Heifer International. I have loved Heifer International for years because they have affordable gifting solutions and the animals (or shares of an animal) you give help to pay for food, school fees, medicine for AIDS patients, and so much more. When the animals reproduce, the recipients pass on the offspring to someone else and “pass on the gift”. They have expanded in recent years and you can give gifts of plants for sustainable farming and stoves for villages. Their gift catalog is here.

Kiva loans. Kiva.Org is another wonderful site. They do microlending all around the world and you can buy $25 loans for someone which they can choose to loan out to the individual of their choice. When the individual pays the loan back, you can either have Kiva send you a check or you can re-loan out the funds. I just looked at my lender stats and I have $225 invested (loans that have been given as gifts) with those funds re-lent two and three times. My loans tend to be to women in the Middle East but the borrowers are from all over the world. Seriously, I’d be overjoyed to get these as Christmas presents because it is such a cool concept and organization.

Samaritan’s Purse. While I frequently dislike Franklin Graham and the crap he spouts about Muslims, GLBTQ people, and anyone he disagrees with, his organization does some amazing work. A family friend has gone abroad with them and provided respite for a missionary doctor and their gift catalog is wonderful if you’re into giving religious gifts. You can feed starving children, bless the weddings of military couples, provide clean water, and help out refugees.

International Rescue Committee. I saw a random link for Rescue Gifts on Facebook and bookmarked it immediately to share. I wish I had millions of dollars to spend because I would buy everything on the list. You can help refugees, give a mom a safe birth, provide teddy bears for kids…

Donors Choose. I have friends who have had things through their classroom funded through Donors Choose and it is an amazing program. You pick a classroom and donate whatever amount you want toward their project. They even have gift cards so that the recipient can pick the classroom they want to support. Stephen Colbert is one of their board members and he took the proceeds from auctioning off his anchor desk from “The Colbert Report” and used them to fund every classroom project in his home state of South Carolina. I think that’s a definite endorsement of this charity!

Go love up Bonnie, DeBalino, and the others.