Scarlett Pannebaker

One of my favorite Christmas traditions is heading to San Francisco during December.

I just love the city during Christmastime. Growing up, my parents would take us to San Francisco to see all the decorations & now I love continuing that tradition with my kids.

San Francisco has a huge homeless population, so whenever we go to the city we see a lot of homeless people on the streets. It's heartbreaking. I have never been comfortable giving them cash, I usually give them food or a gift card. For the past 5 or 6 years, we have taken "Blessing Bags" with us to the city.

 What is a blessing bag?

It's a ziplock bag filled with items/food that you give to a homeless person. 

What's in a blessing bag?

That is up to you! Here are the items that I put in our blessing bags: 

-New pair of socks

-Peanut Butter crackers (or you could do cheese/crackers)

-Granola Bar

-Beef Jerky/Cheese Stick

- Package of Almonds

-Mini Water Bottle

-Juice Box

-Chap Stick

-Toothbrush/Toothpaste

-Travel Size Deodorant

-Cough Drops/throat lasenges

-Pack of gum

-Travel size Wipes

- $5 Gift Card to McDonalds (so they can get a meal and/or hot coffee)

***Other items you can add****

-Applesauce/Fruit Cups

-Hand Santizer

-New Mittens/New Beanie

-Bar of Soap

-Travel Size Shampoo

-Hand Warmers

 

 Put all of these items in a Gallon Size Ziplock Bag.

 I like to make 10 bags at a time to bring with us to the city. 

Here are all the supplies:

 Kevin usually keeps 1 or 2 of these in his car, so that if he sees a homeless person on the corner, etc. He can give them a Blessing Bag.

 My girls love to assemble these. We talk about how fortunate we are & that some people don't have homes & so this is something small we can do for them to help them out.

Kate told me this year that we shouldn't give them a McDonalds gift card because they don't serve good food and that we should give them In-n-Out instead. I explained that there are a lot of McDonalds in the city & no In-n-Outs and they don't have a car to drive to In-n-Out. 

I like to include a $5 McDonalds gift card because then they can at least get a meal and a hot cup of coffee.

 The girls also wanted to make Christmas Cards/drawings to add to the Blessing Bags this year. I thought it was a great idea.

 All of the items fit perfectly into a Gallon Size Ziplock.

 Our Blessing Bags all filled up!

We are headed to the city later this afternoon to pass out the bags & to go ice skating. 

These are just suggestions for what to put in a Blessing bag. 

You can make them smaller & put them in sandwich size ziplock bags, it's totally up to you!

It's a simple way to bless a homeless person. 99% of the time they are extremely grateful.  

Now, go bless someone who needs a Blessing Bag!