FindingJoy4Eternity Blog

Because the banana project has been so well received and loved we had the idea to hand out bananas at the 4th of July parade.  WHAT A HIT!!  People were thrilled and begging for a banana!  Many people thanked us for handing out something healthy.   We prepared almost 2500 bananas and had hundreds of scratch and sniff banana stickers to hand.  It was an amazing success! Our amazing teacher!  You'd have to be amazing to dress up like a banana so you could wave at people!  :) The kids!  A very important part of why we do this kind of thing! The official waver!

One of the most "famous" Bible Lab ideas the Lord has given me so far.  We tie a glow tract and little banana card on each banana and hit the road with our wagon filled to the top.  People are beyond thrilled to receive a banana from the kids!  The kids greet everyone with, "Have a happy, healthy day!"  And, of course, a big smile. On the back of the heart health card is a list of banana health benefits. In stores... At the fire station... At the TV station...on the other side of the door they are interviewing a few of the kids. In the Goodwill... At the drive up portion of the bank...

I think one of the kid's favorite things to do at the nursing home is to help the residents play BINGO.  Some of them are pros at it and need no help, but they enjoy the kids so much that they let them help anyway.  More often than not, the kids walk away with prizes instead of the residents. 

This was my kids favorite care kit to put together.  The kits contained all sorts of school items for kids who couldn't afford their own. My kids magabooked to earn money for their education during the summer so they used some of that money that they had set aside for a missionary project in order to buy these items.  I'm proud of them for loving to give to the Lord.  

Along with the school we had the opportunity to make care kits for children.  These kits contained toys and educational and emergency items.  The kits are handed out during times of disaster.

Back during our evangelism series we made little packages just to welcome the guests (and members who had not been for quite some time!) to church one Sabbath.  I haven't met anyone yet who doesn't like to receive a warm welcome that includes a gift!  

I love random acts of kindness so I was thrilled to find out that WORLD KINDNESS DAY was coming up.  It was on November 13.  We set to work making muffins, bread, and cookies. Early in the morning we set off to the school.  We set a muffin and glow stick on each of the kids desks.  It was a surprise but somehow they knew who did it!!  :) We dropped these off for some church members.  Everyone who came to prayer meeting got one of these packages of cookies!  One peanut butter.  One oatmeal raisin. 

Right after we finished up at the college on October 31 we had to make a stop at Walmart.  We decided that we would leave a few "halloween" type glow tracts laying around the store.  Find a glow tract in each picture...  :) We also had a lot of fun slipping tracts into gift bags, garbage cans, and various other items that were for sale in the store.  We prayed that just the right person would buy the item and find the surprise waiting for them!  :)

I saw that October 31 would fall on a Bible Labs day so I had it my mind that we needed to do something in the community to shed LIGHT since this day is filled with so much darkness.  We love to attach things to glow tracts so we finally decided that we would attach fruit leather to the glow tract entitled Twilight: Is It Just a Story.   This particular glow tract use to be called Twilight Trick or Truth  which would have been perfect for the day, but we went with with we had.  :)  We decided that going over to the college would be perfect!   A small piece of double sided tape did the trick! We ended up with about 150 or so.  We hit as many popular spots on campus as we could before we ran out -- the library, lunch area, the halls.  The college kids and professors alike were thrilled to receive something from the kids on a day in which kids just expect to be given to! 

It's been quite entertaining to participate and help with some of the activities at the nursing home.  Who knew that nursing home residents could bowl??  Well, they can.  And some of them are quite competitive!  The kids take the ball back and help set up the pins.  Once someone bowled the ball right towards them and right on queue they all fell over.  What a hoot it was!!

As part of the Bible Labs program at our local SDA school, we have adopted a nursing home in our area.  It is a win-win situation.  The residents and the workers love to have the children there.  And it is so good for the children to learn to interact and love the elderly population!  We have done many things at the nursing home over the months.  This time it was a singing program!

People love baked goods!  At Christmas time we wanted to thank some of the people in the community who do so much for us.  We attached a note to some muffins and handed them out.   The note said: "Thank you for how you serve our family.  We are so grateful for what you do." We handed these out to our chiropractors, dentist's office, and mailman.

  One Sabbath as a Missionary outreach, the church members made up about 450 of these little packets.  They contained a glow tract, a little card with the saying, and a mint.  It fun to take these to public places where there will be lots of people.  It's also fun to carry them with you in case the Holy Spirit impresses you to hand one out sometime.  I've done both, but the latter happened to me just recently with neat outcome.   David and I went to OH to pick up our "new" Prius this past Tuesday.  Having been up since 4 something we were both very hungry after finally leaving the dealership with our new car.  We stopped to eat and after our meal I left one of these little packets with the tip.  Before leaving the restaurant we needed to use the restrooms so left our "leftovers" where the waitress said we could and finished up so we could be on our way home.  As I walked out of the restroom the waitress comes hurrying over ...