Sophie, your family had a tradition involving charitable giving over the holidays.

Tell me about that.

Yeah.

Hey everyone, I'm Sophie Summergrad, one of the producers here on How To.

And when I was a kid around eight or nine, my parents would always try to get us some kind of present for every night of Hanukkah.

They'd be fairly small things, you know, a doll I'd asked for or some kind of toy.

Maybe you're going to get like a gift card or something.

Maybe I'll get to go to Dunkin' Donuts and get a box of munchkins or something.

My Massachusetts is coming out in terms of what I think is exciting.

And instead, you get this really, really lovely donation from my mom that was in my name or my

brother's name.

And almost always, this donation went to Heifer International.

Wow.

Where you're able to sponsor an animal for another family, but as an eight-year-old,

you're a little like, okay, thank you so much. What am I supposed to do with this? Like,

this isn't a gift for me. And the first time I got this gift, I had no idea what it was. I was

just too young. And then every year

after that for the next, you know, let's say like two to five years, I was like, oh, got it.

Okay. Message received my Hanukkah Heifer, the Hanukkah tradition of the Hanukkah Heifer.

Wow. And now as an adult, I really appreciate that my mom was doing this because she felt that this was really part of the spirit of the season was giving and making sure other people had and using our gifts for good.

But I was, I was a little like, huh, as a kid, like, oh, so this is taking one of the spots of my limited, coveted gifts,

and this is what I'm going to get.

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