By Heather Melton, UTO Staff Officer

Many of you are just getting your hands on our newest Blue Boxes, so we wanted to extend the deadline for the coloring contest to accommodate those Ingatherings held after Thanksgiving. Just be sure to upload photos of your box before the end of the year to be considered to win a prize for our coloring contest.

You can design your Blue Box however you want. You can color it with all shades of blue, or with realistic colors to the nature scenes on the box; you can color just the parts you want to highlight—it’s completely up to you. You get to make your Blue Box however you want (match your décor, stand out on a shelf, whatever you want), and if you do it before Dec. 31, you can enter it into our coloring contest to win some great prizes. All the information about the coloring contest, including how to order boxes or submit photos, can be found here. While the materials are available for use at any time, the coloring contest does end in December.

If you want to expand beyond the coloring contest, we’ve also got FREE formation resources and Illustrated Ministries coloring sheets for children and adults that accompany the General Thanksgiving, found in the back of your Book of Common Prayer. The coloring sheets are in English and Spanish with more and less detailed designs to choose from. (You can see all coloring pages here.) For kids, we’ve got amazing new formation lessons from the Rev. Rowan Larson; and for adults, a journal with weekly coloring sheets and themes to help deepen a gratitude practice or help to create one. You can use the coloring sheets on their own or with the materials—whatever works best for your congregation.