Have you heard of 26 Acts? When I saw friends on Instagram & Twitter posting about 26 Acts, I was intrigued. People were giving away money, gifts and other things to random strangers. After researching I found it was from Ann Curry who had posed the question, “What if everyone did one act of kindness in remembrance of those who died at Sandy Hook Elementary”. It’s an amazing idea. After hearing of this tragedy my heart was saddened, how could we help? We make snowflakes but we wanted to do more. We had a blessed Christmas and wanted to pass along blessings with random acts of kindness.
We participated in 26 Acts where we passed out goodies to strangers, gave cashiers who worked on Christmas lottery tickets, gave Redbox codes w/ treat bags at Redbox and we even delivered goodies to Firefighters on Christmas Eve. This was a fun family activity where we got to bless others, a chance to step out of the chaos of Christmas and make someone’s day brighter. We tried to make it anonymous but sometimes we got a hug from a happy cashier and even a mom who cried.
Our favorite was the firefighters. Not because they gave us a tour of the fire station (even though that freakin rocked) but because I realized my son really understood what blessing others means beyond ourselves. When we were making the gifts, I told him about the little boy who was killed who wanted to be a firfighter and how we should give goodies to the firefighters in remembrance of him. He looked at me and said “that will be nice because that little boy will look down from heaven and it will make him smile”.
Seriously, I balled. And I have balled every time I have told that to someone, Clever Guy’s heart is so pure that this is natural to him. Clever Tween sees it as a challenge and wanted to see how many we could get done by Christmas and how we could do it after. We almost finished 26, just a few more to go but we won’t stop there, we’re hoping to bless others through out the whole year.
You can follow 26 Acts on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/26acts and through the hashtags #26Acts on Twitter and Facebook.
Now this like anything has gotten controversy. Why only 26, why not 27 with doing one for the mother who was killed. I agree, but why stop at 26 or even 27, what if you did one act of kindness everyday for someone? I hope this post inspires at least one person to pay it forward to someone, you never know whos life you will be touching and how that can impact them.
I used the printables from Skinnyemmie.com, thanks for sharing! http://skinnyemmie.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/26_acts_printable.pdf
I love this post, Sara! Just yesterday, i saw Ann Curry’s ad on tv, about the 26 acts of kindness, and finally understood “what” it was all about. I love how you tried to stay anonymous as you shared kindness with others, and the story of your son’s comment about the little boy who wanted to be a firefighter – coupled with the pic of your son w/ a firefighter – was beyond wonderful!
Beautiful story about your son – and a wonderful family activity!