Help Area Families with St. Louis Crisis Nursery's Holiday Hearts Program

As part of the program children in need create a wish list and people can sponsor children for Christmas.

St. Louis Crisis Nursery has been in the Greater St. Louis Area 26 years. The organization, is an independent, not-for-profit agency funded by donations and committed to preventing child abuse and neglect by providing short-term, emergency shelter for children, birth through age 12, whose families are faced with emergencies or who are in crisis. Is looking for community members to help out a child this year via it's Holiday Hearts program. As of Dec. 6, only 35 families out of 500 still need to be adopted for the holidays, according to the Crisis Nursery twitter feed. As part of the program children in need create a wish list and people can sponsor children for Christmas. "Our goal is to not have any children wake up on Christmas and think…

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Help Wanted: Salvation Army Needs 300 Volunteers

The organization is filling trucks at Walmarts on Saturday, Dec. 8.

A Night Different From All Others: Jewish Holiday of Passover Begins

Festival of freedom starts tonight, April, 6, with ritual called the Seder and haggadah reading.

This year the Jewish festival of Passover begins tonight, April 6, at sunset and lasts seven or eight days, depending on the congregation.  Temples or congregations in University City include: The first day is usually celebrated at home. The holiday, also called Pesach, is meant to be seven days, but a long-standing tradition exists for Jewish holidays celebrated outside of Israel to add a day. This is because in ancient times the Jewish year was not set according to a calculated calendar but rather simply by observing the status of the new moon in the sky, and there was some doubt as to when the holidays were. So Passover outside of Israel is eight days long for many congregations. The roots of the holiday are found in the biblical Book …

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Arts and Entertainment with Jeff Brandt

Loop Businesses Offer Out-of-the-Ordinary Shopping Ideas

University City Patch profiles three local businesses offering interesting holiday gifts.

Let's say you're sick of seeing all of the same bland gifts at a big box store. You want to spice up your shopping to make this holiday season one to remember. Why not just take a stroll down the Delmar Loop? These three stores on Delmar offer fun, unusual alternatives to traditional Christmas gifts. Enigma Tattoos Located above Sunshine Daydream, accepts walk-ins for tats and piercings. With a wall full of samples and an open mind when it comes to custom designs, Enigma is no stranger to offbeat Christmas shoppers. "A week or two before Christmas, people will come in wanting to buy their mom, sister, brother, dad or whoever a tattoo," employee Chris Greer said. Wait . . . moms? Even the white picket fence suburban moms who wear mom jeans…

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