“It’s just a beautiful thing to know that even though we’re not purchasing these gift cards, we know that we are helping people in the community to get together to make this impact and that is just so fulfilling,” said Nancy DiPasquale, co-founder and president of Local Acts of Kindness Foundation, of the nonprofit’s Trim-A-Tree Challenge.
Local Acts of Kindness Foundation’s 2023 Trim-A-Tree Challenge collected 26 gift card trees from the community last month, the most since its launch in 2019.
“It’s just a beautiful thing to know that even though we’re not purchasing these gift cards, we know that we are helping people in the community to get together to make this impact and that is just so fulfilling,” said Nancy DiPasquale, co-founder and president of the nonprofit. “Anyone who has ever done an act of kindness knows how contagious it actually is and how fulfilling it actually is, and that’s our passion.
“Some people paint for their passion and some people play music for their passion, and this is ours,” she added. “This is just what we enjoy doing and it’s something that’s really fun and it fuels us.”
Every year, the family-run nonprofit challenges neighbors to decorate a holiday tree in five days with $5 gift cards and notes of encouragement for local families in need. Once accepted, a tabletop tree is dropped off to a home or business and picked up five days later. Families in need are identified by other area nonprofits familiar with their needs during the holiday season. Photos of trees and names of donors are posted each year to the Local Acts of Kindness Foundation’s website.
“With this one (Trim-A-Tree Challenge) in particular, we wanted to do something for the holidays, and we had thought about, ‘What’s the goal we want to accomplish?’” DiPasquale explained. “The goal is always to – just like our mission – is always to bring the neighbors together, the community together, and do good deeds for other people and connect them.
“Spreading kindness connects people and everybody wins all around,” she added. “It’s a win-win situation for people who do the kindness, people who receive the kindness and people who witness the kindness.”
The donated trees come in handy even after the holidays.
“In the past, if we don’t have the recipient to receive every tree, then we hold a few throughout the year so that when something happens – and things have happened – like a tragedy, a house fire, a medical situation – when we hear of those things, then we gift those trees within the community,” DiPasquale noted.
“ … You’re receiving help from people you’ll never meet,” she continued. “Chances are you don’t know who it is. You’re giving help to someone you don’t know, but it’s the feeling of a win-win. It’s a feeling of such joy to be able to help someone, even though you’ll never meet them or know who they are.”
From DiPasquale’s perspective, the Trim-A-Tree Challenge’s success boils down to the human connection.
“COVID was devastating obviously, but what (it) showed so clearly was that … it’s absolutely imperative for people to have a connection with others,” she observed. “We were shown as a world that when you cut off connection because of illness or disease, it’s absolutely devastating …
“When you’re doing good deeds or doing kindness to others, you’re connecting, and that’s just another word for connection. Kindness equals connection, which equals love.”
