For the faith series, I shared the 9th Commandment, thanks to Jill and her posts on Compassion Family. Jill also gave me permission to share her beautiful photography!
Then I sent a letter about deer! My friend, Helen, had sent me some beautiful photos of deer and I had been intending to send them to my kids for a while. The information about deer was taken from a BioKids article!
Dearest Friend,
I wanted to send you a letter about white tailed deer! Deer are very amazing animals that live all over the United States. Do you have deer in your country? Or do you have a similar animal? My friend, Helen, took some photos of white tailed deer near where she lives, in the state of Illinois. She gets snow where she lives! We have some of the same deer here, in Florida! Here is some information about white tailed deer:
"White-tailed deer have different colors depending on the season and their location. Usually they have greyish fur in winter and reddish-brown fur in summer. They have white patches of fur on their face and lower legs. The tail is brownish-red above and white below. When startled the deer lift this tail as they bound away, making the white patch prominent. Males have antlers that begin growing in April or May with a layer of velvety fur on them. In August and September the antlers shed this velvety covering for the mating season. The antlers fall off in January and are re-grown the next year. With each year of age a male will grow larger antlers with more points. White-tailed females are very protective of their babies. When looking for food, females leave their offspring in a hiding place for about four hours at a time. While waiting for their mother to return, fawns lay flat on the ground with their necks outstretched, well camouflaged against the forest floor. They are extremely agile and may bound at speeds of up to 30 miles per hour. White-tailed deer are also good swimmers and often enter large streams and lakes to escape predators or insects or to visit islands. They inhabit most of southern Canada and all of the mainland United States except portions of the west central states to the California coast. Their range extends throughout Central America to Bolivia."
Writing about deer reminded me of two passages in the Bible.
- Psalm 42:1, "As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, my God."
- Habakkuk 3:19, "The Sovereign Lord is my strength; He makes my feet like the feet of a deer, He enables me to tread on the heights."
My prayer for you is that you desire God as much as a deer who is incredibly thirsty. And I pray that when you seek God, that He will strengthen you like a deer! My friend, Deborah, made beautiful journaling pages for you to meditate on these truths from the Bible. Do you ever write out your prayers to God? I enjoy doing that when I am able to. I hope that you will be able to write out some prayers to God on the attached paper.
Love, Hannah
I also remembered the Secret Place Journal designed by my friend Deborah, and I thought that they would go together wonderfully! I couldn't include the cover, but I was able to include the pages by changing them from pdf files to jpg files. (If you're ever needing ideas for fun paper items to send to Compassion or Manna kids, I encourage you to check out Deborah's webpage, Trusty's Mailbag, for ideas and items.)
It was also time to reply to all the letters that have been pouring in! When I reply to our kids' letters, I like to have something personal to share with them. Partly because they seem to enjoy it, and partly because not all kids write enough for me to respond with a whole letter. This enables to me to have room to reply, and share a bit about our lives. Since Juanito and Rosie both just had their birthdays, and the cousins were in town for a visit, I had some fun photos and stories to share!
I also included some photos of Shamim's new baby, Shadrach! I always share her story whenever we begin writing to a new kid, so I thought the kids would enjoy hearing about and seeing her baby!
As always, I am sharing what I write in hopes to inspire your letter writing! There is nothing too big nor too small to share with your kids. They just love hearing from you! And photos are an extra-special hit and so easy to attach when writing online.
