How to give back to kids this holiday season.

The holidays are coming and I’m already turning into a real mother. I’m excited for the fabulous fun, but also dreading my girls getting generously-gifted an overabundant slew of junk toys that don’t do any *real* good in the world until after they outgrow them and we donate them to local families in need. Call me Scrooge… but now (as a mom) I really look at Christmastime as an opportunity to do some real GOOD.

Mark Steines, Max Page, Cristina Ferrare, Jack Witherspoon & me. Spread the JOY.

Mark Steines, Max Page, Cristina Ferrare, Jack Witherspoon & me. Give JOY.

So I had a little idea to do a segment on Hallmark Channel’s “Home & Family” about gifts that GIVE BACK to kids who really need them during the holidays. Watching the segment about Jessie Joy Rees Foundation’s JoyJars (featuring adorable and talented actor, activist and congenital heart defect survivor Max Page) might break your heart a bit about how the foundation started, but you’ll also learn how much love, care and spirit can be legitimately jammed into a humble gift that truly does deliver ‘joy’ directly to kids stuck in hospital beds. JOIN MAX’S JOY SQUAD AND HELP HIM REACH HIS GOAL TO GIVE 100,000 JARS TODAY!

(I must say, Max’s mission does kinda stroll hand-in-hand with a personal project of mine this season called TV Moms for Children’s Hospital Los Angeles… something that’s been on my to-do list thanks to my husband‘s inspiration.)

As for another fab gift-item pick, check out SYDNEY PAIGE: a company that promotes the importance of education to help break the cycle of poverty one child at a time.

Way cute, right? And buying ONE actually get you TWO.

There are more than 16 million children in America living in poverty (1 in every 5 children) and, according to the National Education Association, such kids are 6 times more likely to drop out of school than those from higher income families. One of the main reasons assigned to this dropout statistic is simply not having the right tools to do their homework and have confidence in school. SYDNEY PAIGE delivers quality school gear (comparable to Jansport and LL Bean) to students in need in the United States in a sustainable way. For each item purchased (preschool through teens/young-adult), SYDNEY PAIGE donates that same product (packed with school supplies!) to a child in need. General prices are as follows: Backpacks $60 Teen, $50 Youth, $40 Toddler ($50 with nap blanket). (There are also several other products besides backpacks… but check out the SP site!)

WHAT’S YOUR FAVORITE WAY TO GIVE BACK FOR THE HOLIDAYS?