The Pay It Forward Challenge

Mary Lechleitner starts a library at a YWCA daycare center for children living in shelters in Dayton, Ohio. Mary buys a bookshelf and fills it with books that she handpicks. Mary's idea is contagious—her friends contribute books and Barnes and Noble kicks in another $2,000!

Mary learns that the center, YWCA Sanctuary Homeless Children's Program, also needs toys, so she asks friends in her card club to bring toys to their next get-together. With generosity coming from so many directions, Mary has enough to provide a book, a canvas bag and a stuffed animal to every child who comes to the center.

"These books might be a way for these kids to 'pay it forward' to someone else, because you never know what doors they'll open," Mary says.