52 Weeks, Week 43

 

52 Weeks to Family Preparedness for Two

Week 43

Spencer W. Kimball 1976, We want you to be ready with your personal storehouses filled with at least a year's supply. You don't argue why it cannot be done; you just plan to organize and get it done.

Food Storage and Preparedness Challenge Of The Week:

Food Storage Purchase 8 Cans of Meat

Extra Item Purchase 8 rolls of Toilet Paper

Family Prep: Write out a coupon and put it in a gift box under the tree. Gifts don't have to be expensive. Teaching is a great way to pass along knowledge, skills, and to help our families become more self-sufficient.

Spiritual Preparedness: Put home and visiting teaching in its proper place of importance. This will bless our ward, individually and collectively.

Christmas without Santa

Santa didn't visit our family this year. Oh, it wasn't because we had been bad or forgot to feed him. It was because he wasn't invited. Our family was spread too far for the traditional Christmas's upon which we had grown. My brother was serving a mission halfway around the world, my sister was recovering from surgery in Salt Lake City, and Grandma had received a mission call and would be leaving shortly after Thanksgiving. With our lives changing so much and money short, Mom suggested that we not invite Santa this year so he could visit homes with younger children. We agreed.

Christmas was on Sunday so we decided to work really hard to make it a season in which we remembered the birth of our Savior, Jesus Christ. We had family traditions that we choose to do—like harvesting the Christmas tree ourselves, making a gingerbread house, and baking goodies for our neighbors and friends. We decided, since Santa wasn't coming, we'd hang out stocking on December 1st and fill them ourselves with small gifts of love, either bought or made. Soon our stockings were bulging with little gifts.

On Christmas Eve, we set around listening to Dad tell us the stories behind the Christmas carols we loved to sing. By knowing their history, we found we felt an intense feeling of love for our family, friends, and the Savior. The feeling of calmness that filled my heart that night was a new experience.

Because Santa hadn't come, we found we concentrated on attending Church that Sunday. We read the Bible's Christmas story and learned to appreciate the reason Christ had come to earth—to show us love and give us the gift of eternal life. A gift that he gave to each of us. Looking back, my family and I agree, it was one of the best Christmases we ever had. We found things money couldn't buy—family unity and love for the Savior. Gifts that will last forever.

A story taken from an Ensign of 2001