It was a simple gift. A basket lined with a tea towel on which rested a loaf of home-baked bread and a small jar of jam.

Behind the gift sent to me by a local church was no small effort. One person had embroidered the tea towel. Another had baked the bread, and a third person had grown the strawberries and made the jam.

This church had found a way to empower people to use their unique gifts and talents in ministry to others. One doesn’t have to be a preacher, teacher, missionary or musician to be engaged in a ministry.

Taking what we have and allowing God to direct us to ways we can use those gifts is at the heart of serving others.

I did a phone interview this week with Karen Kiefer, a Massachusetts mom who founded an international ministry of love out of a simple desire to teach her children practical ways to be kind to others.

Kiefer and her four daughters loved baking bread together. They began tying on ribbons and attaching small notes of love, hope, gratitude, appreciation or encouragement and giving the bread away to neighbors. Their efforts expanded to making the bread for people in homeless shelters, veterans’ homes, schools, fire stations, police stations — anywhere they wanted to deliver a special message of kindness, still warm from the oven, when possible.

Kiefer’s Spread the Bread now engages people from all cultures and all walks of life to share their memories, stories and personal messages with each loaf of bread.

She told me she hopes to inspire people to use whatever means they have to spread messages of hope and love to people around them or far away.

If you’re like I am, baking bread won’t be the way to do that. I’m only halfway joking when I say I have sticky notes on all my kitchen appliances to tell me what they are designed to do. I spend more time in the kitchen feeding a bunny and a cat than I do cooking. I never bake.

However, I’ve learned there are many ways to “spread the bread” of love and kindness. The secret is timing, not effort.

Did you read about someone in the paper who is a hero of sorts? Send them a note of appreciation. Is there a veteran who lives near you? A note would be a great way to say a personal thanks to them. Include a bookmark, a news clipping about them or any other small token they would enjoy.

The moment you experience gratitude or admiration, use your specific gifts and your imagination to express those feelings to others. E-mails are great ways to stay in touch, but something tangible is always more personal.

When you realize someone is struggling with a difficult situation, find a way to send them a ray of hope. When you become aware someone is suffering from cabin fever, pay a visit. If someone is caring for a sick loved one, find a way to lend a helping hand and give them a break.

Make it personal. Give yourself as part of the gift. It won’t take more than a little thought and prayer to find your special way of spreading the bread to someone else.

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Cary, NC (OPENPRESS) February 27, 2009 -- FootstepsClothing.com, an online family clothing company and trademarked brand of Love Your Family™ matching pajamas, announces their 2009 Best-Selling Mother’s Day Gifts for the New Mother and Mom & Baby Gift Sets. The Guide is an annual resource that Footsteps Clothing proudly offers to its customers each spring in time for Mother’s Day gift giving. The best-selling suggestions contained in the Guide include great gifts for any Mom, gift ideas for a New Mom and Baby including their very popular Mother and Baby Matching Clothing and gifts, and the always best-selling mother and daughter matching pajamas. This year Footsteps Clothing has expanded their mother daughter pajama styles and product line so you are sure to find a great set for every mom, daughter and baby.

The new Spring and Summer Love Your Family™ womens pajamas and matching girls playwear sets include fun pajama designs in a short tee and boxer set and short-sleeve tee and pant set. Best-sellers include the Froggie Family in mint green with two child frogs eyeing up their mommy frog lovingly. The Froggie matching pjs are available in tee and boxer sets for ladies and girls and also a tee and cotton pant set for mom and girls and boys and even baby. The new Flower Power mother-daughter pajamas sport a bold flower with smile face and come in a comfy pink boxer set and also are available in a short-sleeve tee and pant set in a gorgeous kelly green. The cool Flower Power design is also available in baby and infant sizes on a soft onesie creeper. A great Mommy and Baby gift set! Footsteps Clothing is also proud to introduce a summer mom and daughter pajama set for their best-selling Paradise Flower design that comes in a snow-white short-sleeve tee with baby blue and brown pants. These lightweight, comfy matching pajamas and loungewear sets are perfect mother-daughter gifts for Mother’s Day, Easter, spring and summer birthdays for mom and girls, a special Mother-Daughter Day or just for spending quality time together with the girls.

