How to teach kids about gratitude

Let's have a Loopy Lunch!

This lovely simple idea will have your kids thinking that you are the most fun person in the world, ever! This is going to get you some brownie points!

What you are going to do is make some sandwiches and drinks with your children, but with a difference. Using jam, for sweet sticky fun, make your sandwiches with your kids into as many different fun shapes as you can think of. You could cut out stars and moons, cars and balls, rockets and table tennis bats! Your only limit is your imagination.

Don't forget, keep any off cuts and make a point of putting them out for the birds, no waste!

For your drinks, you are going to get even sillier! Your juice or water will be poured from a teapot, and you will all drink out of the daftest things you can find. Use egg cups, serving spoons, saucepans or even a wok, but no cups or glasses!

Now go to your favourite place and have a picnic lunch together. If you don't have the weather, spread out a blanket on the floor and have an indoor picnic!

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Your kids will think it's the most fun!

Now here's the thing; when you've all enjoyed eating together and making the sandwiches together, explain to the children how simple your meal was. There was no lobster, no steak, no caviar, no silver plates or chandeliers. You were able to enjoy yourselves with what little you had.

Talk to your children about how we should be grateful for what we have and make the very best of it, and not waste our time complaining about what we don't have. This attitude of gratitude is at the core of any successful and effective relationship with God.

Ask the children what they most enjoyed about the meal. Try to leave them with the sense that their enjoyment had nothing to do with how much 'stuff' they had.

Continuing the theme of encouraging your children to pray, share with your kids that approaching God with a grateful heart will bring us much closer to him than going to him always grumbling and complaining. We should make a habit of looking for the good in our circumstances, and thanking God for that.