Grace Bags

[Everlie Bolton]

I wanted to share a new resource that has a been a big hit for our church library:  Grace Bags.  These bags contain books and manipulatives for families to checkout and use during service or to take home. For example, the Daniel bag contains 3 books, a simple puzzle, felt pieces and a flannel board, finger puppets, a lion lacing card and a small plastic lion.  We currently have 6 bags and will continue to add more.  I have attached a few photos. This resource is similar to our local public library Subject In A Box kits and was made possible by the family of a dear member who passed away.  Her name was Grace and she was an educator and reader.  These bags have been a great way to honor her memory.

[Mercee Tate]

We have taken your idea and made "Busy Bags". We have 2 services. The second service has a Children's Church, but the first service doesn't. So, we have made busy bags for kids to grab before service to keep them quietly listening. Ours don't have quite as much stuff. Each has a book, a fabric maze with a ball inside (purchased on Amazon), coloring page with 4 crayons, "My Sermon Notes" page with a pencil. Then we add a paper or felt craft. We have a die cut machine, so we have a lace puppet, finger puppets, and things that we can use. We also have some of the felt boards with pieces like the picture above that we put in sometimes for more fun. Pipe cleaners, 3 strands of yarn that we tie together so they can braid a bracelet, googly eyes on pom poms, and things like that also make good fillers. The children's ministry also donated gummy snacks to tuck in there for their little bellies. At the conclusion of service, they just leave them on the front pew. We grab them during the week and repack them for the next week. We only have to keep about 6 or so because most moms bring their own bags.

We started providing them for the 2nd service when Children's Church has to be cancelled. These bags are smaller with a coloring sheet, sermon notes, crayons, pencil, gummy snacks, and a paper craft. We keep them small because we have to do a lot more. At least 12. Last time they used all 12, so I guess we'll make 20 next time.

A local group "Connect for Autism" provided us with Sensory Bags. These bags have a set of headphones (some have adult size and some child size) and various sensory items to help children with sensory issues be able to enjoy the service. These bags are not used often, but are an amazing resource for our members.

Our church averages about 500 on a Sunday. We just make the bags available as you walk into the Sanctuary, and collect them from the front pew during the week. 

[Morlee Maynard]

Everlie also provided some photos of the new bags and how they store them.

[Morlee Maynard]

Everlie and Audrey communicated through email. Everlie just gave me permission to share her reply to Audrey on the CLN. Great ideas here!

Patrons typically check out our Grace Bags for use during the worship service. However, we welcome families to take the bags home to use (2 week checkout). I think most parents are worried about keeping up with all the pieces if they take the bags home (and I appreciate that concern).  

 

This was a combined effort between me and the family of a dear church member. Grace Dampier was a retired educator and reader. She passed away in October and the family requested donations to the church library in her memory. When her birthday rolled around in January, the family was really struggling in their grief and reached out to me. They asked if there was a specific need for the library and I mentioned something that I had wanted to do for a long time but did not have the time or resources...

 

I am a full time volunteer with our local public library. One of my favorite parts of the collection are the Subjects In A Box. Public library patrons can check out a box on a specific subject (multiplication, community workers, hedgehogs, American history, etc.). Each box contains books, manipulatives, DVDs, and games on the subject. I had wanted to create something similar for the church library. When I mentioned this idea to Grace's daughter, she was immediately excited. To make a long story short, helping create the Grace Bags was a way for the family (scattered around the country) to work together to honor Grace's memory. Having a specific activity helped with their grief and was a way to engage believing and unbelieving family members! 

 

Grace's family created the bag design, chose the topics and curated the contents. They gave everything to me to put on the finishing touches and cataloging information. I was able to immediately create 6 bags from that donation. After those were in circulation for a while and I learned what worked well, I added 3 more bags. I hope to slowly add a few more bags over time.  

 

Bags are all the same but different! They all have books and a flannel board with figures. There are puzzles, puppets, sewing cards and other items in each bag to make it unique.  It has been surprising to me that the sewing cards are HUGE favorites. The original post that you saw has some photos of the laminated cards attached to each bag that has the checkout barcode and photo of the contents. When the bags are returned, the librarian can use the laminated cards to confirm that everything was returned.  

 

[Audrey Carr]

Are these bags ready made, or do you make up the collection for each?

 

[Everlie Bolton]

I am THRILLED to hear that other church libraries have found interest in our Grace Bags.  We currently have 9 bags in our collection.  Without a doubt, the bags are our most popular checkout!  Feel free to reach out directly for more details.  [e-mail]

[Audrey Carr]

I sent you an email.

[Faith Richardson]

Thanks so much -- we are now planning our Grace bags!

[Lydia Neeley]

I love this. Thank you so much for sharing! 

 

[Jenni Harvey]

thats a really cool Idea

 

[Denise A Roberts]

What an awesome idea.