As most of you probably know, Tuesday April 22 was Earth Day.  We knew this day represented an opportunity that was full of teachable moments.

The first thing we decided to do about Earth Day, was go out and clean up our neighborhood.  Daddy even made the kids each their own poker sticks!… so they didn’t have to pick things up with their hands too much.  They were so excited to get out there, and get to work!

While we had noticed unsightly trash on the roadsides before, once we got to cleaning it up, it amazed us just how much there was around, sticking out of leaf piles and strewn about here and there.  What my husband and I really smiled about, was hearing the rumblings between the kids, about how they just couldn’t believe people would throw trash on the ground, and ruin God’s beautiful Creation.  {S} said to me at one point, as he proudly brought more ugly findings to the barrel, “Mama, God is really happy with us, for cleaning up His world. Right?”  And I confirmed his thoughts.

 

The kids were so into it, as we all worked together, making a difference in our neighborhood.  They were obviously enjoying every bit of it, but I really cracked up when I happened to notice that everyone had their own yucky expression on their faces, as they worked.  Even us grown ups!  It was a yucky job, and just hard to comprehend the mess around.

Our barrel filled up with little things pretty quickly, and towards the end we found some larger items that barely fit on top:  a huge gas can, a full unopened jug of tiki torch fluid (?), a real estate sign, and if you can believe it……

…..a bike we had noticed in the woods for many days. It was in pretty decent shape too.  (We later called the police to come pick it up as found property.)

We all walked back home with the sense of a job well done, and enjoyed the cleaner view around us as we did.  The kids didn’t want to stop cleaning up, but our barrel was full, and we had other projects (and work of our own) on our day’s agenda.  We promised them we would head out again soon.

 

When we got home, we talked about other ways we can care for the gifts and blessings of the amazing and beautiful world God has given us.  We discussed the importance of turning off lights when we leave a room, not letting the water run as we brush our teeth, recycling everything we can, trying not to buy more than we really need to meet our needs, and how there is always more ways to contribute to what is best for our global environment.

Then the little ones colored an Earth Day page.  We all got a hardy chuckle out of {O’s} picture, with all of the skin going on there. (See below, middle). I mean, talk about really relying on your natural resources!!  All we could see was shoes on the girl!  But {O} cleared up our  in-accurate assumptions (with a tad of disgust with us), and assured us that the girl did indeed have clothing on behind the globe. She said she had on “a tank top and shorts, or something”.  (Phew! )

We are going to start trying to use the blank backs of most of our coloring pages from now on, starting with these.  We aren’t the greenest family around, although we are greener than some. : )  In researching about other ways we can do better, it was nice to realize we are doing many things right.  But we also noticed areas where we can do better, and more.

To wrap up our Earth Day projects, we had Devotion & Cocoa.  Family Devotion is something we do every day, and I plan to post about this wonderful bit of our day that we all look so forward to, and the books we use for it.  But the cocoa was a bonus treat today!

To our surprise and delight,  the Scripture and discussion in our Devotion book was Earth Day themed!  It really helped review and round out all of the lessons of our day, and had a beautiful closing prayer I thought I would share with you.  We hope you had a wonderful and Happy Earth Day too!

Creator of all, thank you for the beautiful world You made. Help me to live in a way that shows love and respect for You and for Your creation.  Amen.