A Franklin, TN thank you.

I live in Franklin, TN and received two generous gifts last week. One was in the mailbox in a beautiful card with Bible verses and the other was hand delivered to my husband when I was away. It also was in a beautiful card with Bible verses and a card from 12 Ordinary Women. This was so touching to our entire family. Our three teenage girls could not believe how thoughtful and sweet this was coming from anonymous woman! I immediately thought of the 12 disciples of Christ who were 12 ordinary men. The Lord has been so very faithful to us! This gift touched my heart so deeply and it was truly needed at this time! I love the necklace with the tree of life and “HOPE” written on it. I will wear this each day to remind me of these women who cared enough about me to send this wonderful anonymous gift!!! You are not ordinary, but extraordinary and I know that the Lord is so pleased with you all! Thank you again for bringing me hope,love, kindness, and compassion! I will remember this all of my life and be forever thankful for your generosity! May the Lord bless each one of you!

Please thank the Special Lady that came to my home.

My name is Maureen and I live in Grand Rapids MI. I lost my husband in January at the young age of 48 unexpectedly. I am a widow at the age of 48 with two children. I want to thank the Special Lady that came to my home to deliver the gift card. I am so humbled that she did that act of kindness. I was not home. Please tell that Special Lady thank you from the bottom of my heart!

Thank You,

Thank you for the tree in our son's name

This email is long overdue, but I want to say thank you to the 12 Ordinary Women of Franklin, TN. My son passed away almost a year ago at 22 years old. We received a generous gift and card from this fantastic group of women during a very difficult time. It helped make our burden a little lighter.

We especially love the tree they are donating in my son's name. I do have a question for them. We are wanting to plant the tree where he is buried in Alabama and not in Tennessee where the tree planter is located. Is there a connection for this in the Birmingham, Alabama area?

Thank you

I received a gift from you all today. I appreciate it very much. It made me cry, but It was very sweet. My kids and I will appreciate it. Thank you so much.

CL

I almost threw the envelope away!

A surprise knock at the door today lead to an unexpected surprise. Two very nice women were standing there and one of them pronounced my name (correctly) questioning, did they have the right address. That threw me, as no one pronounces my name right! I thought, do I know them? I know my life is I upside down right now, but am I starting to forget people who know me too?! Mind you this all happened in a span of 5 seconds. One of the women handed me an envelope and said there was a note inside that would explain everything and slightly shrugged her shoulders like she had no idea what was going on. They smiled and left. I'm a not a very trusting person anymore so I brought the envelope in and set on the table and stared at it for a while before I opened it. I don't know what I was afraid of but all these different scenarios of what I might find in that envelope scared me. I wasn't sure I was going to open it at all. I considered throwing it out. When I finally did open it , I found a short, simple loving letter of encouragement and some money for a journey I'm about to take. You ladies are wonderful people and just what I needed at this time. Thank you so much!

At a time when I really needed it you were there.

I want to express my surprise and heartfelt thanks for the caring package that was left at my door. I am battling breast cancer, along with the loss of my special daughter in law and your organization checked in on me at a time that I really needed it. I know that they also came to my daughter in law and I am realizing how important this can be to people .... I am praying that I can bring a smile to someone in the future at a time when they need it. Please keep up this wonderful practice… And let others know if the need is there to help. Thank you so much!!!!!

My thanks is extraordinarily inadequate

Dearest “Ordinary Women”, The words of appreciation and thanks that I have for you seem extraordinarily inadequate. However, I'd really love for you all to know how profound the impact your gift had on me. I have struggled for years with assurance of my salvation, mainly because I had a significant unconfessed sin that I had hidden deeply for 23 years. Although because of God's mercy and grace, I had repented and never repeated the sin, I was ashamed and didn't confess it until I was confronted 4 years ago. Since then, the LORD has been so sweet to remind me of His character and forgiveness in many ways but none so impactful as in the ways HE encouraged me this year. One of those ways, was your surprise note and gift I found in the “black hole” that is my purse. It came toward the end of May this year, just shortly after my husband and I gave away our first daughter in marriage and were still reeling from the significance of that and also finally “dealing with” the fact that the LORD had granted us another blessing in my womb, #11(at age 47 and in the middle of menopause 😉). He knew I would need encouragement and reminders of His love and faithfulness not only then but now too. We have had one medical “crisis” after another this summer and it seems as if that is going to continue for a while. Please know that your sweet words of encouragement and your commitment to pray for me have had a profound effect on me and has strengthened my faith in God and His provision. Although I still don't understand all He is leading us through, I am encouraged to acknowledge Him in all things, to trust Him because He is trustworthy, and to KNOW that He will direct our steps. I have kept your note close by and wear the beautiful “hope” necklace often! They are both sweet reminders of His love for me. The money that you included also made a big impact in our lives and again reminded us of God's provision and trustworthiness. Thank you for ministering to me and my family in such an extraordinary way. We truly have a God that is beyond compare. To Him be the glory!

You will never know the depth of my gratitude for your kindness

I do not know who you are or how you know my situation, but thank you from the bottom of my heart. A young lady about my age knocked on my door this afternoon and handed be a gift bag and said this is a gift from 12 ordinary women who want you to know you are loved and know what you have been going through these last couple of months. I accepted the gift bag and said thank you and away she went. I then looked in the bag and found a a very sweet note with no names, simply signed Love, 12 ordinary women. Inside the bag I found a Kindle fire and a $150 gift card for Target and an inspirational necklace that represents bamboo. I am so overcome with emotion that I have not been able to stop crying since. I immediately got on my computer and found this site. You will never know the depth of my gratitude for your kindness. This unexpected kindness came on a day when my physical and emotional pain are affecting me more than usual and I have not had the strength or energy to put on a brave face and go out into the world today. What you do makes a difference and you are a true blessing.
MW

Minneapolis Star Tribune tells our story.

