Tonight was Cookie Baking Night. In attendance this evening: Carissa, Allison, Rylar, Enzo, and Abigail.
Allison has been busy with soccer games and soccer practices for the past month, so we postponed her birthday choice until tonight. For supper she chose: Macaroni & Cheese, strawberries, and blueberries. For her "cookie" choice: Muddy Buddies.
Muddy Buddies, also known as puppy chow, is a mixture of Chex cereal covered in a mixture of melted chocolate and peanut butter, and coated in powdered sugar.
Allison's choice tonight was a Cookie Baking Night first. The kids enjoyed making this one for the first time.
In honor of Allison's birthday, as an activity tonight we did something that Allison has a particularly tender heart for. We packed Operation Christmas Child Shoeboxes.
First, we had to assemble a few boxes.
For being the youngest, Abigail caught onto "box assembly" the quickest. It came naturally to her.
And now the filling of the boxes. The Operation Christmas Child project through Samaritan's Purse ministry is also one that is dear to my heart. The ministry takes shoeboxes filled with gifts and distributes them to children in different countries all around the world. The boxes are not only a chance to give a gift to someone else but they are an opportunity to share the gospel with children all around the world.
I shop clearance sales all year long and collect items for the boxes. Papa-Larry also orders items in bulk like soap, flashlights, toothbrushes, yo-yos that we use in boxes. Our "collections" made for an orderly little assembly line of many choices to pack in our boxes.
Everyone did a great job personalizing their boxes and thinking of the child it would go to.
(On a side note: Allison is a generally happy kid and pretty content in life. This project, however, brings out a joy in her beyond her norm. I usually have to remind Allison to smile when I'm taking her picture, she always looks so serious, but no prompting here--this one was natural).
No one could stop at one box. We had 11 packed boxes by the time the evening was done.
While we were packing boxes, Enzo chose to keep the house in good repair.
In between box packing, Abigail joined Enzo in his efforts. Their diligence was appreciated.
On a final note, we are enjoying the new children's Bible series from Kaleidoscope. We finished up Romans a few weeks ago, and now we are reading through "The Saga of the Seed", the book of Genesis. It is a retelling of the books of the Bible at an elementary children age level. They are really well written at a level that engages the children without distorting the integrity of the Scriptures. I highly recommend checking out the Kaleidoscope children's Bible book series.
Another Cookie Baking Night has come and gone and, as usual, a fun time was had by all.
