At last week's staff meeting, our director of youth ministry told us that he and his family had been invited to an "Ugly Sweater Party." It was the variation known as the "Ugly Christmas Sweater Party" where everyone comes in an "ugly" sweater of the Christmas variety.
He told us that he was a little worried about finding ugly sweaters for them to wear. Turns out, it was no trouble at all. If you google "sweater" you get a respectable number of hits. If you google "ugly sweater" you get hundreds of hits. They were able to get ugly sweaters for the whole family, including their two toddlers.
Turns out, ugly sweaters are kind of a hot item, as are the parties. This shows how out of the loop I am. I had never heard of an "ugly sweater party".
I just went on line to find a few ugly sweaters myself. Some of them looked all right to me, until I did a close up of the picture, so I could see the design. Others were obviously ugly at first sight. And a couple of them -- dare I say this -- looked ok to me. I shudder.
There's something so "right" about the popularity of ugly sweaters right now. The formerly despised, now finding a home, like the toys from the Island of Misfit Toys, or the Puppy That Wanted A Boy. There's something hopeful about ugly sweaters being popular. Not exactly the ugly duckling becoming a swan, but the ugly duckling being wanted just for himself.
May all of us, ugly, garish or useless, too large or too small, be redeemed and made useful and beautiful in God's eyes.
P.S. I am more out of the loop than I realized. Go over to this post at Quotidian Grace's and read more about this amazing trend!
7 comments:
Beautiful!
That's the best sermon I've read this morning. Really. Beautiful.
Love to Scout.
Lindy and Rowan
PS- Rowan wants to know if "Table Talk" includes Table scraps... you know where his priorities are.
This is inspiring -- I think I just might have to have one of those 'Ugly Sweater' parties!! Sounds fun!
Diane, I had not heard of the ugly sweater parties, either, so I suppose I'm out of the loop, too.
May all of us, ugly, garish or useless, too large or too small, be redeemed and made useful and beautiful in God's eyes.
Amen!
Quotidian Grace had a post awhile back about ugly sweater parties...
as i read your post i thought "mmm this would make a great children's sermon." because children would find the loud colors and such on said sweaters attractive...which teaches us something about having faith like a child doesn't it?
however... i draw the line at "holiday sweaters" that have battery operated lights in the "breast-region" ahem.
yeah, hot cup, me too.. I'll have to see if I can find Quotidian Grace's post and link to it...
Nifty.
Here, the trend among young people is to have a "tacky Christmas sweater" party. Someone told me that ten years ago, that was called "My mom's Christmas sweater" party. Ex-elementary school teachers (like me) have those kind of sweaters.
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