The new Womens Loungewear product category at Footsteps Clothing is a great place to find the fun designs and high quality of the Love Your Family™ Brand of womens loungewear that is a great gift for any mom and any woman who loves her family. Womens pajamas and loungewear sets with fun family designs and expressions are a sure favorite with Mom on Mother’s Day.

The new Spring Mother-Daughter matching pajamas and clothing are already a hit with Footsteps Clothing customers all across the United States and Canada. Tammy from Cinncinatti said, “When I came across the Love Your Family™ line of family matching pajamas at FootstepsClothing.com, I knew I just had to purchase a pair for my daughter and her little girl and new baby. I chose the Flower Power pajama set and can’t wait to present this unique gift to my daughter on Mother’s Day! I am so pleased with the high-quality of the matching pajamas offered at a reasonable price.”

Footsteps Clothing not only offers a large selection of fun and comfortable mother daughter matching pajamas, but also offers brand new matching pajama designs for Fathers and sons and the whole family to include mom, dad, girls, boys, baby, uncles, aunts, grandmother and grandfather. Cara of Kentucky said, “I love that Footsteps Clothing offers fun designs for the whole family. It is my one stop shopping place for every occasion!” Please come visit the large selection of Great Gifts for Mom on Mother’s Day, Mother Daughter Pajamas and shirts, New Mom & Baby Gift Sets, Father Son matching pajamas and shirts, and Family matching clothing at www.FootstepsClothing.com .

SOURCE

Heartland Alliance Catalog Offers Mother’s Day Gifts That Uplift and Inspire

Chicago, IL (February 23, 2009)- This Mother’s Day, Americans can honor the women who have made a difference in their lives with a unique, charitable gift from Heartland Alliance that offers hope and meaning to disadvantaged women, children, and others struggling the most.

For $15, gift givers can provide a blanket and pillow to bring comfort and security to a refugee child. . For $50, gift options include a stocked backpack for a disadvantaged child so she will have the chance to succeed in school by being supplied with the essential tools needed for a solid start.

Special Mother’s Day packages are also available such as the “New Mom in Need” Bundle. This gift package includes a wellness checkup for a homeless newborn, and an infant care kit that provides a poor or homeless new mom with many essential baby items like diapers, bottles, and blankets. With the bundled package, mothers receive a special set of beautiful handcrafted heart-shaped notecards made by disadvantaged women working hard to develop important workplace skills to support their own families.

You can find these and other life-changing gifts in the Hope for a Hurting World gift catalog (www.heartlandalliance.org/mothersday) from Heartland Alliance for Human Needs & Human Rights. It’s a great way for anyone to honor their mom or the special women in their lives with a gift that nurtures and uplifts others and makes a statement that provides both hope and inspiration.

For more than 120 years, Heartland Alliance has brought hope and healing to those in the most dire circumstances, providing programs and services that make a genuine difference to people in poverty and danger in Chicago and beyond. From trauma recovery and legal assistance to job training and affordable housing, Heartland Alliance’s efforts bring comfort to the suffering, security to the displaced, and opportunity to the disenfranchised.

By purchasing one or more of the tax-deductible, charitable gifts in the Hope for a Hurting World gift catalog, gift givers will be partnering with Heartland Alliance to further its work with people in poverty, refugees and survivors of violence, and the lost and forgotten.

How it works: Visit the Hope for a Hurting World gift catalog online at www.heartlandalliance.org/mothersday. Select gifts you want to purchase and make them in honor of your mother, wife, grandmother, daughter, or other special woman who has positively touched the lives of others every day.

For each gift, Heartland Alliance will send a beautiful card to your honoree with a personalized message from you. Last minute shoppers can purchase gifts online and an e-card will be sent through email.

