Service & Giving

Day 9:

Service

When we did our 25 days to Christmas countdown list I told my kids that we had to have at least 3 days of service along the way.  We didn't plan anything specifically because I knew that we could find several opportunities.  Wednesday night, I received an email from my Ward Relief Society, telling us about a Toy Drive that was taking place this coming Saturday and letting us know that they were in desperate need of gently used toys.  They had invited several families to come and pick out toys for their kids, but didn't have enough.  I thought this would be the perfect activity for our Service day.  I knew that we had several toys that were never played with anymore and still in good condition.  I could have easily packed them up and taken them over and they would have never missed those specific toys, but I wanted them to be a part of it.  I wish that I could say it was easy, but it wasn't.  There were many tears.  Those toys that have been out of sight for a very long time quickly became very important again.  I didn't force them to give anything away, but we all sat down and talked about service, sacrifice and giving to those less fortunate for about 20 minutes.  I cried a little as I recounted stories from my childhood and they cried as well knowing that it was the right thing to do.  It was so neat to see and hear them talking about it amongst themselves afterwards.  Jayson picked out one of his nice toys and was adamant that it needed to go to another little boy.  I couldn't help but cry a little bit as I watched them all. 

In the end we had 5 big bags of nice toys that we could donate.

 I let them deliver them to the lady in charge of the whole thing.

It was sweet.  I am so proud of them.  On the way home Tayler said "Mom, what does the Holy Ghost feel like again"   and in the dinner prayer, Rylee said "thank you for letting us give some toys to other kids."  It was definitely my favorite day so far.