This year we decided to do a different service activity each month. Service can take many different forms, and we tried to find a way to help out our friends, family, and those in need however we could.
DECEMBER
Wait, December should be the last month right? Well, we decided to get a head start after Thanksgiving with the Harrison Family, so we’re using December 2022 instead of 2023! The Washington DC temple had a couple Giving Machines so we went to see what we could give, and Jared was extremely excited to see “Kids Games & Books” as an option. He chose to give that. Shelby loved the idea of giving a “Music Therapy Session,” so we punched our selections in the giving vending machine and felt happy to be helping children in need around the world.
JANUARY
For January, we decided to help some friends in our ward who hadn’t been able to go to the temple for a while and needed someone to watch their kids so they could go. We offered to babysit them for the night so they could attend and serve in the house of the Lord. The Jenkins’ kids are adorable, so we were VERY happy to help serve them by playing trains with them and reading bedtime stories to them.
FEBRUARY
In February, we spent our Saturday morning helping AFAC (Arlington Food Assistance Center) hand out food to families in the community in need. We helped in the proteins and dairy section where Jared gave out 2 selections of meat and Shelby gave out milk and eggs. It was so wonderful to see so many families getting needed food and to see how grateful they were to receive it. Shelby even got to talk to some families in Spanish because Jared only knew the words for “chicken, fish, or hot dogs.” We enjoyed serving at AFAC a lot.
MARCH
March was a fun one as well! Our ward helped clean out the Long Branch Creek which is near a popular park and biking/hiking trail in Arlington. Because it has a lot of foot traffic, a lot of people end up littering and it all accumulates in the creek and gets very dirty. We spent a very windy Saturday morning grabbing pieces of trash, old clothes, and even some headphones (they didn’t work anymore) and throwing them away. Jared found a shopping cart that had been thrown over the bridge into the creek. He made it his mission to get that thing out of there, without falling into the water. It was successful! The ward together cleaned up several trash bags worth of litter and one shopping cart.
APRIL
April was an interesting month. We had an extremely rude lifeguard at our apartment. We were minding our own business, just enjoying the hot tub, when he got angry at us for staying too late (we did not stay later than the posted hours), some words were exchanged, and he escalated and made the whole night no bueno. Turns out he is the only lifeguard they have available. So if we got him fired, we’d effectively be closing the pool for the whole complex. So we gave him the benefit of the doubt that he was having an off day and left it at that. Service to you, Lenox Club residents. You’re welcome.
MAY
We got to participate in the Ward Service Auction. We donated a big box of board games to raise some money for the youth activities for the next year. We were happy that Bishop’s family of 6 kids was the one to win the box!
JUNE
We love the Minceys. They are the family we served Thanksgiving/Christmas to last year. Since we were leaving Arlington at the end of the month, we asked if there was anything we could do for them before we left. They said they had a storage space in their apartment that they needed some things from and just cleaned out in general. We gladly found the items they needed and reorganized the boxes they had in there. We have been so grateful for their love over the two years we lived in the Arlington Ridge Ward. We are going to miss them.
JULY
July was a busy month, but we were able to help move a member of the ward. We loaded up their truck in record time, and as a thank you, they gave us some printer paper! Yay!
AUGUST
Coming back to Albuquerque, we noticed the rise in homeless people asking for help at intersections. We enjoyed giving food out a few years ago, so we decided to do that continually. We went to Sam’s Club and bought huge boxes of snacks to leave in the car so that anytime we are driving around and see a hungry stranger on the side of the streets, we would have something to give them to eat.
SEPTEMBER
I am sure you both remember Mariah Garcia - from Del Norte. She played tennis and volleyball with me. She is going through a really hard time right now. She was in an abusive relationship for many years and she finally divorced her husband and took their son and came back to the United States with him. The father has been emotionally abusive to both her and the son so she is trying to gain full custody. There have been a lot of costs for her and as a single mom who has recently had to move across the world and leave a lot behind, she is struggling with the costs. She set up a GoFundMe Page. We had been wanting to donate but we were trying to be careful with money. We realized that we have been immensely blessed and could donate some money to help her out in a really hard time. So, we decided to donate $200 to help her. She continues to struggle but we are glad we could help just a bit.
OCTOBER
After moving to Albuquerque, finding out we were pregnant, traveling, and trying to adjust to our new schedules, we were looking for ongoing ways we could serve. Ana had been struggling with a lot of personal and work issues in her life and we could tell that she was having a hard time. There were some financial needs there, but we realized that many of the needs were also emotional/mental. So, we decided to offer to watch Ali once a week for a couple of hours so Ana could take care of what she needed to. Of course, we loved spending time with Ali anyway but it was nice to give Ana a little bit of relief each week.
NOVEMBER
Our ward was doing an Angel Tree for other members of the ward. The RS president listed items on angels that other people needed. We decided to participate. When we went to go pick up an angel, there weren’t very many items, which was good because it meant a lot of people were participating. A couple of angels had something very simple but sweet on them - a picture of Jesus with your testimony on it. We decided to pick one of these so that we could share our testimony with others. We thought this was so neat, that sometimes people definitely need material items, but sometimes people also just need a reminder of Jesus Christ and His love for them. We are grateful for our knowledge of Jesus Christ and His birth and atonement and the service He has given us and continues to give us each day.
As always, we are grateful for the opportunity to serve and for you for asking us to do this. This year was especially influential because we tried to think of something year-round. We did stuff that we wouldn’t usually do, and even when we did stuff that we would have participated in any way - we focused more on the service and the WHY behind it. We love you!