By Anne Thompson
NBC News

Laura Pita is a bundle of energy and she needs it. She is the mother of four tireless boys. Like so many moms, her plate is overflowing. Raising four boys is a full-time job on its own, but one of her sons, 8-year-old Josh, has an acute form of leukemia. Last April, as Josh was undergoing intensive chemotherapy, Pita was also comforting her mother, Roberta "Emmy" Burt who was dying from melanoma. That month, on the day Emmy died, a distraught Pita decided she had to do something positive, something that would remind her that there is happiness in life.  

"I lost my mommy. I needed to do something or else I would have gone insane," Pita said.  

So she decided to make a tutu for her niece. That act in a moment of despair was the start of her charity "Emmy's Heart" that is bringing moments of fun and joy in the pediatric wards of Joe DiMaggio Hospital in Hollywood, Fla., and Bethesda Memorial Hospital in Boynton Beach, Fla.

Looking at the tutu, Pita thought of all the little girls she saw fighting cancer. The drugs that promise to make them well also take their hair, their glowing complexions, and their energy. But Pita knew they were beautiful and knew her tutus could remind them of their inner beauty. As for the boys, capes would make them feel like superheroes. With the help of friends, Pita started making tutus and capes and taking them to Joe DiMaggio, where Josh is treated. Watch the faces of scared children transform into confident smiles as they put on the capes and tutus and you will see that Pita's creations have magical powers.

Instantly, the children go from the difficult reality of being sick to their world of imagination. They become Captain America, Superman, ballerinas, and princesses. They jump, they twirl and most of all, they laugh. Pita's son, Josh, calls himself the Chemo Kid. He is vanquishing his leukemia, now getting chemo just once a month to keep his illness in check. So far, Pita said, they’ve distributed 250 tutus and about 200 capes.

"I honestly thought here and there I would drop off a tutu for the girls, I had no idea -- no dream ever that this would happen," said Pita, whose family has spent $4000 on the charity since April 2011.  

They call her "The Tutu Lady." I think you'll agree, they can call her a superhero too. 

You can learn more about Emmy's Heart by visiting their website or emailing Laura Pita at laura.pita@emmysheart.org.

By Ginny Harris
NBC News

Antoinette Kolesnikov, a first generation American of Russian parents, wanted to give back to her country and serve it well. A chief master sergeant in the U.S. Air Force, she is based at Ft. McGuire Air Force base in New Jersey. Her rank is coveted, as there are very few women who have held that position. Only 2 percent ever attain this rank. When she joined the Air Force 37 years ago, only 7 percent of service members were women, and now there are 18 percent.

Kolesnikov is a single parent who made sacrifices. Because of her dedication to her job, she had to juggle motherhood with her responsibilities to the Air Force. Kolesnikov's daughter is now a lieutenant in the Engineering Corp of the U.S. Air Force. Once again, Kolesnikov led by example.

Each year around Christmas time, AK (as she is known) cooks omelets for a special holiday breakfast for her troops and her community. It started 23 years ago, in her office, when it was just about 20 people who had nowhere to go. It has now grown to more than 300. This year she'll cook her last breakfast before she retires. AK pays for the breakfast herself. In the last few years, she placed donation jars on the table, and the money goes to someone in need. This year, some of it will go to an enlisted member., Michelle Duffanti, who is single and recently adopted 6 children, some of them with special needs.

In the past, AK has donated money to service members who have suffered personal tragedies. Two airmen had  houses that burned down and she donated the money to them. In addition, a battered women's shelter has been a recipients of AK's kindness and generosity.

Eunique Scales-Brown, a resource advisor for the 135th Squadron has been mentored by AK. She saw her potential, then encouraged and helped Scales-Brown to advance into the position. When Scales-Brown's mother died suddenly and she couldn't afford a funeral, AK was there to help with the funds for a burial. 

"She helped me when I didn't know what to do," Scales-Brown said. "I was on active duty and didn't even know my mother was sick. It's stuff like this that has made me a better person.

"I know I can strive to be like her she is such a blessing, with her busy life, she never forgets you."

Tarun Patel is an only child, born in India to a working class family with a business in medical distribution. When Patel was very young, his father was pushed off a building and the injuries led to memory loss. The family business failed and they lost everything. The Patels moved to Delhi. They were so poor that Patel's mother saved money for eight years just to buy her son a bicycle for his ninth birthday. When he was 11, his family sent him to live with his uncle in New Jersey. She gave him a $20 bill and told him, "Here's enough money for one night's meal and make sure you always do the right thing."

Patel had a passion for aviation and that's how AK came into his life. He got a full-time scholarship at Rutgers University but struggled with English. He secretly joined the Air Force reserves in 1998 when he was 18.

