Paper bag

Last week when I was at the Kroc center for Zumba, I noticed a stack of brown paper bags next to a sign that read: Families Feeding Families.  I grabbed a bag to take a look at the label glued to the front. It was a shopping list of groceries.  A Kroc worker told me that I could sign up to bring a bag and bring it back filled with the groceries listed on the front.  I LOVED that idea, so I took one.  Bag number 47.

Tonight, for our FHE, we headed off to Fred Meyers with our empty brown paper grocery bag.  The kids had so much fun filling the bag with all the items on the list.  Kimball even got to be a super great helper by reading the list of items for us.

After the store, we took our filled brown paper bag to the Kroc center and dropped it off.  While this was nothing very significant, it really made me happy.  Mostly because of the whole idea of the bag.  We try to donate as much as we can during the holidays, but I'm never one to want to hand off a $20 bill and be done.  I love the idea of being handed an empty bag and physically going to the store as a family and filling it with things that people need.  I love that my kids were able to get involved with this in a big way.  How simple, but so cool!  I wish lots of other places did this as well. Maybe they do and I just haven't noticed.

And of course I'm not posting this as a pat-on-the back, job well-done blurb.  I really love how happy I feel after doing even the smallest bit of service and love that my kids got to experience it too.  And I'm especially thankful after small opportunities like this that I am blessed to come home to a full pantry and warm home when I know all around us are people who don't.  So blessed and very thankful.