Giving Back  As A Daily Habit

Here in North America, we are so blessed.  Most of us have a good job, food, friends, a roof over our head.  Yes, we contribute to disasters such as Katrina and the Tsunami we had back in the start of the new year, but what do we do on a daily basis and better still what do you we do about teaching our kids about being charitable.

We live in a not only keep up with the fictional ‘Joneses’ but go above and beyond what they have.  And I find that we are teaching our kids the same lesson.  My daughter has a friend who is 12 now, but even when she was 8, she had her own TV, VCR, phone, phone line, all the little toys a kid shouldn’t live without.  Seriously, what will she have to save and work for when she is a teenager?  Plus, I actually want to see my daughters once in a while.  It makes me wonder what’s next?  A mini fridge and a small grill?  Ok, ok I know I am exaggerating, but you get the picture.

I am thinking that if our kids see us help with our community, they will want to do it too.  I know what you are saying, it is hard to physically help out, all I can do is send them a cheque. That’s not so bad either.  During the summer, it was hot, the girls were bored with nothing to do and for years, I have collected beads.  I had talked to a missionary from Africa and wanted my daughters to think outside of their own little world.  So my daughters and I decided to make bracelets to sell and send the money to less fortunate kids their own age all over the world.  My younger daughter sorts out the beads and packages the bracelets while my older daughter and I make bracelets.

Helping out in a soup kitchen, having a yard sale and donating the profits to charity, even collecting used clothing (a friend of mine did this for the victims of the tsunami).