December 19, 2012
Kind News Story: Maryland Kid Gives Award Money to Good Causes
When Allie Peterson got to keep the change from a mall fountain for a month, she donated it to help animals and people in need
Have you ever thrown a coin into a fountain and made a wish? Maybe you wished that you could collect all the coins in the fountain! Well, for Allie Peterson of Frederick, Md., that actually happened.
Allie received a Kids Are Heroes award for volunteering her time to give free music lessons to elementary-aged kids. As part of the award, Allie would get to keep all the coins thrown in a mall fountain—for an entire month!
To encourage people to share their coins, Allie put up a poster. The poster explained that she would donate half of the money collected to the Alzheimer’s Association in honor of her grandmother. The other half would go to The Humane Society of the United States. At the end of the month, she proudly gave $98.22 to each organization!
Allie chose The HSUS because she loves animals and wants to help them. “Animals are defenseless,” Allie explains. “We should try our best to keep them happy and safe."
And that’s exactly what Allie does with the feathered and furry members of her family. They include two parakeets, a pug named Eleanor, and her hamster, Moses. Allie adopted Moses from a local rescue after she read that there was a need for good homes for hammies.
Before adopting him, Allie learned all she could about her new pet. One thing was that hamsters in the wild have large territories. So Allie does what she can to re-create that for Moses. She builds treat-filled play kingdoms for him out of toilet paper rolls and cardboard boxes.
On Saturday mornings, Allie does hamster housekeeping. She cleans his cage and checks him for signs of illness. And at night when Allie is drifting off to sleep, the sound of Moses running on his wheel comforts her. She knows all is well with her hammy.