Easy envelope prayer journals

At our last formal Sunday session before the holidays we made some prayer journals that we could use over the summer.  They are very easy to make and our 6-11s got so into making them that it was really hard to tear them away at the end of the session.  We had to load them up with things to take home so they could finish them off!

First take 3 envelopes.  Glue the flaps of two of the envelopes and cut the flap off the third.

Stick the envelopes together in a line like this...

This now makes a fold up journal with pockets to put things in (the children especially love this part!)

I made a version of my own to give the children some ideas:

Inside the journal with pockets named for the world, me, other people...

Inside the journal with things pulled out of the pockets and the folded world map opened up.

Inside I put: a folded world map for world prayers, a mini healing board to stick plasters to when praying for people to get better, a little sheet to pray for others on, a little sheet to write prayers for myself, some information about countries I could pray for where it is hard to be a Christian, a string of people holding hands to help me remember people to pray for.

Outside of the journal with a space for thank you prayers and praise of God.

Here's what the children came up with!  We gave them a selection of envelopes, maps, country information, paper shapes and paper and let them do whatever they wanted to with them.