In case you missed them, the stories are enough to soften the hardest of hearts: The St. Christopher School in Nashua ran its Christmas Shoebox Drive service project for the third consecutive year and, within two weeks, 150 shoeboxes arrived at the school decorated for Christmas and ready for donation to the Salvation Army, which distributed them to other children. The boxes were stuffed with gifts ranging from toys and games and clothes, to toiletries, all of which will no doubt be welcomed by their recipients.

Students from the Birch Hill Elementary School stopped by our offices to fill our sleigh with presents and donate cash, part of the school’s annual tradition whereby third-graders raise cash – $150 this year – and fifth-graders collect new presents for the Santa Fund.

There’s something wonderful about kids helping kids, and the older ones showed they are committed to keeping the spirit of Christmas alive, too, as 275 Nashua High School South vocalists and musicians staged Christmas concerts for the 16th straight year to raise money for the Santa Fund. Talk about striking just the right note.

Then you have the knitters, a group of women who meet in Nashua every Tuesday to knit and crochet gifts that are donated to a variety of organizations, including The Telegraph’s Santa Fund. Part of a national initiative called "Warm Up America!" the women make hats, mittens and scarves, baby clothes and blankets. This year, the group made nearly a thousand such items.

It’s the stories of such labors of love that warm us up, like the efforts of Dorothy Losik, 84, who for more than a decade has been donating knitted and crocheted items to the Santa Fund, including bed slippers, stocking hats, scarves for children and adults, baby bibs, booties and bonnets.

Many of those who make contributions were helped themselves, and are just trying to give back a little. Lynn Killgren remembers how grateful she was 27 years ago, when she was visited by Santa Fund helpers.

There were four men, all with Santa hats," Killgren said. "They gave us everything the kids needed."

Her family received food, boots, coats, toys, mittens and taxi certificates. The Santa Fund also paid her rent for a month. "I would have lost the house if it wasn’t for them," Killgren said.

This year, Killgren decided to repay some of the good fortune that was visited upon her; she donated four new bicycles to the Santa Fund.

This, after all, might go down in Santa Fund lore as the Year of the Bikes, thanks to people like Killgren and folks like John Farrer of the Hudson-based firm Right Networks. After seeing a story on TV about a shortage of bikes, Farrer and some co- workers showed up at the Salvation Army of Greater Nashua with a U-Haul trailer full of bicycles.

We are just incredibly grateful," Salvation Army director of development Jennifer Horn said. "It looks like this will be the first year every child who requested a bicycle will be able to get one."

Then there were the employees of BAE Systems, the largest single contributor in the Santa Fund’s history. This year they adopted 300 children and delivered two trailers full of toys to The Front Door Agency, which also helps distribute Santa Fund gifts.

The generosity never fails to amaze us.

Take, for instance, Alex Fansel and friends, music students at North Main Music who decided to play nonstop for 24 hours for shoppers at the Pheasant Lane Mall to raise money for the Santa Fund. They dropped off more than $500 in cash.

Being the repository for such kindness allows us to spend a few minutes living in the final scene of the Frank Capra movie "It’s a Wonderful Life."

We get to experience what it’s like for people to show up, seemingly out of nowhere, and hand over thousands of dollars to help people who are not as fortunate.

We’ll leave the explanation to Bonnie Draper of Wilton, who donated $2,000 to the Santa Fund this year and has contributed similar amounts in the past: "It just makes you feel good in your heart."

It surely does.

Merry Christmas.

Newsletter