FINISHED OCC Shoeboxes

Britain and I had a blast putting together our 4 shoeboxes (2 boys and 2 girls) for Operation Christmas Child!!

We had tons of FREE items (candy, promo pens, Chik-fila/McDonald's toys, etc!).  It's been so fun shopping for items since earlier this summer.  The Target Dollar bins are a gold mine when they have their 75% off sale!

I made handmade hair bows for the girls and Brit made little sticker notes for each of the kids.  We included a handwritten note and family picture in each.

This summer, Britain won an Arial floatie at VBS and since it was a free item and something we don't need, I asked if she'd be willing to give it to one of the girls for the shoeboxes.  She graciously and enthusiastically said YES!  I love her sweet and compassionate heart!

Samaritan's Purse is having a contest for the MOST AWESOME shoebox so I submitted one of the girl's shoeboxes for the contest.  The winner receives a $300 VISA gift card!!

Target FINALS

Britain lost her FIRST tooth yesterday so the Tooth Fairy brought her just enough money to buy a Littlest Pet Shop toy at Target.  While we were there, we stopped by the $1 bins at the front of the store and some of their merch was 75% off!!

We snagged the items pictured above for the four Operation Christmas Child shoeboxes we're giving this Christmas and only spent $2!!

(4) plastic sunglasses
(2) pairs girls socks
(2) lip balms
(4) Tic Tac packs (on sale for $0.52/each - used (4) $0.75 coupons = 4 packs FREE)

Burt's Bees FREE Toothpaste Sample

You can snag a FREE sample of Burt's Bees Multicare with Fluoride .5oz here!  *Allow 8-12 weeks for delivery.  This would be a great item for the Operation Christmas Child shoeboxes!

Thanks, Hip2Save!

Operation Christmas Child Update

Last month, I posted here about our commitment to make 4 shoeboxes for the Operation Christmas Child project in November.  I'm so excited about our growing stockpile!  Everywhere we go, we're always on the look out for inexpensive or FREE items to put in the boxes.

Here's a picture of the items we've collected so far.  FREE soaps and pens from hotels, Happy Meal toys from Chickfila, Hardee's and McDonald's, and other cheap items.

So far we've spent less than $10 on all of this!!

It's such a JOY to give!

Operation Christmas Child: Preparing for Christmas in July!

Crystal over at Money Saving Mom has a great post here about inexpensive ways to start stocking-up on items for Operation Christmas Child shoeboxes.  She also includes a great video from Clair over at Mummy Deals on her top 10 ways she gets cheap items for the shoeboxes.  She spent $45 on 45 shoeboxes!

There are so many great deals on school supplies now and last week Target had some of their $1 bin items half off!  I always seem to wait until November to start thinking about OCC and really want to get a head start this year so we can bless more kids!  We've got about 4.5 months to grow our stockpile!  I'm even more excited to get Britain involved and excited about this ministry.  She has such a heart for giving! 

Thanks, Moneysavingmom & Mummydeals!