The Giving Tour: The Salvation Army

I'll be honest. The kids weren't super thrilled to be spending their Christmas morning volunteering. They immediately thought we'd have cereal for breakfast and be gone all day with no time to play with their new toys. We typically wake up, get some hot cocoa, tea and coffee, open presents and stockings and finish up with Gramma's famous eggs benedict and mimosas.

We had something else in mind...

Our lil' bear and her brother bears on Christmas morning. No more pictures Mommy!

This year we skipped the mimosas and headed to the Tucson Convention Center to help the Salvation Army deliver meals to homebound families on Christmas. We were given 3 addresses and then waited in line to pick up the holiday meals. We even got to pick out a bunch of flowers for each of the families, too! While in line I overheard one of the ladies at the check-in desk saying that there weren't any more volunteers (it looked like no one else was arriving to deliver meals). We ended up taking 3 more addresses for delivery. 

Little Miss had to bring the purse Gramma got her for Christmas

Daddy prepping for all the food

I absolutely love this embrace

The assembly line of volunteers feverishly prepping meals

Full meals: turkey, stuffing, green beans, pie and more!

My little ducky off to volunteer with Mama. I gave her my coat tie (my tail) to hold onto  Here is what she did with it. 

It was nice and a perfect thing to do on Christmas morning. I will also say that although my kids got to pick up the meals, select the flowers and made the effort and all that N fell asleep in the backseat and R wasn't far from it. Those poor kids were exhausted from no sleep the night before. The adults took turns staying in the car with the sleepy kids (even little miss who slept the night before passed out) and the others delivered the meals. I wished they were able to see and meet the people they were helping and one woman in particular was so grateful. She even asked for a hug! I was quite happy to oblige.

Hugs all around for this sweet lady!

This Christmas was our first in the RV. It was different but wonderful. We partook in our traditions and added some new ones to the mix. It was uniquely us and because of that incredibly special. The important part-- insert cheesy line here-- is that we were together (AND that we we were able to break out the mimosas when we got back from volunteering!)!

Hope your Christmas was wonderful! And yes, that is C's smile. HA!