It's the Little Things

I never finished blogging about this, but this summer, all six kids and I took part in a service project for 77 Kids by American Eagle. I wrote about how we served lunch to the families staying at a local Ronald McDonald House HERE. But I never wrote about the second part of our mission.

77Kids also gave each blogger $77 dollars in singles to use in whatever pay-it-forward way we wanted. This was right around the time that my kids went on a mission trip with my church, so I gave the money to the youth leader and told her to use it however she saw fit to help with the kids' mission work.

On the way home from the mission trip to MI, the junior high kids stopped in a town and handed out these dollars to the folks they saw on the street. Attached to each dollar was a note. On one side of the note were ideas of things you could do with the dollar - things like buy a stranger a cup of coffee, pay someone's toll, etc. On the other side, were ideas you could do for free - things like open the door for someone, shovel a neighbor's sidewalk, etc.

The idea was not only to pass these dollars on to people to show them that someone cares, but to encourage them to continue the chain of kindness by paying it forward.
(I love that 77Kids chose a project like this for their advertising!)

This was the best part of the mission trip for a lot of the kids, including my Jackson. They loved handing out these dollars! Not only did they hand them out, but they took a minute to talk with the people they gave them to. They explained what the dollars were for. Just think. What if every one of these people, in turn, did something nice for one other person? And what if every one of those people turned around and did something nice for yet another person? How cool would that be?!

It doesn't take much to be a blessing in another person's life - a smile, a moment to talk, a mere dollar, a simple act of kindness. You never know how far that little act will travel. :)