Contenders of the Faith: Senior Citizen Helping Badge

A few weeks ago, the Shane and Nigel had the honor of helping out at a Senior Citizen Olympic Event at local  assisted living center.  They had a blast and are already planning a return visit. 

Contenders of the Faith: Building Diversified Children

Raising Godly, responsible, loving, well educated boys is not an easy task.  It easy to focus on one area, but what good is a well educated child that does not love and respect God. What good is child that loves God, but does now how to teach others how to love and respect God. I take educating my boys very serious. Of course, I want them to be book smart, but I love them too much not to work on their character too.

I am amazed how much work and effort my boys will put forth for a solid piece of recognition. We have been doing  Contenders of the Faith (COF) for around three years now and the boys LOVE it.  What impresses me most about COF that it is easy to modify to meet my family and yet is powerful in help me teach my boys life skills. My boys love earning their badges and showing off their badges of honor to anyone who will listen.  I can't help but crack up when my boys share nonchalantly share how they earned their Africa badge. They don't know they are doing extra ordinary things for kids their age. By the way, they had to learn all the countries in Africa to get their Africa badges.

So far the boys have earned approximately 45 badges of honor and they have their eyes and mind on quite a few more badges.


                                                                 Editable Fruit Badge

Trampoline Badge

Official Swimmers

Official Swimmers: Both boys passed their swim test at the Y. They had to swim the length (25 yards) of the pool. The enjoyed hanging out in the 5 feet. I enjoyed having them swim along side me. — at YMCA.

Climbing High

Shane and Nigel try their hands (and feet) at rock climbing.  They both took to the wall like Spider Man.

Nigel climbing like a pro. I am so proud of him.

I wish you could see his face..He was beaming with pride.

Pure FocusAin't no mountain high enough. Shane reaching the top

Scaling the wall.

Giving Back to Others

Shane and Nigel with Angel from Mansfield Methodist .

For the past three years Shane and Nigel have been taking toys to our local United Methodist Hospital.   The hospital distributes the toys to children who find themselves at Mansfield Methodist either by illness, abuse situations or accident related incidents.  

The Giving Back to Others project originated in 2009, when I was trying to figure out a way to teach my children about giving and being grateful for all they have.  The original thought may have been mine, but the boys took the ideal and ran with it.  I gave them a few options and they where gone ho on helping other children.  What is so exciting about this project is that the boys get to reflect on helping others all year long, not just Christmas time when most focus on being giving.   Shane and Nigel work on collecting toys all year long, by saving their money, selling their used toys and even reserving some of their fast food toys for the project.   Over the past three years they have donated over a 100 toys to Mansfield Methodist.

Me and boys with Mansfield Methodist representatives.

Things that melt your heart

Nigel (age 4) searching for God's plan for his life.

For the past few weeks, Shane and Nigel have been working on memorizing a positive affirmation entitled "I am Somebody".  Shane has memorized it in entirely and Nigel has 80% of it down.  Part of affirmation states "God has a plan for my life", well today Nigel sat down and started reading the Bible all on his own.  He sat there for quite some time "reading" the Bible, so I asked him what he was doing.  He stated" I am trying to find what God's plan for my life is".  Aww melt my heart. So we looked at Jeremiah 29:11 and his eyes were filled with joy.  

I AM SOMEBODY 

I am smart, important, creative and loved.  I have the power to control my actions, speech and thoughts.  God has a plan for my life and I am perfect according to his plan.  I am a leader and my actions affect others in a positive manner.  I am confident and happy.   I feel good about myself, family and friends.  I am somebody.    (copyright pending)

Cashing Reading Awards

Shane and Nigel are participating in three reading programs this year: Braum's Reading Buddies, Pizza Hut's Read to Succeed and Six Flag's Reading Success Program. Both Braum's and Pizza Hut’s reading programs require six books to be read in order to receive a free a menu item. The Six Flag’s Reading Success Program is a little more intense, requiring 6 hours of reading in order to receive its reward of a free ticket to Six Flags.  Just in case you’re wondering, I do not allow the same book to be used to meet the different program requirements

Shane enjoying his first Braum's Reward!