Girl on a Journey: Spending: Day 10

So I had my first moment when I shopped outside my 7 designated areas. The stuff was not for my family, and all for donation (which I knew would be a possibility… hence placing it in the rules) so zero guilt. Operation Christmas Child… we love it! We have been participating in this program for… well this is our 8^th year, crazy! If you don’t know anything about Operation Christmas Child it is definitely worth checking out. In a nutshell it provides Christmas presents (shoeboxes full of toys, hygiene items, candy, and booklet about Jesus) for children all over the world, even very remote places, and while doing that opens the doors to learning about Jesus Christ. They have a follow-up program… it really is a miraculous, insanely well put together organization. You can check it out here:

http://www.samaritanspurse.org/what-we-do/operation-christmas-child/

(FYI… I have never made it through an OCC video without shedding tears… you have been warned.:)) This is also through Samaritan's Purse, the same place that my kids are trying to purchase a well for an entire village to have clean drinking water. Great organization!http://www.samaritanspurse.org/what-we-do/operation-christmas-child/

For the last several years I just keep a large tub in my basement that collects OCC appropriate items throughout the year. That way when I see a great bargain on a large quantity of things, I just buy them. I would never buy 90 bracelets for one child… but I find them super cheap, I can put those in my tub then lots of little girls get bracelets when we bring our stuff to the packing party.

This was the first year each of my kids packed their own boxes. Everyone was given a set dollar amount and then allowed to shop to fill their box for someone their own age. I LOVED watching them do this! It was an amazing feeling to watch my children carefully pick out each thing that would be the “perfect” item. Each child got their own shopping basket and was instructed it must have toothbrush and toothpaste (which Landen fought me hard on…didn’t see the need). Addi struggled only having one basket. At one point in time she had two baskets (because they are at then end of the aisle… so she took it upon herself to grab an extra) so she could get stuff for her in one basket and stuff for her designated child in the other. This picking out things you like to give away is a hard concept for a 3 year old… this is probably why I have waited so long to do it. Everyone (except Addi) was really excited to get home and pack their box for their “Christmas Child” as Eleni kept referring to them.

Their individual purchases.

all their packed boxes and the extras.

We (Addi and I) took our packed boxes and our “extra” stuff to the MOPS packing party. Our local MOPS group is what introduced me to OCC years back, so even though I don’t belong to the local MOPS group anymore, they were super kind and allowed me to join in on the packing party! Always love doing it (and Addi had a good time playing with other kids for the morning). We, as a group, packed 150+ boxes to be shipped out. So AWESOME!

Packing party!

We also hit the dentist today… all 6 of us! Insurance change has us at a new dentist… so we all went in for check-ups and teeth cleanings. It was a long 2 ½ hours, but we survived. Landen (who often lies about brushing teeth and has to be sent back to “do it again” refer to the above of fighting me on packing the toothbrush) was our cavity culprit… good thing dentist/doctor is on the list because we will have to head back. Addi had her first full blown cleaning. She has been 2 other times, but this is the first time she sat through an entire cleaning. She was a superstar and took it like a champ!