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Every Christmas Season since starting this toy review website in 2008, we like to take a brief break from talking about the best toys for kids and instead direct attention to a worthy charity.

Last year we wrote about Compassion International. Compassion is an organization that allows you to commit to monthly giving to support a specific child in need. My family has supported two kids through Compassion for a few years now. You can read what I wrote about Compassion last year here.

Some of you may not want to commit to monthly giving, but would be willing to make a one time donation. Compassion has provided a list of real needs that can be met for a specific dollar amount. So it’s not just giving a dollar amount into a fund and you never know what it goes towards. You can give $10 toward garden seeds to help a family grow their own food. Or $30 towards school supplies.

Or my favorite, give a Chicken for $16. That’s right, a chicken is more than a meal to a family living in poverty. It can provide a source of income, manure for a vegetable garden, and a steady supply of eggs. This gift helps a family to put food on their table and provides them with earnings.

If you would like to make a one time donation and see the full list of gifts, you can do that here.

Every year since we started this website in 2008, I like to take a day during the Holiday Shopping Season to take a break from talking about the best toys and instead highlight a worthy charity. You can see a listing of all our previous Charity posts here.

During this season of shopping and giving, I think it’s important to remember that there are people in the world who cannot afford the life style that many of us lead.

Today I want to encourage you to learn about Compassion International. Compassion International is a Christian child advocacy group that seeks to break the cycle of poverty by providing resources to children such as food, shelter, education, and health care. Founded in 1952, Compassion currently helps more than 1 million children in 26 countries.

Compassion provides the opportunity to sponsor a child for $38 per month. This is a unique opportunity to radically change the life of a child whom you will never meet in person.

My family started sponsoring 2 children through Compassion over a year ago. It’s been great. Our sponsor children write letters to us and tell us about their family and what they are learning in school. Both of our sponsor kids happen to live in Haiti, so when the earthquake struck in January 2010, we were concerned about our kids. It took several months after the earthquake until we received a letter from our children letting us know that they were ok. It was a big relief for sure.

If you would like to learn more about sponsoring a child, you can learn more about that on the Compassion site here.

If you are not ready to sponsor a child at this time, but would still like to make a one time financial donation to this organization, you can learn more about that here.