'Ordinary Women' offer a shot of hope for people in need

A nameless group delivers thoughtful gifts to people facing tough times.

They asked for only one thing and left much more in return.

“Are you Melissa?” they wondered.

Melissa Wickstrom-Sirek didn’t recognize the two women who approached her as she was presiding over outgrown toys, out-of-style clothes and used furniture for the yard sale at her Eden Prairie home.

Unassuming, dressed in shorts and T-shirts, one wearing a baseball cap, the women looked like they were out for an afternoon stroll. Wickstrom-Sirek gave the response they were looking for — “yes” — and one of them handed her a gift basket.

Then they turned and walked away.

It was last August, and the kids’ school year loomed ahead. Most of her yard sale customers were neighbors who knew her story: a single mother of four children, three of whom are on the Autism spectrum.

Wickstrom-Sirek had organized the sale with a neighbor to help to cover what her one full-time and three part-time jobs couldn’t: tuition for a school offering specialized training needed by one of her kids. One shopper paid with a $50 check — insisting she wanted no change — for boys’ toys valued at a few dollars.

Confused by the arrival of the gift basket, Wiskstrom-Sirek took it into the house before looking inside.

“I just started crying,” she recalled.

Inside the basket was a wallet filled with gift cards for gasoline, groceries and Starbucks, other knickknacks like notebooks and soaps, a children’s Bible and a book of encouragement.

The senders went by a name she didn’t recognize: “12 ordinary women,” was all the card said.

The group 12 Ordinary Women was conceived seven years ago.

One ordinary woman was lying beside her husband in their home in Franklin, Tenn. They had food, clothing and warmth, but the country was caught in the recession, and some of their neighbors were scrimping to afford rent, bills and groceries.

“I can’t do enough to help someone,” she told him.

“Then why don’t you?” he responded.

It turns out this woman wasn’t alone. She approached 11 friends of different backgrounds, education levels and ages. They were onboard. And thus began their monthly anonymous giving under the collective pseudonym “12 ordinary women.”

The flagship group has inspired others, from Florida to Texas, as well as two groups in Minnesota.

One ordinary woman from a Twin Cities western suburb started her group in March 2014 after meeting the founder in Tennessee. The group meets once a month to nominate recipients for a surprise token of optimism purchased with their “ordinary woman tax.”

Nominees are people the group recognizes as being in need. Although the recipients often are people that someone in the group knows, they go to great lengths to keep the beneficiary from figuring out the connection.

“We make sure there’d be no way they can connect the dots right back to our group … I cannot lie to save my life and so it’s always fun to come up with ways to help people without them knowing anything about it,” the Minnesota founder said.

The gifts vary by need. There have been provisions of comfort and rest for a cancer victim, a new computer for a high school graduate and a photo shoot for a dying mother who wouldn’t see her children into adulthood.

Other times, a dozen handwritten letters have fit the bill.

“We have found that it’s not so much the gift — whether it’s a financial gift or a care basket or whatever it may be — that’s not really what it’s all about,” the founder said.

It’s about hope. “It’s letting someone know that they’re seen, they are heard. Someone understands their situation and cares about them deeply,” she added.

There have been offshoots like “12 Average Joes,” founded by the original ordinary woman’s husband, and “12 Ordinary Families,” which functions the same way. The only way to contact the groups is through a blog to which recipients from across the country sometimes submit thank-you notes.

“We want them to know that we understand their pain and struggle,” the Tennessee founder said, citing the proverb “blest be the gift and the giver alike.”

“I think there’s more blessing for all of us who give than there will ever be for a recipient,” she said.

Late-night visitors

Jennifer Stepan and her family were getting ready for bed one April night when the doorbell rang. Standing on her doorstep in Victoria were two unfamiliar women toting a large gift basket.

They handed her the basket and turned away, leaving Jennifer and her husband, Jamie, exchanging confused looks.

Jamie had lost his job in January, and the family of four became dependent on a single income. They were getting by, but just barely. Even such a simple outing as taking their kids, 6 and 8 years old, out for custard at Culver’s was beyond their means.

“It’s the most humbling experience to know that you can’t do what your status quo has always been,” Jennifer said.

Inside the basket were gift cards for groceries and gasoline. There also were cards so they could take their kids to an ice cream shop and the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum.

The Stepans scoured the Internet hoping to discover whom they could thank, but the search uncovered only the anonymous organization’s website.

Jennifer vowed that they’d repeat the gesture once they had the means.

A public thank you

After two women showed up at Liz Sosin’s doorstep, she spent the next couple of weeks trying to track down their origin. “Twelve ordinary women?” she’d ask to random people, to their confusion.

“I didn’t bust anybody, and if I did, they covered it really well,” she said.

Sosin was out one day when her husband, Phillip, answered the door of their Minnetonka home to find two strangers holding a package. It was a rarity that he was at home that day in April. He had spent much of the previous few months in the hospital because of a series of colon surgeries.

Inside the package were Twins tickets for the Sosins and their two children, as well as gift cards to Potbelly and Caribou Coffee.

“It happened on a day when you try to keep your chin up and march one foot in front of the other,” Liz Sosin recalled. “But some days it’s just bad. You’re tired. You’re losing faith a little bit.”

The gift brought a bit of fun back into their lives that had become bogged down by hardship.

“I have no idea who they are,” she said of the donors. “You must be talking to them, so would you please say ‘Thank you’?”

Natalie Daher • reporter