Back in November our church announced that they were doing Operation Christmas Child boxes and we knew we wanted to do one with Hope. Jaye and I have done them in the past and I have always loved doing this together as Jaye has the most generous and thoughtful heart. When we'd go as a couple I used to find myself gravitating towards dollar bin items, where Jaye didn't care, he wanted whatever would be best for the child receiving the box.
This year, we wanted to get Hope involved. Our friend Mary Rice Hopkins has a kid's TV show that airs on Saturday mornings. This particular Saturday we tuned in to watch and it was all about Operation Christmas Child and filling the boxes. Hope watched the show and we talked about how the boxes were to help kids all over the world and I told her that maybe we could make a special box too. When Jaye woke up that morning she told him, "Daddy, I want to put shoes in boxes". He knew what she meant.
We went shopping together, all 3 of us, and helped Hope pick things for her box. We told her we were making the box for a little girl who was 2, just like her. I don't know what she totally got it, but she did get the fact that this was not a day to get things for herself...we were picking special things to go in our box. We had a lot of fun shopping and talking about what the little girl might like. Hope picked out the toothbrush and toothpaste, she picked special princess hair clips, a princess phone, etc.
We discovered this year that if you pay for your box online then you can print out the label and they'll track where in the world your box goes. SO COOL! We printed off our label, packed up our box and Hope very proudly delivered her box to church the next morning. (the picture at the top is from Sunday morning when we were going to take our box to church) When she dropped off her box she got a special sticker and wore it proudly! I love that we can start this tradition together and begin even now to teach her what it means to help others!
