- Can’t figure out what to get the person who has everything? Need an inexpensive, quick and memorable gift/activity idea? Looking for something you can do in your own neighborhood? There are actually quite a few wonderful ways you can make your giftee and other people happy while simultaneously making the world a better place.
- Here are some great options to get you started:
- Donate to charity. Go one step further: talk with your giftee and find a cause that’s near and dear to their heart.
- Volunteer or donate food to your local food bank.
- Participate in a charity walk or run.
- Plant a tree or sow indigenous wildflowers
- Leave kind messages on sticky notes, rocks, on the sidewalk (with chalk)…
- Anonymously buy a coffee for the next person in line at the coffee shop.
- Send postcards or letters with messages of encouragement and kindness (this can be done anonymously or not). You might be surprised at how much a simple hand written note can do to improve someone’s day.
- Pick up garbage in your neighborhood. It may sound like work, but picking up that plastic bag or wrapper instead of walking by it can be oddly satisfying.
- Leave change in a vending machine
- Hold the door for someone
- Return someone else’s grocery cart
- Kickstart someone’s day and text them good morning
- Buy lemonade from a kid’s stand. We’ve all driven by them, why not stop next time?
- Start a piggy bank for a cause
- Donate clothes and blankets to your local shelter
- Leave a generous tip for a hard-working restaurant server
- Make a care package for someone
- Give a stranger a compliment
- This activity works beautifully with a bunch of themes:
- Nature lover/outdoorsy
- Recycler/going green or simply use this gift to represent Green in our Colour theme
- Anonymously buying a coffee for a stranger or donating to the food bank can easily be worked into our Coffee lover or Foodie themes
- Picking up garbage fits nicely with our Earth (Elements) theme
- If you opt to put messages of kindness on rocks, try working that into our Rock, Paper, Scissors theme
- Shout out to Julia H. who donated her time and energy on a lovely afternoon to try out most of the above options with me. We had an amazing day and garnered a surprising amount of community goodwill. While picking up garbage, we were thanked by many, many strangers and treated with friendly honks from cars passing by. It felt awesome!
