December opportunities...

December brought cool weather and many cups of hot chocolate.

It also brought opportunities to help the girls see more than presents under the tree. The more they understood the special joys of giving the more exciting the season became.

Sophie played Christmas carols at a nursing home while Mackenzie, Haleigh and I made some new friends among the audience.

Haleigh's Cubby group decorated a tree with gloves, hats and scarves for Miracle Hill Children.

One special outreach tugs on my heart every time I think of it. It is a partnership our church has made in Liberia. We are working toward building a "reading room" and supplying the books for children and adults who may never have had the opportunity to read. Our community group rallied our children to donate some of their books as well as some new books to send to Liberia. It was so fun to see the huge stacks just from our group of kids.

And finally this year, we actually got our Operation Shoe Boxes packed and sent. I have planned to do this for the last several years, but it always seems to slip under the radar until it was too late. Our co-op joined forces and stacked the boxes high. We just received an email with notification that our boxes traveled to Lebanon.

(One of the most touching things was hearing Sophie lead her co-op class in praying for the children who would receive the boxes.)

Our church challenged us to be mindful of the leading of the Holy Spirit to ways to give throughout the Chirstmas season. As we shuffled through the business of December we were blessed over and over as we heard the Spirit lead us to love on others around us. The girls watched with a keen eye to see how we could help. We were able to look for small ways to give as we moved about our days because we have seen how Our Lord and Savior has given Himself for us.