100 Acts of Kindness

Looking through my house a while ago, I determined that we have way too many things. Toys, clothes, movies, books, too much of everything. In the interest of making sure that my children don’t grow into ungrateful little monsters, we have decided to make some much needed changes to the way we live.
One night while mindlessly scrolling through my Twitter feed I came across an article about a man from Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan, who was in the process of performing 1000 acts of kindness in his community. Feeling inspired, but knowing that 1000 of anything is likely too ambitious for my little ladies, we’ve settled on 100.
100 acts of kindness that can be performed throughout the year, starting with this Christmas and ending with the next. We have already performed our first act, and the girls were very happy to do it! Last night we took them to the mall where they picked Santa’s Anonymous presents. The big girls each picked a child off of a Christmas tree- L picking a seven year old girl and P picking a three year old girl- and then we went to Toys R Us to pick out the gifts. We had a lot of fun browsing and in the end the girls picked some great gifts that they each out a lot of thought into.
I was so proud of them for understanding what they were doing and for not asking if they could have something that my mind went immediately to rewarding them with some kind of gift. Knowing that they would defeat the purpose of this whole endeavor, I decided that the reward should be feeling good about helping others.
Our next act involves all of us packing up the things that we don’t need and donating them to a few different places. I have way too many clothes that go unworn, Big Daddy has way too many books. The ladies will be packing up the majority of their toys and too-small clothes. Toys that they actively play with, no more than ten each, can be kept. They can keep their art supplies, and the stuffed animals that have sentimental value. The goal is to strip the house of all of the excess. Relying on things to make us happy is not the lesson I want to teach my daughters, and I think that by teaching them go pass things on to others when they are done is a good way to help teach that. I want giving to become second nature to them, and even though we are starting during a holiday season, by continuing throughout the year they will see that is important to care all year round-not just when we think Santa is watching.
I have some more ideas lined up for our year of giving and learning, and I have every intention of continuing the cycle for as many years as i can. who knows, maybe when the girls have families of their own, they will continue the tradition!
If you have any suggestions for acts of kindness, please pass them on! Has anyone out there reading done something like this? Let’s talk about it! Reach me via the comments here, or on Twitter! (@thesagemum) Let’s get a discussion going on ways to make our children more kind, forgiving, empathetic people.
I will keep track of our progress here, so stay tuned for more good deeds!