Inspiring People: SWFL girls spend Spring Break raking in cash for charity

While most children spent their Spring Break playing, one group of girls did yard work. It’s a chore many children dread, but this small gang of philanthropists embraced it as a means of earning money for charity.

Kara Hoff, 10, and little sister Lindsey enlisted the help of friends and got started.

“We’re raking yards and we’re earning money,” Kara said.

“We were over at her house; we just really wanted to help people,” said 9-year-old friend Sadie Thomas.

And away they went. Not only earning money but giving half of their earnings away. With each bucket of leaves collected in their neighborhood, the cash also came piling in; $200 later, with the help of the sisters’ mother, Julie Hoff, the girls bought items and donated them to the Gulf Coast Humane Society.

“This has really helped to teach them responsibility, teamwork, the value of making money, and hard work,” Hoff said.

The lesson among the leaves meant even more than that to 9-year-old Graecyn Pickard.

“It makes me feel good,” Graecyn said. “I think my grandma would be proud of me, but she’s not here. She passed away.” But Graecyn says she knows Grandma is looking down at her and smiling.

The girls have caught the entrepreneurial bug: They plan to open a dog-walking business and say they’ll keep donating.