With AK's help, Patel traveled to Qatar and worked there for 90 days. But before he set out for Qatar, Patel dropped out of Rutgers. When he returned, AK nominated him for awards, and he won Airman Of The Year. AK believed in Patel and knew he wouldn't make it without an undergraduate degree. She also gave him a part time job, so that he could work in the morning and go to school at night. He graduated in 2003 and AK hired him full time.

AK and Patel's mother both attended the graduation.

"If AK weren't there in 2000 for me, my life would have been so different," Patel said. "We believe in nine lives and I hope she is in every one of mine. She nurtured me and transformed me into the person I have become."

Patel is now the head ff engineering for the U.S. Navy.

"I am blessed to have AK in my life. Because of her dedication, there is hope," Patel said. "She has been my mentor and my mother rolled into one." Patel gives back to his co-workers by donating 100 hours of work each year.

Watch more of our Making A Difference reports here.

By Anthony Galloway
NBC News producer

Rachel O’Neill is at home in Malawi. Her real home is in Trenton, Mich., not far from Detroit. But when she arrives in Lilongwe, Malawi’s capital, she is welcomed like a native.

On her most recent trip to the country last month, O'Neill was greeted at the airport by a handful of locals, people she has known and worked with for almost five years. Her visits are never routine, but this trip was special.

Anthony Galloway/NBC News

O'Neill was returning to Malawi on the five-year anniversary of her first trip to the country. It was Thanksgiving week in 2006 when she first made a commitment to sew and hand out dresses to a few thousand girls – five years ago, almost to the day, when she promised to do something small to bring smiles to the faces of girls who she knew held so much promise. O'Neill didn’t know it at the time, but her simple idea to help a few thousand girls would end up touching the lives of hundreds of thousands of women around the world.

How to help: Little Dresses for Africa

Correspondent Chris Jansing and I had the opportunity to profile O'Neill over the past 14 months, reporting her story for NBC Nightly News. Each time we meet with her, we are impressed to learn about the astounding response she continues to receive from viewers. Since our first story aired in December 2010, O'Neill has received more than 400,000 dresses from all 50 states. The dresses arrive on her home doorstep and she, along with a dedicated army of volunteers, makes sure they get to needy girls throughout Africa.

The day before Thanksgiving, Jansing and I traveled to meet O'Neill in the village of Thobola, about 100 miles from Lilongwe, to witness firsthand what we had seen in so many photos and videos. There’s no easy way to get there. Eighteen hours in flight and three connections to the capital city, then a two-and-a-half hour drive south to the countryside, picking up fuel when you can, because Malawi suffers from a fuel shortage. But when you get to the end of the dirt road that leads to the village, you know instantly why O'Neill makes the trip.

Thobola is a simple town perched on a hill overlooking a green valley. Most people live in small, thatched-roof huts, pump their water from a well and only have basic nourishment. Still, despite their lack of traditional western resources, the kids’ smiles are radiant and their singing is contagious. They incorporate all of our names into a song: Rachel, Chris, Anthony, and also the names of O'Neill’s family and friends, Dave Taylor, Kandyce Muniz, Jerry and Mark Adams, who have come with her to help distribute the dresses.

Anthony Galloway/NBC News

It is a long, hot day in the unrelenting sunshine, but the girls are patient. It’s striking when O'Neill tells us the dresses may be the only new things these girls have ever been given. The larger message only sinks in later. In a place like Thobola, a brand-new, handmade dress is not just a piece of clothing. It’s a symbol of hope and a gesture of friendship from women 8,000 miles away. It’s one small thing a girl can hold on to as the sun sets and Rachel O’Neill prepares to make the long journey back to Michigan, knowing her little idea brought happiness to thousands of little girls today.

Address for tax deductible donations to TOPPS:

TOPPS
c/o Delta Trust & Bank
P.O. Box 17607
Little Rock, Arkansas 72222

TOPPS phone:  501-944-9472

TOPPS Facebook page

TOPPS website

By Jay Blackman
NBC News producer

In a nondescript office park in Rockland, Mass., the unemployed can find an oasis. It’s the home of a nonprofit called One Life at a Time, an organization that helps those looking for jobs, but in a different way than the state office of unemployment.  

"We basically do one-on-one, and what that means is that everybody is an individual," said founder Christine Driscoll O’Neill. "Whatever their needs are… whatever they need to get to that place to be able to be employable again – we do."

Driscoll O’Neill believes the one-on-one attention that she and her staff are able to provide free of charge is what makes the difference for her clients.  

