Waiting for my kids to get up this morning (I know - you would think they would be standing tall at 6am on Christmas morning, huh?!) so I thought I would blog about why they are still sleeping!  ;)

This was maybe the 5th or 6th Christmas Eve in a row for us to participate with my parents' ministry, Restored to Serve, in passing out Christmas presents to families in need - not homeless (although we did distribute about 100 shoeboxes of toiletries and needed items to a homeless shelter earlier in the week) but underemployed or unemployed families trying to make ends meet.  What a tough but good thing for our kids to experience.

They run to the doors of each of the apartments or duplex/quadplex houses to find out if kids live there and if we can bless them with Christmas presents, then run back to the cars to select the presents for that home's kids with a little something for the mom and dad too.  We had amazing testimonies of families that didn't have presents and of one man who made our teenagers cry because what they gave him was the only present he was going to get this year.  Now I'm crying again just typing it!  The love that pours out of our own kids (mine and some other families) while they are sharing God's love on Christmas Eve is the best present a mom could receive.  I love it - maybe even more than what we will do today.  Because Christmas Eve's work is life-changing, today's is memory building, but maybe not life-changing, you know?

Each one had a favorite experience to share - Nicole's was the older man who couldn't believe these kids showed up with a present for him out of the blue - he cried, they cried (Nicole and her 2 friends) and came back wishing they could do even more to bless him just because it blessed them so much the first time they knocked on his door - we sent them back with a little something else for him.  :)

I'll post more later - I have kids waking up now!  Tired as can be, especially for a Christmas morning, but a good tired! 

MERRY CHRISTMAS to you and yours!!!!