Sunday, December 26, 2010

HAVE YOU FILLED A BUCKET TODAY?

One day while I was working in Trevor's class, his teacher brought over this book to me and had me read it. It is a wonderful story about how all of us have invisible buckets and every time we are kind or thoughtful, we fill those buckets for others. On the other hand, if we are unkind, selfish, rude, etc., we become "bucket dippers" and empty others' buckets. Trevor's teacher had thekids make little paper buckets and for 2 weeks the classmates wrote notes to each other and placed them in their little buckets taped to desks. I had Trevor notice anyone in the class who might not be getting any bucket slips. He found a sweet, sweet boy in the class who didn't have many bucket fillers. Trevor had lots every day. This little boy's mother emailed the teacher that afternoon telling her how excited this sweet boy was that Trevor would send him a little note. What a difference a little note can make in all of our lives.


I decided that this would be a fun experience for my seminary class. The last 2 weeks before Christmas vacation, we filled each others' buckets. I gave them all little buckets (Dollar Tree) and 20 slips of papers (one for each class member AND me!). The papers read......"I want to fill ____________'s bucket by saying "________________" and then there was a "From" line as well. The slips were small (8 to a page) so they didn't have to feel like they had to write a novel. I also made up a sheet of everyone's names so that no one was left out. It was a very wonderful experience.


A week before Christmas, I read this story to all of my family members. Once again, the buckets and slips were passed out. After dinner on Christmas, we went and filled each others' buckets. We all went around 2 times (we had 22 people) and randomly pulled out a bucket filler and read them out loud. My niece summed it up well when she said, "I am so glad I have these so I can read them when I'm feeling down."


I didn't take pictures like the real bloggers because for some reason, I didn't want it to be a "media" experience, if that makes any sense. There was such a fun spirit about this activity and I didn't want to go around taking pictures. Everyone filled out bucket fillers for Heidi and Ryan as well.


It was unanimous that it was a great experience and we raised the idea of doing this every year at Christmas.

Friday, October 22, 2010

The Blessings of the Temple




It has been very exciting to have Ryan and Heidi prepare for missions at the same time. We had the wonderful blessing of witnessing Ryan and Heidi receive their endowments on the same night. It was a little early for Ryan, but he really wanted Robby to be there. Robby was leaving shortly thereafter to experience his internship in Washington DC. It was a great night to be in the temple with 3 of my 5 kids, as well as great family and friends! It was truly a "heavenly" night.