Martin Luther King Jr. Day

So, apparently in 1994, Congress passed a resolution that Martin Luther King Jr. Day should be a day of service for our country.  Instead of taking the "day off" people should have a "day on" and help out in the community somehow.  I didn't find out about this resolution until a few days ago. That is quite a legislative lag if I've every heard of one.  

For a while now, I have been wanting to get my kids involved in community service.  The idea is that if they help others they won't become so self-involved and self-centered.  Acquiring material possessions will not be the focus of their lives.  We have done a few service projects here and there, but I thought why not do one on Martin Luther King Jr. Day?  The problem is how much can a 4 year old and a 2 year old really do?  So, we decided to pick up trash at the park.  They were really excited about this.  I think a lot of the excitement came from the Backyardigans episode they have been watching about a space-age garbage truck.  But, whatever works.  I got everyone different colored plastic gloves and off we went.  The only problem we ran into was that apparently we live in a very clean place.  We went to three different parks and couldn't find any trash.  It was very disappointing.  After driving around a while, we finally found some trash across from a school.  The school grounds themselves were immaculate, but we found all the trash that had blown away from the school.  The kids thought it was great frolicking in the field collecting "stinky trash".  (Stray school papers and chip bags hardly constitute as being stinky, but this is kid talk.)

Next it was time for service project number 2.  The "yes we can" can in honor of Barak Obama's campaign slogan.  (I didn't come up with this on my own.)  We decorated soup cans and covered the tops with a slit to hold coins.  The idea is for the kids to collect coins to donate to their favorite charity.  I picked their favorite charity to be the Mile High Down Syndrome Association.  We went to five neighbors' houses and everyone emptied their coin jars into our cans.  The best part of it all, was when I was trying to get the kids to explain to our neighbors what we were doing.  After a few moments of silence when someone had answered their door, Braydon blurted out, "trick or treat."  It was hilarious!  I can understand the confusion.

Here's the link on how to make a "yes we can" can:

http://crafts.kaboose.com/yes-we-can-can.html

Fun Day!