days because those are organized community events such as the Jingle Bell Run or the Nativity Ballet that Lona's involved in.  So I think I'm going to have to give up  the family tree decorating time as an advent activity and replace it with something such as eat a candy cane.  The advent activity has to be able to evolve, change, and grow to fit our family's needs and my expectations have to change as well.  Someday I'm the only one that will open our advent calendar and that will be different.