Gifts through the Heartland Alliance Hope for a Hurting World gift catalog will not only show your recipient that you care and love them, but are choosing to give a gift that will help others as well.

About Heartland Alliance:
Heartland Alliance for Human Needs & Human Rights helps people who are threatened by poverty or danger improve their lives and realize their human rights. For more than 120 years we have been providing solutions – through services and policy – creating paths from crisis to stability and on to success. Our work in housing, health care, legal protections, and economic security supports more than 200,000 people annually, helping them build a better future.

Note to Media:
Bindu Batchu, director of marketing and communications at Heartland Alliance, is available for interviews. Hi-res images of packages are available by request. To schedule an interview or to receive images, please contact Megy Karydes at 312-560-2715 or via email at Megy@KarydesConsulting.com.

We know sisters who have an unspoken Christmas contest every year: She whose gift makes
everyone cry happy tears wins.

This Christmas, with so many wallets pinched, is the season to dig deep, think hard and hand
out gifts filled with memories. (Lovely recession bonus: These presents almost never come
from the store.)

Your goal here is heirloom status: a meaningful, return-proof piece of your family tree.
Sentimental tears are likely, and you'll be the star of Christmas.

Here are six ideas for history-laced gifts of the heart:

Fashion a silhouette

Hand-cut silhouettes from eras past are stylish collectibles, and the savvy and crafty among
us are now making our own. They're easier than you might think. Have your subject stand
about 2 feet in front of a plain wall or door, turning to the side so you see his or her
profile, and snap a digital photo. (Tip: Have girls pull long hair off the face and neck.)
Try to fill the frame with your subject.
Print the photo on regular printer paper, filling the page with the photo. Photo-printing
shops can help you do this, if necessary.
Trace the outside of your subject with a Sharpie, taking care to capture little details like
small wisps of hair. Cut this out with small sewing or cuticle scissors. Take your cutout
outside, turn it over and spray the back of the cutout with flat black spray paint. Two or
three thin coats do the trick. Allow the silhouette to dry between coats, and frame it.

Raid the photo album

Every family has an old photo that makes everyone sigh - Mom in high school wearing a fur
stole, or Grandpa's days as a firefighter. Borrow a picture from the family album, and have
it reproduced and framed for everyone in your family. Scan it in yourself, or take it to a
printing shop. We recommend Ikea in Tempe for inexpensive and stylish frames that come with
precut mats.

Bust out Grandma's button jar

Did your mom or grandmother save extra buttons? Ours, too - hundreds of them. Sneak into her
stash and turn those vintage buttons into something fun. Etsy.com seller PoorRobin turns old
buttons and pieces of felt into barrettes for little girls. You can also turn them into
button bracelets. For bracelet instructions, go to blog.creativekismet.com and search for
"button bracelet."

Fill a shadowbox

Fill a deep glass-front frame with all those bits your family has been collecting: wedding
ephemera, tiny childhood toys, old military pins, even vintage wedding rings. Imagine that
box of memories deep in your mom's closet. Go get it. Treasures lie within, and recipients
will love having them on display. Mix in a few photos, which you can scan and reduce to the
size you wish. Shadow boxes often come backed in fabric, with pins to secure your memories.
Frames are available at Michaels Arts and Crafts and Target stores.
Other fun things to look for in your memory boxes and frame: Grandma's needlepoint work,
quilt blocks, even knitted doilies.

Hand it down

The wedding china, an old clock, even jewelry: Many families have treasures meant to be
passed from one generation to the next. Why wait? Pass on things to their intended
recipients now, and be there to experience their joy.

Cook up a family recipe book

It's a good idea that has bounced around Christmas to-do lists for ages. This year, do it.
Collect all the recipes that mean something to your family into a small album and hand it
out. Give the recipes funny familial names, type them into your computer, print them and
compile a small book.

Try kolo-usa.com for inexpensive and pretty paper albums sized perfectly for recipes. Small
Kolo albums are also available at some Barnes and Noble bookstores and Aaron Brothers Art
and Framing shops.

SOURCE: www.azcentral.com