This year, consider a charitable gift. It’s like giving two gifts in one: it’s a meaningful gift for your friends and family and it helps someone who needs it. Gifts are purchased in the name of a friend or loved one and a card is sent to those individuals describing the gifts and their impact. So if you’re looking for a gift that means a little bit more, consider something charitable.

World Vision
World Vision offers a wide choice of gifts that can help improve the lives of children and families in need by providing the tools and opportunity to overcome extreme poverty.

According to a World Vision survey conducted by Harris Interactive:
•    84% of adults would prefer to receive a meaningful gift that would help someone else rather than a traditional holiday gift such as clothing or electronics
•    57% want something for the holidays this year, but only about 36% say they need something

Most surprisingly, the survey found that more than half of U.S. adults couldn’t remember what they received for the holidays last year! This year choose something that will really stand out.

Sample gifts:
Stock a low-income American classroom with learning supplies ($25)
Give a wool blanket to a disaster survivor, AIDS patient or a child in need ($30)
Seeds, tools, and training in Africa ($30)
Goat ($75)
Dairy Cow ($500)

Check out www.worldvisiongifts.org.

Heifer International: An Udderly Original Gift
Heifer International helps people feed themselves. The goal of every Heifer project is sustainability – project partners achieving self-reliance.

For $500 you can give a cow. For $50 you can give a share of a cow. The cow’s first offspring is passed on to another family, and so on, so who knows how many families you’ll help. A good dairy cow can produce four gallons of milk a day.

Other gifts at Heifer.org:
Sheep: $120 (or $10 a share)
Llama: $150 (or $20 a share)
Water Buffalo: $250 (or $25 a share)
Goat: $120 (or $10 a share)

These are really gifts that keep on giving. Check out www.heifer.org.

Shop and Do Good
If you are planning on doing most of your holiday shopping online check out igive.com—a percentage of the purchase price goes to which ever charity you choose.

Goodsearch.com is a Yahoo-powered search engine that donates 50% of its ad revenue to the charity of your choice when you use the site to search the Internet.