Tzedakah Customs

In our home before Shabbat we set a dollar at everyone's place, on top of the napkin. Then before we light candles, our daughters, ages four and two, go around and collect the tzedakah from each person in a special Tupperware container we have transformed into our tzedakah box. They take immense joy from their participation in this ritual. Every few months we collect a few pieces of mail from non-profit organizations that we think would interest the girls and ask them to choose where to send the tzedakah money they have gathered.