Adopt a family: December Kindness 2011

For our last Kindness of 2011, we adopted a family from the Salvation army.  Brandon was adamant on having this be our December kindness since he enjoyed buying gifts last year for an unknown family in need.  So I contacted our local Salvation Army at the end of December and requested to adopt a family.  We were given a family of three; an almost 70 year old grandfather raising his 2 grandsons (ages 10 and 11).  We got some ideas on what they wanted and off we went to shop for our adopted family.

While on a mission for pajamas and socks in JCPenney's, Brandon had his own mission to extract Greyson from various clothes rack hide-and-seek spots.  A random passerby actually said to Brandon, "got a little ninja in there?" which Brandon still thinks is hilarious.

Besides jammies and socks for the boys, we also snagged winter hats, toy cars, a puzzle, and a movie.  I was debating on a set of sports balls for them, until I considered that the last thing grandpa wants is flying balls and broken windows for Christmas...so I opted for a game they could all play together instead.

Then it was off to pick up their Christmas day meal - which I always like to include a little breakfast stuff, since it's my favorite meal of the day.  Besides a ham, sides, and desserts, we also included noodles and my family's recipe for Ham Pot Pie so that they can enjoy the leftovers for a day or two after the holiday.

All of our gifts were delivered to the Salvation Army by December 12th so that they had enough time to go through everything and deliver to the family before the big day.

While our kids continue to get bigger (and able to understand concepts a little more), we plan on teaching them about being on Santa's team.  My sister recently sent me a story (hi, Kayla!) that is really sweet and will lift your heart in the giving spirit.  So hopefully, as we continue this kindness through the years, our kids will understand that being a part of Santa's team is just as good as getting presents from him too.

As we sipped our coffee on Christmas morning, Brandon and I smiled at each other and talked about how grateful we were to know that while our son ripped and tore his gifts open on Christmas morning, somewhere in town two other little boys were opening gifts from Santa's team too.

Our December kindness of adopting a family always makes me think of the Swedish Proverb:  "Shared joy is a double joy; shared sorrow is half a sorrow."

Hope you all got to be on Santa's team this year too:)