Lent

I've been trying this year to make Lent about service. I've been inspired by various blogs and Pinterest pins to commit to more acts of service and random acts of kindness. By posting this, I hope to make myself more accountable for the rest of the season. Part of my reason for focusing on service is to show Max how important it is to serve others and to be kind, so I'm trying to do things that involve him as well. I made a list of ideas we could do, with the idea of doing one for every day of Lent but we definitely have not accomplished that. A few things we have done so far:

• We bought food with the intention of taking it to a local food pantry, but then our church had a food drive for that food pantry this week so that made it even easier. Max helped pick out the food. 
• We're taking a meal this week to some friends whose 3 year old son was in the hospital over the weekend with a staph infection. Thankfully he's doing much better and is home now. We also sent him a balloon and car while he was in the hospital. 
• Max picked out a present just from him for Matt's birthday.
• We just started a "responsibility" chart for Max. His jobs include feeding the dog and clearing his dishes from the table. I think this will teach him that we all serve each other within the family too and so far he's doing a great job with it.

I'm planning for Max to help me cut flowers and take them to his teachers at school this week. Hopefully over spring break we will do some others, like taking treats to the fire station just down the street and having Max help write a letter to the kids we sponsor through Compassion/World Vision.

I hope that by focusing on this over Lent it will become more of a habit. Service is something we value in our family, and by talking more about it and doing more that Max can participate in, I hope that he begins to see what it means to serve others and show kindness, even to those we don't know.