Moms With a Mission- Part 4

Teaching the Alphabet to Toddlers and Pre-schoolers

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I'm sorry that "Moms With a Mission" is a little late this week, I haven't had internet service until today! I hope you enjoy reading this post from Amy as much as I did!

Hi there! I'm Amy, aka One Artsy Mama, and I'm so excited about this Moms with a Mission series that Kate has put together. I feel like it's so important to teach a child not only to be the best he or she can be at academics, sports, and other pursuits, but to be the best person possible. A person who shares and loves and gives. A person who is considerate of others' feelings and who doesn't take his/her own blessings for granted. Because let's face it, our neighbors care a lot more about how we act toward them than whether or not we can solve a complicated math problem.

The holiday season is an important time to focus on serving and giving with our kids because it's so easy for children {and adults too!} to get caught up in the materialism of the season. They see things everywhere that they think they need, and Christmas can become all about the presents in their minds. One thing that my four year old "Little Crafter" and I do to focus on helping others each Christmas is make shoeboxes for Operation Christmas Child to send to needy children around the world..

First, we decide the gender and age for each shoebox we're going to fill. This year, we chose to do one for a boy aged 2-5, and one for a girl in the same age range. We headed to Target, and now that he's four and full of his own ideas and opinions, I let Little Crafter do the choosing for almost everything we bought. I gave him some guidance using the list of suggested gift ideas; for example, I took him to the oral care aisle and told him to choose a toothbrush and a toothpaste for each child, but what he picked was entirely up to him.

When we got home, we wrapped and stuffed the shoeboxes. The second box we had proved too small for all we had bought, so we had to get my mom to bring us a larger one. We attached the appropriate label to each box, then turned them in to someone at our church who took them to one of the official collection centers.

Now, two children somewhere in the world will have a special box full of surprises specially chosen for them by Little Crafter. I think that's pretty special.

Later in December, we'll do another of our favorite annual projects; we {along with the other members of our Bible Study} bake dozens and dozens of cookies and other baked goodies which we distribute to unsuspecting people in our community.

We take them to the firefighters, to people working at fast food drive-thru windows, to people who are outside selling Christmas trees, to shut-ins we know, to the nurses at the nursing home, to the Salvation Army bell ringer outside Walmart...anyone and everyone is fair game when we're delivering them! We do it as a practical way to show love {not only ours, but God's} and we always get a great response!

I love having opportunities to teach him to be aware of the needs and feelings of others and to do things to serve and give. What are your favorite ways to serve with your children?

I'd love for you to stop by One Artsy Mama sometime to see some of the other things LC and I have done together; he loves to make crafts too!

Counting my blessings,

What wonderful ideas Amy, thanks for sharing! I'm definitely feeling inspired to look for some similar activities to do with my little guy too!

I would love for anyone else to share how their family serves "here and now"! Please link up your ideas below or tell us about them in the comments for this post!

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