Littlest Lady Cares spreads kindness throughout Delmarva and beyond

When Alyssa Bennethum, now 13, changed elementary schools she was bullied. She drew a heart on paper, colored it, and cut it out and gave it to someone who hurt her feelings with the message “I forgive you, I’m still your friend”. That was the start of the Littlest Lady Cares kindness group and her efforts to spread kindness.

Bennethum, who now lives in Millsboro, is autistic and is being home schooled. The name Littlest Lady comes from her being the youngest kid in her family and is also a nickname she has for her mom, Brigitte.

She created her kindness group, a private Facebook group that her mom helps her run, when she was nine years old to spread kindness one heart at a time. Alyssa has a following of over 700 people and used the group to spread her kindness hearts around the world.

Alyssa Bennethum started the Littlest Lady Cares kindness group to spread kindness one heart at a time. She started creating kindness hearts with little sayings after being bullied when she was in elementary school.

Bennethum started making the kindness cards/hearts using colors she liked and small simple sayings such as “never give up”, “always smile”, “choose joy”, and “be awesome”. She started making them before COVID and they took off during the pandemic. When she goes somewhere, like an amusement park, she puts them down. She also gives them out to people. The kindness hearts have gone as far away as Switzerland, the Great Wall of China, Iceland, Australia, and Germany.

Alyssa gives them out to bring joy, happiness and smiles to people. The reaction is usually, “that’s neat, cool, smart, good idea”. She painted rocks in an effort to spread kindness before making the cards.

Also during COVID, Bennethum raised funds for the library in Cecil County, Md., where she used to live. She also created a little free library at the children’s park in the area.

“She had a fascination with books,” her mom said.

Alyssa took books as donations to keep them filled and continues to do so once or twice a month. Around 6,000-7,000 books have gone through the library. She also raises funds with brick pavers for people to paint. The pavers went around the library as a pathway and featured book quotes and Disney and television characters.

She is looking to start a little library somewhere in Millsboro to continue to spread kindness. She also puts the hearts in libraries and bookstores.

“I feel like now that I’m older, I’m more into it,” Alyssa said. Her mom added that she can now advocate for herself and is a better public speaker and has more confidence with who she is.

“I think Littlest Lady Cares has given her a platform to build on and to help her to become more confident and self aware,” said Brigitte Bennethum.

Alyssa gets joy out of giving back to people and wants to reach others to let them know that they are not alone. Her goal is to make the world a kinder, safer place. Her slogan/mission is “spreading kindness one heart at a time”. She does this by sending or giving hearts to people to pay them forward to other people.

Bennethum partnered with another kindness organization and the neighborhood (in Maryland) and built kindness signs, raising funds and donated the money to a kindness organization in Kent County (Md.). She has done fundraising and has given to organizations that she felt needed it such as an animal shelter, which bought toys for the animals.