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Meaningful Christmas giving

Since we were out of town over the Thanksgiving weekend, our family is a little behind on our usual Christmas traditions.

One of my favorites is sending some Christmas goodwill from the World Vision gift catalog. We usually cap off our Thanksgiving celebration and kick off the Christmas season by allowing our children to pick a selection from the catalog. We all love this tradition, which brings out the true spirit of the season for our family. World Vision Catalog

Are you familiar with World Vision and its gift catalog? World Vision is a Christian humanitarian organization that makes a difference around the world. Selections in the catalog are gift options for people around the world – what World Vision calls “gifts of hope.”

Gift options include chickens, goats, pigs, fishing kits, fruit trees, and drought-resistant seeds to provide an ongoing source of food to help hungry families. Other choices are life-saving medicines, vaccinations, and mosquito nets that help prevent malaria. Educational gifts are also available, such as school supplies, a bicycle for a girl’s safe transportation to school, or a sewing machine or career training to help women in poverty-stricken countries.

Browsing through the catalog together with our kids is a wonderful teachable moment to talk about the needs in other parts of the world and our calling as Christians to show compassion, as Jesus modeled for us. We can focus on the privilege of giving something truly meaningful.

This year my children chose to give a goat, which will provide milk, cheese, and yogurt. It’s great to see them joyfully find a gift they want to provide to help meet the need of someone across the globe!

The World Vision catalog is available online at worldvisiongifts.org.

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Days of thanks: Getting things done

Whew! We’ve had some busy weeks.

My kids have each had big assignments to complete for school. Somehow those always end up being big projects for the parents, too, don’t they? Supplies and library books are needed; they need help finding illustrations. It’s a balancing act to provide the right amount of help while ensuring they’re learning their own project management skills.

Meanwhile, I gave myself outdoor projects that had to be finished before the cold weather rolled in for the winter. After I painted our front door, the shutters needed a new, coordinating color as well. I also had to complete the patio project I promised to our boys to give them an area to play basketball.

Today I’m thankful we’ve finally wrapped up all of these projects!

The English writer Samuel Johnson said, “Life affords no higher pleasure than that of surmounting difficulties, passing from one step of success to another, forming new wishes and seeing them gratified.”

None of the projects we completed quite lives up to his lofty description, but it is a great feeling to have them done!

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Days of thanks: Celebrating the past and present

Thanksgiving week brings a lot of excitement to our home each year. We all look forward to the wonderful meal and time with family. Then Friday is our official kickoff of the Christmas season. In our family, we don’t start Christmas until we’ve celebrated Thanksgiving. And the kids are definitely ready to start on Christmas!

This year we have the added joy of attending a wedding this weekend. We have so many wonderful things to enjoy this week.

Each year Thanksgiving and the Christmas season also bring back many happy memories of past celebrations. I’m so thankful for both our present blessings and our past joys.

There are people who aren’t with us anymore, and they are greatly missed. But I’m thankful for the time we had together and the great memories we have of them. We’ll remember them and recall happy times together. Those memories are a special part of each holiday season.

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