ding-dong ditch (christmas style)

here is the 2nd christmas story from my mom in my "christmas stories from mom" series {creatively titled, i know}

 read the first story, and a little bit about the whole thing here

 story #2

{dictated over the phone}

"a woman had picked up her things at the morning distribution, at her appointed time, and everything went the way it was supossed to, but she returned in the afternoon. she very apologetically asked if she could exchange the toys she got for one of her daughters for clothing instead. she was also apologetic because she had her 4-year-old daughter with her, and childern are not usually allowed at distributions for obvious reasons. but head start was over and she had nobody to watch her, so she had to come along. it was a bitterly cold day but the little girl only had on a see-through plastic raincoat for a coat. she had no hat or gloves, and her hands and face were bright red from the cold. the mother said that the other 2 girls had gotten clothing but she wanted to exchange the toys for clothing because they had been homeless and the other two girls had gotten some clothing and they needed that more than toys, so that's what she wanted to do. 

we agreed to do that, and while we were locating clothing of the right size, i had some other volunteers find a brand new coat, boots, hat and gloves for the little girl that was in the rain coat. so she left all bundled up and in warm new outer gear. the lady was extremely appreciative. 

after she left, i got a couple of our long-time and wonderful volunteers and we went through our toy shop, which was well supplied, and found the wishlist for all three of the girls and got them all of the toys they had asked for, and then lots more nice new clothing and just really did a christmas that they would never ever forget in their whole lives. we bagged them up in great giant bags and our volunteers took them that night to the family's house, put them on the porch, rang the doorbell and ran!"

this just puts a huge smile on my face :) and it reminds me of the importance of giving back to others this holiday season! i wish i could do more, i wish i did more, but i try my best to remember that every little thing counts and can make a difference in someone's life.

{photo via}