Journey to Bethlehem

My favorite Christmas outing so far has been our Journey to Bethlehem.
Amazing.  It made me think of things on a more personal level.
What is it?  Well, in Cambries words it goes something like this:
       First we had to get passports and new Jewish names.  We had to have passports to show the Roman Soldiers and we had to have them ready to show them at any time.  The Roman Soldiers were very grumpy and kind of scary.

We got adopted into a Jewish family for the night then sent by the Soldiers to pay our taxes and be part of the census.  We had to travel far.  It would have taken us about 7 days to walk to Bethlehem.  Luckily it was only for the evening, in the snow.  It was cold and very wet for us.  We walked and got stopped a few times by the Soldiers and showed them our passports.  (They made Cambrie very nervous and she listened very well.)
We saw the 3 Wise men and they showed us their gifts for the new Messiah.  We talked to the Shepard's and saw an angel who told us the baby had been born.  (It wasn't a real angel, just pretend.  Zane wants everyone to be sure of that.)  We met some thieves in the forest who stole some of our money.  And finally we made it to Bethlehem where we paid our taxes and were counted.
Bethlehem was a busy place.  We saw the market area and looked for somewhere to stay but couldn't find any place.  An Inn keeper told us to pitch a tent beyond the stables but to be quiet because a new baby had been born.  We quietly made our way up to the stable where we saw some sheep and Mary and Joseph.  Mary was holding a new baby, Jesus.  I wanted to see and touch that little baby, which was really only a doll but it seemed so real!
We were all covered in snow, cold, and wet, but this was a wonderful experience.  I felt more for Mary.  How hard all of this had to be on her.  Traveling while being so pregnant.  I don't know if having a baby recently and being able to recall those feelings as we rushed to the hospital help at all.  But man!  How horrible!
This is something that I really would like to do next year.  Cambrie and Zane have both asked if we could too.
If you haven't gone yet you should totally go too.
It's held at the Mountain View Baptist Church on 193 and it runs for about 4 days.
~Shalom~