How to Love
Your Neighbor
this Christmas

‘Tis the season to be neighborly! I’ve got everything you need to celebrate the season on your street, from simple (and affordable!) gift ideas to a Christmas Open House made easy. 

Easy & Affordable Christmas Gift Idea for Your Neighbors

Purchase a large set of ornaments in bulk and divide them up for the homes on your street, or upcycle and re-gift an ornament from your own collection! Download this free gift tag and keep a bag of ornaments in your car to pass out to your neighbors! 🎅

Host a Christmas Open House for your neighbors!

My Christmas Open House Kit includes an Advent Calendar craft with 25 Bible verses that tell the story of Christmas, two adorable invitations to choose from, and a Planning Guide to make it easy.

Enter your email address to instantly access these free printable resources.

Open House Invitations

Choose from two designs – a vintage wreath or pretty amaryllis – that gently invite your neighbors to get to know one another over coffee at your kitchen table. If you opt to do the Christmas Countdown Craft at your Open House, you can print an invitation that says, “Bring an old 4×6 photo frame to create a Christmas countdown.” You customize each invitation with your name and contact information as well as the date of your event.

Advent Calendar

This adorable Christmas craft is made by removing the glass from an old photo frame, inserting Christmas paper, and gluing on a little clothespin. Download, print and trim our Christmas Countdown Cards; each card has a number on one side and a number and Scripture verse on the other. Your neighbors will leave your home with a memory, a new friendship, and 25 messages about the real meaning of Christmas.

Planning Guide

Now that you’ve decided to host a Christmas Open House for your neighbors, it’s time to deck the halls with boughs of holly – but don’t worry, you’ll still be jolly when you’re done!

My Planning Guide keeps your guests as the focus, walking you through the process with prayer, picking a date and time, passing out invitations, picking up a few supplies, preparing your home, and finally – party time!

Custom Christmas Open House Invitations

Don’t have time to fill out those free invitations? Choose one of these adorable Christmas Open House Invitations, and I’ll customize it just for you for just $5! Within one business day, you’ll receive a print-quality PDF with four invitations per page, customized with your family name and address along with your Open House date and time.

Give the gift of Hope!

Can I Borrow a Cup of Hope? offers refreshing Living Hope from the pages of 1 Peter. This hybrid book/Bible study is full of personal stories and rich Scriptural application that give help for hard times. Perfect for personal reading or small group studies, my newest book is available at your favorite local bookstore or wherever books are sold online.

Don’t forget to grab your free book bonuses to give along with your gift! You’ll receive an excerpt to start reading now, printable Bible verse art suitable for framing, delicious drink recipes, and notecards to print and share. 

I’m here to help!

This is a practical, adaptable way to offer extravagant hospitality – not extreme entertaining – to your neighbors. You can make it as simple or as elegant as you’d like (I’m a paper-plate kinda hostess myself). If you have any questions, fears, or concerns about reaching out to your neighbors this Christmas, please contact me.  You are not alone and I am here to offer encouragement, advice, and prayer!

More Christmas Ideas

Neighborhood Cafe Podcast Christmas Episode

I was podcasting before podcasting was cool! Actually, I had a weekly radio program on a local Christian station! Jesus. Since this was published, even more people are lonely and we're more desperate for a friend.  I hope you enjoy this oldie but goodie about the real...

5 Easy Ways to Love Your Neighbor this Christmas

Tis the season to be jolly! 🎶Fa la la la la, la la la la!🎶 Or is it the season to be busy? Overwhelmed? Overcommitted? Is it the season for celebrating “God with us,” or complaining about others with us in line at the grocery store and the post office? Planning...

The Ghost of Christmas Past

Twas the day after Christmas And all through the house Mama was yelling, "Hey, clean up this mess!"   On the day after Christmas, my girlfriend had a serious holiday hangover...Her sweet smile and that cute little emoji make light of a heavy complaint: Christmas...

5 Christmas Gift Ideas for Your Neighbors

As you’re makin’ a list and checkin’ it twice, don’t forget to add your neighbors!   Here are five simple, powerful, and affordable gifts to share the joy of Christmas with the people living around you. Gifts open doors for natural connections that can lead to...

How to Have Hope at Christmas

We’ve heard the Christmas story a million times, but if we read it with fresh eyes and soft hearts we just might find ourselves in this magical tale. It begins in Israel: When Herod was king of Judea, there was a Jewish priest named Zechariah. He was a member of the...

5 Ways to Love Your Neighbor at Christmas

Tis the season to be jolly! Fa la la la la, la la la la! Or is it the season to be busy? Overwhelmed? Overcommitted? Is it the season for celebrating “God with us,” or complaining about others with us in line at the grocery store and the post office? Planning...

How to Love Your Neighbor at Christmas for Introverts

Celebrate the season in your own special way!   Whether you're extroverted or introverted, a party animal or party pooper, God has intentionally placed you in your neighborhood to reach your neighbors in your unique way. As long as you are obedient and...

Merry Christmas… Maybe.

When "There's No Christmas Like a Home Christmas" hit the airwaves in 1950, less than 10% of homes contained only one person. Today, one in four of the homes on your street is occupied by a single person living alone. Twenty-five percent of people say they have no one...

Christmas in the Neighborhood

On that first Christmas morning, in that dingy stable, the King of Kings was born as a helpless baby. John 1:14 says, “…the Word (that is, Jesus) became human and made his home among us. He was full of unfailing love and faithfulness. And we have seen his glory, the...

Christmas Cookie Brigade!

Christmas it the BEST time of the year to love your neighbor!  Everyone loves to receive Christmas cookies, so why not make some plates for the homes on your street? I've seen God use this simple act in my own neighborhood to impact lives over the course of...

Church Outreach Tools for Christmas

Guest post from Valley Community Baptist Church, Avon, Connecticut   Our church in New England isn't in the heart of the Bible Belt. This area is full of stoic people behind stone walls. Folks in our neighborhoods can even be hostile towards the Gospel. But that...

Christmas Advent Countdown Craft

This simple craft is a fun and festive way to count down the days until Christmas while remembering the real reason we celebrate!   It’s made by removing the glass from an old photo frame, inserting Christmas paper, and gluing on a small clothespin to hold a card...

How to Love Your Neighbor this Christmas

“Instead of being a time of unusual behavior, Christmas is perhaps the only time in the year when people can obey their natural impulses and express their true sentiments without feeling self-conscious and, perhaps, foolish. Christmas, in short, is about the only...

Advent Devotional

Did you know there was 400 years of silence between the end of the Old Testament and the nativity story? Yet Luke 1:10 tells us that “a great crowd stood outside, praying” as a priest named Zechariah did his duties at the temple. The people had been praying for 400...

Friends from Far and Near (and Christmas Gift Ideas)

Last weekend [12/2013], I had the joy of spending time with so many incredible people! We dodged snowstorms to come together from all corners of the country, and God's Spirit made us instant friends as only He can do. Today I bought milk that expires after Christmas,...

Delicious recipes to fill your cup!

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