Packing boxes for Samaritan's Purse is always a pre-Christmas project for our family. We used to all go to the $ store, boxes in hand, selecting and packing as we went up and down every aisle, each finding treasures for a faraway child. With our mission accomplished, boxes stuffed with fun for someone else, we'd eat a meal out somewhere as a treat.
Those were good times!
That's not how it goes more recently, and certainly not this year. Since the boxes have to be packed and turned in before Thanksgiving, it's a stretch for me, more and more, to rally the Men and get those boxes packed! This year, with the bigger boys seeming so much older, I ended up with only one willing, store-going boy partner to help pick out box items. So I stuffed some bags full of small goodies, bought and brought them home, and everyone packed their boxes out of the bags, instead of selecting for themselves from the store shelves. Hmmm....
I don't think it's that the bigger boys don't delight in giving anymore ... well, OK, they are self-centered teens right now, so no, they're not at their Empathetic Peak in life. At least, I hope they're not! We hope (is it faith?) that going through the motions of giving may cause it to be one value that will endure through this phase of their lives, emerging and even blooming in their maturity.
Lord, let it be so!
I am trying to get our family box together this week! It comes up so quickly but is so rewarding to do in the weeks leading up to Thanksgiving! P.S. My husband's involvement is looking at what I bought. :)
ReplyDeleteWe do this each year too. It's lots of fun buying all the goodies to stuff inside. Like your family ours has made it a family ting as well. But the past two years it's been a mom thing. Everyone gets so busy.
ReplyDeleteThis year I found out that my daughter and my daughter-in-law each did their own family boxes. A tradition continued!
I so used to enjoy doing this, and then thinking on Christmas Day about the child who opened our box, and hoping it brought some joy. 'Operation Shoebox' it's called over here. I haven't done it for a few years - actually because I haven't known of a collection point since we moved to a different part of the country. I know what you mean about how our traditions have had to change as our boys have got older, though.....
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