Today I want to encourage you to do something nice for someone. Think about the things that are important to your heart. If you do not have a favorite charity, group or school that you feel led to support take some time to make a list of the things that are important to you.

I have gone to charity watch to check out how charities rate if I want to make a donation. If money is tight right now, think about sending a note or letter to an soldier serving overseas, far from home. There is a wonderful site called anysoldier.com. You can get some friends together and write letters, or collect beanie babies and mail them. They love to get care packages as well.

A charity that I have recently become aware of is called “Filter Pure”. They provide water filters to the Dominican Republic and Tanzania. They are trying to grow to encompass more countries. Lisa Ballantine wrote and article about Filter Pure called “Providing Safe Water: A Sustainable Solution” and it is posted on Oprah’s Angel and also on facebook.

In my community, I like to support our local food pantry. I am hoping that there will be a bounty of veggies from my garden that I will be able to share with the food pantry.

Another thing that I think is wonderful is freecycle which is on yahoo groups. If you have things that you do not want any longer, you can post them on this site and people will pick them up. It is a good time to go through your summer clothes and get rid of those items that you are no longer using. You can also get rid of toys or books that you no longer need.

If you are adventurous, you might consider sharing your home with an AFS student. Students form all over the world come to the United States for 6 months or 1 year. They need a host family that will provide a place for them to live, food to eat, and American experiences to enjoy.
It changes the family dynamic as you take in someone from another country. There are lots of different kids and some are outgoing and some are shy.

You can never know the effect that doing something nice for someone else has on that person or the world. It creates a ripple effect that helps make our world a better place.

There is a wonderful site called www.worldgratitude.com which promotes sending waves of gratitude out to the world. They are starting a 42 day program tomorrow. Please check it out.

And with thanks and blessings, have a wonderful week.