Tuesday, November 24, 2009

The kids and I did something fun this year that I think will become a family tradition for us. I came across the Samaritan's Purse website and I thought my kids would really enjoy preparing shoe boxes for their Operation Christmas Child project.

I was a little nervous that they might have a hard time picking out a bunch of stuff they liked and then giving it all away, but I didn't need to be. Other than one isolated incident involving Noah trying to take a Jolly Rancher from one of the boxes after they were all packed, they were really excited about sending presents to little kids who wouldn't otherwise be getting very much, if anything, for Christmas.
Emma, Noah, and Allie each got to send a box to a kid in their own age group, although we helped Allie with hers, of course. We went to Target and the dollar store and picked out a bunch of fun goodies to fill the boxes. After we bought the stuff, Emma and Noah drew pictures to put in the boxes, along with photos of themselves.Yesterday we brought our boxes to the drop-off place and watched as hundreds and hundreds of shoe boxes were loaded onto a truck. I'll be getting an email that will tell us where our boxes went and possibly some info about the kids who received them, so we're all looking forward to that. I already marked this on my 2010 calendar and am excited about continuing this tradition every year!

5 comments:

Chick in the Czech said...

Good for you for teaching your kids to give back at a young age! We always did the Angel trees, which I enjoyed. David and I are doing one this year too!

Mary Beth said...

Thank you for the link! I would love to do this with my little boys--I see that can still be mailed in at this point.

Mom said...

What a sweet thing to do!

Anonymous said...

So much fun for your children and such a good learning experience.
A friend of ours has her family pick from the Samaritian Purse catalog and each year their grandchildren pick something to donate to help buy a Lama, goat, a water purifier as part of their Christmas celebration. Richard and I did the Samaritian purse for couple children the age of our littlest ones and had such a good time filling the box. Its what Christmas is all about giving as He gave.
lj

Hamons said...

What a sweet and meaningful project!