12 Days of Service Jar for Christmas

Remember our Gratitude Jar we do in November? The service activities have really had an impact on my children. My husband and I were discussing it one evening, and he said, “I wish we could continue this into next month. Maybe like 12 Days of Service or something.” And so that’s exactly what we’re doing! We decided to do a spin off of the gratitude jar, except this time the activities are only service-oriented.

So, we made a list of some people in our community that we could serve. I put them on gift tags and placed the tags in a jar. You could easily do this as an advent idea, but we decided to limit ours to 12 because this season gets so busy. On the nights that we are free, we’ll pull out one at dinner time and figure out a way we can serve that person. My thought is that I’d like to do more than just baking cookies each time, although we will definitely include baking! It would be fun to hang the tags on a tree or branches (I’m thinking silver) in a vase.

We’re really excited to try this! We’re hoping this will help us turn our thoughts and hearts to Christ.

My friend and neighbor suggested that this would be a fabulous neighbor gift! I LOVE that idea!! And obviously, you could do this any time of year, not just at Christmas.

Here are some ideas (many from YOU):

grandparents                           stranger

mailman                                   Bishop (Church leader)

neighbors                                 friends

soldiers                                     Primary teacher (children’s Church leader)

school teacher                         music/dance teacher or coach

someone in need                    librarian

doctor/dentist                         co-workers/boss

bus driver                                organization (like Salvation Army, Toys for Tots, etc)

elderly (at a facility)              firefighters

baby-sitter                              missionaries

grocer/pharmacist

Can you think of anyone else?