Operation Christmas Child

It's that time again! Time for Operation Christmas Child. We always look forward to November for several reasons, one of those being Operation Christmas Child. Every year our church is majorly involved in the collection of shoe boxes that later will travel across the world and be delivered to a child. In most cases this will be the only gift they receive for Christmas. More importantly than the shoebox stuffed with gifts is the little booklet they receive that tells them in their own language about Jesus and His ultimate gift.

Our home school group always picks a day during the collection week and volunteers to help collect boxes.

While we wait for people to come drop off their boxes we inspect, fill, and wrap other boxes. Here is Seth wrapping a shoebox.

Noah and Chloe finishing up a box that needed a few more goodies.

Seth is ready with the cart. They love it when someone comes with a car full of boxes. This was only the second day of collection week and you can see the mountain of boxes behind Seth.

Yea! Boxes are here. Everyone is ready to help out.



More boxes!



While we were there we decided to go ahead and finish our boxes.



The boys really enjoy picking out toys for their boxes.



Most of the time we purchase way to much stuff and end up trying to cram it all in.



Rearanging, trying to make it all fit.

Okay. I think we managed to get it all in and with the help of rubber bands manage to keep the lids on. The one thing I always like to include in our boxes is a personal letter from each of the boys. They write a short (or long in Seth's case!) letter telling their kid about themselves and asking them questions. One year we actually received a letter back and that was really special. His picture is still on our refrigerator and every time I notice it I try to stop whatever I'm doing and pray for him. I hope we get letters again from these boxes.

Seth with his finished box.

Noah and his box. It's really sweet to see the things they think of to put in their boxes. Joshua was in class so I wasn't able to get a picture of him with his box.

Oh yeah, we can't forget about the pizza. Another favorite part of Operation Christmas Child. LUNCH!

Family Trip - Blowing Rock

Last weekend we took a day trip to the mountains.



For lunch we ate at the Mellow Mushroom. YUM!



Some of us could hardly wait for the food. I wont name any names...

ahem...noah!

Then we went shopping... window shopping that is. There were quite a few unique shops to browse through. One of our favorites was this hat shop, which we almost got kicked out of, because we were trying on all the hats. Seth's sombrero was so massive it almost didn't fit down the aisle.

wouldn't he make a handsome matador?

Our next stop was Mystery Hill. We have heard a lot about this house where gravity supposedly defies the laws of nature. You can read more about it here.

All of these pictures are taken straight and yes they are really leaning that far.



Here is a picture of Seth standing in the doorway. Cool huh?

It was really hard to walk across the room with out falling over. I wasn't able to go all the way in the room, because of issues with my ears and equilibrium. When I first walked into the room I immediately got dizzy, so I decided to stay in the doorway and take pictures.

This was a cool shot of Joshua going down the stairs.



Seth going up...



..and then down.



This was their favorite part of the whole trip.

can you tell?



In another room there were illusion type brain games/puzzles...

... and bubbles. We stayed here a long time trying to get the bubble completely around Noah. This is the closest we got. We thoroughly enjoyed this day getaway, even though we never made it to the actual mountain!