O'Neill, who started the organization with the proceeds from a whistleblower lawsuit and hopes to continue supporting it through grants, understands her clients’ pain firsthand.

"I know what it's like to feel unemployed, I didn't like it," she said. "There wasn't anybody there for me, so I want to be there for all the underemployed and unemployed." The organization has two offices in Massachusetts, but it has helped many people who live out of state, too, by phone and by Skype.

With a staff of 12, One Life at a Time offers many regular career services, such as resume polishing and help with cover letters, but it doesn’t stop there. In a conference room with a wall of windows, a makeup artist offers advice on what colors to wear to interviews while applying eye liner on Diane, who is out of work for the first time in her career.

"It's about feeling good about yourself," the makeup artist tells Diane. "Just be yourself. Obviously you want to show some confidence. You know that you're able to do the job, and I think that will go a long way."

Surrounded by an unemployed teacher, a laid-off senior accountant and a nurse struggling to find work, Driscoll O’Neill holds a group discussion about the importance of self-esteem.

In another office, career specialist Russell Abbatiello sets up a small video camera in preparation for a mock interview, which puts clients through the process before they have to do it for real. The interviews are recorded to show people how they performed and what they need to work on.  

Abbatiello is now working with a chemist who has been out of work for more than a year. Not only is he testing her interview skills, but he is also drilling her on everything from how she would deal with an ethical issue to what her advanced degrees would mean to an employer. When the interview is over, they watch the video together, analyzing her performance.

"It's not always the answers that you give," Abbatiello tells the chemist, "it's how you give the answers."

For Ted Burns, 53, and a 20-year veteran in the telecommunications industry, the past year has been challenging. With one child in college and another in high school, he is looking for any edge that will get him back into the workforce.

"I'm  trying to stay as positive as I can, put a smile on and, I know eventually something will come," Burns said. "It's tough, it's a battle, it's a struggle and you just try to stay as positive as you can."

Burns taps on a keyboard in the organization’s computer lab, where classes are offered to help clients leverage the networking power of social media sites such as Twitter and LinkedIn. Burns already has used LinkedIn to make several connections. (UPDATE: Just this week, with One Life's help, Burns started a new job in his field.)

Driscoll ONeill says the organization has helped 5,000 people find work, including people such as Jen Guisti, who was laid off from her job as a television producer. Guisti was surprised at how hard it was to find another job.  

"I  heard it was hard but I didn't think it was going to be like this," she said. "I didn't think I was going to be out of work for so long."

Guisti says she struggled going the traditional route through the state offices, and found she needed the one-on-one attention that One Life at a Time provides.

"They were able to help me see things in a different light, and have me go down different paths, and kind of test my skills and test myself," she said. Guisti is now back at work at MK3 Creative, working on corporate videos.

Even with success stories such as Guisti’s, Driscoll O’Neill knows there is more work to do. To her, the country’s 8.6 percent unemployment rate isn't just a number; it represents millions and millions of people.

By Shannon Urtnowski
NBC News associate producer

In conjunction with NBCUniversal's Green Week, Nightly News will bring you a special report tonight about two youths with a big dream and tough legs.

Through their non-profit organization Pick Up America, Jeff Chen and Davey Rogner have been traveling across the country picking up litter and spreading a message of zero waste.

Since March 2010, Chen and Rogner have walked almost 2,000 miles and gathered more than 140,000 pounds of trash along the way.

But the two don't work alone. They have recruited various volunteers along the way, some for just a day and others for months at a time.

Chen and Rogner say they want Pick Up America to instill lasting change in behavior and mentality among the individuals they touch.

"I'm hoping that we can create this kind of respect for the earth," Chen said. "And I think it's very much up to us youth to do that."

Pick Up America has completed half its journey to date. The team, currently just outside Denver, started the pickup in Maryland and has San Francisco in its sights.

The journey is supposed to end there in one year. But Chen and Rogner hope the message will last a lifetime.

Watch the full report Wednesday at 6:30 ET on Nightly News with Brian Williams.

By Ron Mott
NBC News

BLOCK ISLAND, RI -- For more than half a century, Mary Donnelly -- still toiling as a state nurse at the spry age of 83 -- has helped nurse fellow Islanders back to health after surgeries, difficult pregnancies and countless other ailments.

But when she saw how her neighbors -- the 1,000 or so who live on the island year-round -- were struggling financially, especially through the winter months, Donnelly wanted to help.

The Mary D. Fund was established in 1979. Donnelly is the lone administrator. The non-profit raises money every year -- the Mary D. Ball in August is the social event of the season -- and helps locals pay for everything from mortgage payments to doctors' and electricity bills when they can't.

