Bake Sale

A friend of mine said that he thought that blogs were just a way to say "look how clever I am."  I thought about that, and I guess they could seem that way.  This particular post might.  But really, for me, and so many others, it serves as a way to document my life, my thoughts, and my family.  There are so many moments that I don't want to forget, so I do my best to preserve some of them here. 

A few weeks ago, (actually it was the same night as the Nerf gun incident...parenting low point) I sat down and wrote out some things that I would like to be more intentional about teaching Jackson.  One of those things was service.  I started thinking about ways to teach service to a 5-year-old.  I wanted him to have a service project where he could actually do the work and have concrete results.  So, I decided on a bake sale.  That way, he could participate in the service by helping with posters and baking and actually sitting at the table selling our goods. 

Jackson and I had talked about the recent earthquakes in Haiti and Chile, so we decided to give all of our earnings to the American Red Cross for earthquake relief.

We posted signs in our neighborhood the afternoon before our sale.  Then, we went to the grocery store and bought all of our ingredients.  Jackson helped me make a couple of batches of brownies before bedtime.  After he went to bed and while he was at school the next day, I did the rest of the baking.  Finally, we set up a table in our front yard and eagerly awaited our customers.  Jackson did great for the first half-hour, but the sunny outside playtime was too much to resist...especially since our stream of customers was less than steady.  Over the course of two hours we had a grand total of 7 generous customers and made $80!

Yesterday we took the money to our local Red Cross.  Jackson was so proud, and so was I.  It was great to physically hand the money to the organization who is doing so much good for so many people.  They thanked Jackson, wrote him a receipt, and even took his picture.  I think it was a very successful lesson in service and charity.