Sweet Memories from Our AWANA Kids' Shoe Box Packing Party

Two sweet children gave us a couple of fun memories from our Spur of the Moment Packing Party this year for Operation Christmas Child.  We had the children fill out the OCC letter forms the week before the party.  My daughter was organizing them, readying them for the party, and as she did it she saw one from a sweet little guy she works with each week so she read it.  Under "your favorite thing to spend time doing" he had put down "look for acorns."  LOVE IT!!!  I am an outside type of gal, and with the new age of electronics, kids are so often having to be told to play or get outside, that this warmed my heart.  I have fond memories from my own and my children's childhoods of "looking for acorns."

This same little guy listened intently as my husband emphasized to remove just ONE item from each box to put into their shoe boxes.  My daughter was with him as he began down the line.  He reached the first box.  It contained ziploc bags full of school supplies.  He picked up one of the bags and began trying to get it open and when Sarah asked why he was opening it he said, "I have to choose just one item from this box to put in."  She assured him one "bag" full of school supplies counted as one item.

We had purchased the playhouse type balls to include the boxes. When organizing the fillers by age groups we pulled out all of the pink balls and put them in the 5 to
9 year old girl "ball" box.  A little girl came up to the box, looked in and turned abruptly to face my daughter and asked excitedly, "are these boxes going to girls?"  My daughter assured her they were, whereupon she happily turned around and picked one up to put in her box as she said, "good thing, because I was NOT going to put a pink ball in a boy's box!"

I just love kids!  My sister once told me, "I finally figured out why kids like you so much.  You're just one of them!"  Maybe that's why I like them so much, too.

You can see more pictures here of our Spur of the Moment Operation Christmas Child Packing Party.