Donnelly's popularity tends to surge when the jet-setters who crowd this quaint New England getaway from Memorial Day to Labor Day head home. "Closed" signs suddenly dot storefront windows, streets empty, quiet settles in.

Making ends meet becomes a real test of discipline and faith for many residents who stick around past tourist season.

"So, it's a hard time," Donnelly says. "They're either running stores or restaurants or taxis or whatever. But then, as you can see down at the taxi stand, it's just empty now.

"So they have, they have a problem."

But she's got the checkbook. Last year, Donnelly put more than $50,000 worth of assistance in its registry.

And while she doesn't approve every request for aid, when she does, it usually comes with a caveat or two about how to stretch budgets and survive life on the island.

After all, she's done it for 53 years. On a nurse's pay.

Click here to help the Mary D. Fund or write your tax-deductible check to "Mary D Fund" and mail it to: P.O. Box 323, Block Island, RI 02807.

What's next for Rachel Wheeler? Building a school in the earthquake-ravaged country

By Mary Murray
NBC News producer

LEOGANE, Haiti - If there really is something called "helper’s high" - that feel-good sensation that comes from extending a helping hand to others - Rachel Wheeler is soaring.

The 12-year-old Florida resident has done more to aid others than many grown-ups do in a lifetime.

Three years ago, when she was only nine, Rachel tagged along with her mother to a very adult meeting about charity work in Haiti. She listened as Robin Mahfood, from the aid agency Food For The Poor, describe children so hungry that they eat cookies made of mud, so poor that they sleep in houses made of cardboard.

At the time, Julie Wheeler wasn’t even sure her young daughter understood much of what was being discussed— "until Rachel stood on a chair in front of all those adults and pledged to help Food For The Poor," Wheeler said.

Then a fourth grader, Rachel promised to raise money to build a dozen homes in Haiti.

"Rachel didn’t just want to help," her mother remembers, "but she said she had to help."

Rachel ran bake sales, passed the can at homecoming games and sold homemade potholders at her Zion Lutheran School in Deerfield Beach, Fla. She mailed fundraising appeals to the parents of her friends and the people she knew from church. In her hometown, the Lighthouse Point Chamber of Commerce cut two sizable checks.

Through her Facebook page and word-of-mouth, a cherry farm in Washington heard about Rachel and sent along the proceeds from one of its season's harvest. Another generous donation came from a family that regularly supports the overseas work of Food For The Poor.

In three short years, this little girl raised more than $250,000.

Instead of just building 12 homes, Rachel more than doubled her promise. She spent $170,000 on brand-new earthquake-proof cement structures that shelter 27 families in a small fishing town outside of the capital Port-au-Prince. The families baptized the housing tract "Rachel’s Village."

Many of the new homeowners had spent their entire lives residing in makeshift homes and tents. Food For The Poor had to give instructions on how to fit a key in a lock and turn a doorknob.

Rachel’s dream now is to rebuild the local school, which was severely damaged in the catastrophic 7.2 magnitude earthquake that rocked Haiti in early 2010, killing 316,000 people and leaving 3 million homeless.

She has about half of the money she needs to fix the Reap de Morel school in Leogane, where 200 students learn the basics of reading, writing and arithmetic in classrooms that have no walls, a patched tin roof and dirt floors. Mahfood calls the fact that children even attend school "a small miracle," given that most are homeless, hungry and live in a country where more than half the population can't read or write their own name.

Classrooms are partitioned by bed sheets. The school "library" is a simple wooden table displaying no more than 30 tattered books. Each child owns just a single pencil and notebook. Textbooks are as scarce as food.

In a makeshift cafeteria, women spend the morning cooking huge vats of rice and beans. By 10 a.m., students are too hungry to concentrate, so lunch is served. This hot lunch, supplied by Food For The Poor, is the only meal of the day for most of these children.

Food For The Poor has worked in Haiti for 25 years. The charity runs hundreds of food pantries that feed more than 400,000 people daily and it supports dozens of free health clinics with medicines to treat thousands of children a week. Many young Haitians suffer from deadly diseases such as cholera, which has killed more than 6,200 Haitians and sickened nearly 440,000 over the past year.

Rachel has been to Haiti twice and has seen the abject poverty firsthand. "I don’t believe I can snap my fingers and change Haiti overnight," she said. "I know I have to work at it."

One might call her approach mature for a 12-year-old. But Rachel isn't your typical pre-teen. She has already invested a fourth of her life to her cause.

"If everyone helped Haiti like Rachel, the country could stand on its own," said Mahfood. "In five years, Haiti would be a completely different country."

If you want to learn more about Food For The Poor and Rachel's cause, go to www.foodforthepoor.org/rachel or call 1-800-427-9104.