March 27th, 2008

See that box below? That's Evan's box.

It is his gift to the soldiers, his "present" to the men (and women) serving far from home.

How does a two year-old decide to send donations to the troops? Well, on Wednesday, Evan started pulling things out of the half-filled boxes on my living room floor. I tried to explain in simple terms why I didn't want him tossing the boxes' contents, so I told him they were "presents" for men and women far away. I explained that the men and women didn't get to see their mommy or families, and they didn't get to live in their houses because they were so far. Evan really latched onto the idea that they were presents (what toddler doesn't like presents?). I think he was momentarily put out by the fact that the presents weren't for him, but he quickly responded with "Evan share." Then he put everything back. I asked him if he wanted to help with the presents for the "far man," as he put it. He said "YEAH!" So he picked a box and we pulled it over to the couch. I dumped all my unsorted goodies on the floor, and Evan picked through and put more things in the box. I rearranged the items so the box would close... but otherwise, I let him choose what to put inside. Unsurprisingly, he picked snack foods and tossed them in. Popcorn, some chocolate cake snacks, and a few other goodies got piled on top of the books that were already in the box. When the box was full, I praised Evan for his sharing and was ready to place the box back on the other side of the room.

That's when he surprised me with his suggestion that a present should come with a card. "Present. Card!" We had some crafty things out, as Staci was creating a very cool scrapbook for our upcoming cruise. So I asked if Evan wanted to make a card. The answer, again, was an enthusiastic "YEAH!" He chose yellow paper for the card, which I quickly folded and handed to him along with a pencil. He drew on the card (and insisted that everything he drew was a fish - I'll take his word for it), stuck on some cookies and milk stickers, then asked me to write his name on it. I asked him what he wanted to say to the "far man" in the card. We settled on hello, cookies, milk, and his name (I added a few extra words so that would make some sense to the soldiers on the receiving end). We then inked up his hands (Evan chose "Blue!" ink) and he stamped his handprints as his signature. He placed the card in the box and dragged it back across the room.

So the box pictured below, that's Evan's box. Evan's present. I taped it up after taking this picture, and it's ready to go, ready to bring some of my nephew's innocence and goodness to the troops in Iraq.


Talk about the wisdom of children....