The Part of Christmas I'm Most Excited About

In a few days, we'll drive to the bank and ask for a lot of ones.

It's just how we do it.

The catalog has been out for several weeks, and Ella, Isaac and Isaias have already circled and written their names on the pictures of what they would like to give.


When we gather together to celebrate our own family Christmas, this is my favorite thing, my favorite part, my favorite tradition. It's what I look forward to most each year. Each child sits with their own stack of one-dollar bills and waits while Ella turns the pages of the catalog to remind everyone what they had previously marked.

Then we take turns with each child, counting out their money, writing down the gifts they have chosen on a piece of paper. If there is money left over, or if there is a costly gift that one of our children in particular *really really* wants to give, everyone pitches in some money from their stack or Adelia and Audra will be sweet-talked to part with some of those papers in front of them or Mark and I will agree to add in a certain sum of our money, so that we are able to get it.

Then we sit with the list, remind the kids what they've chosen to give, and we take turns praying. We thank God for His generosity to us, we pray for the gifts we have carefully chosen, and we ask God to bless those who would receive them, and that He would multiply each one.

Would you consider giving this type of gift this Christmas? Here are two organizations I heartily recommend:

Samaritan's Purse~Samaritan's Purse Gift Catalog
Compassion International~Gifts of Compassion Catalog

"Christ has no body on earth but yours,
no hands but yours,
no feet but yours.
Yours are the eyes through which
Christ's compassion for the world is to look out;
Yours are the feet with which He is to go about doing good;
and yours are the hands with which He is to bless us now."
~Saint Teresa of Avila