To start...

If recipients on your holiday list like museums, zoos, aquariums or botanical gardens for example, why not give them membership for a year. If they like music, tickets to an individual concert or opera (or, if it's within your budget, for the season) make a great gift. Scholarly types enjoy historical associations and private membership libraries.

Memberships come with extras, such as free admission and publications, invitations to openings and reduced prices for art classes, lectures and on items in the gift shop.

Keep in mind, however, the children like to actually open gifts. My suggestion -- if you're giving a child or his/her family membership in the local zoo, for instance, wrap an item from the zoo's gift shop for the child to tear into.

In connection with your wish to do good, you can help out your favorite museum by shopping in the gift shop, by catalog or online. The gift selector at Museum Shop at the Art Institute of Chicago (www.artinstituteshop.org/gift.asp) for example, enables you to shop by price range, type of gift and recipient gender.

Animal adoptions...

If someone on your list is a great animal lover, adopt an exotic animal in his or her name. Three to check out: Defenders of Wildlife (800-385-9712, http://www.wildlifeadoption.org/) where you can search by price or by animal - snow leopard, penguin, elephant and many more; Caribbean Conservation & Sea Turtle Survival League (800-678-7853, http://www.cccturtle.org/) which has a great gift shop and a long-time favorite, Save the Manatee (800-432-5646, http://www.savethemanatee.org/).

Or, you may be able to arrange an adoption at your local zoo. At the Dallas Zoo (214-943-1771, http://www.dallaszoo.org/), for example, adoptions start at $25 and that includes a personalized certificate with a color photo of "your" animal, a zookeeper's report about your animal and an invitation to the annual "Parents' Party!"

Additional suggestions...

The United Nations Children's Fund is best known for its gift cards. However, UNICEF (800-486-4223, http://www.unicefusa.org/)

has a number of reasonably gifts for children and adults.

Save the Children (800-728-3843, http://www.savethechildren.com/), which provides assistance to children and their families when disaster strikes, has interesting neckties from different countries, among other items.

Something less well known but that also falls under the "doing good" category is National Geographic World Food (888-259-3191, http://www.nationalgeographicfood.com/). Here, for example, a sampler of traditional Latin American cuisine costs $34. Or, give a 3 to 12 month membership in one of the World Food Clubs -- the Oil & Vinegar club membership costs $42.99/shipment, including shipping.

The $20 membership in Earth Justice, (800-584-6460, http://www.earthjustice.org/), a nonprofit law firm that works to protect our natural resources, includes an attractive tote bag. For an additional $18 you can purchase a special CD entitled "Where We Live" with songs by Bob Dylan, Bonnie Rait, Lou Reed and others.

The $25 membership in Ocean Conservancy (800-519-1541, http://www.oceanconservancy.org/) comes with a subscription to the group's magazine and a wildlife calendar. Higher-level memberships mean fancier gifts.

Search services...

By using Good Search (877-466-3004, http://www.goodsearch.com/) you can connect with thousands of nonprofits that have partnered with this free Yahoo-powered search engine. You enter your favorite charity, shop as you normally would (choose from 700+ top online retailers (Apple, Best Buy, Barnes & Noble, Bloomingdale's, Staples, Target, Wal-Mart, etc.) and Good Search will donate up to 37% of the purchase price to your selected charity. The prices are the same as if you went to the retailer directly.

Donors Choose (212-239-3615, http://www.donorschoose.org/) selects a classroom project in a poverty area that needs funding. You then give a gift certificate to your holiday recipient and he/she picks the project that means the most. 

Changing the Present (http://www.changingthepresent.org/) will help you find a nonprofit group that will appeal to your recipient. For example, click on "teens" and you'll find projects young people like - perhaps a month of care for a rescued rabbit at a farm sanctuary ($10) or a pair of shoes for an African girl so she can attend school ($14).

Through The Hunger Site (888-355-4321, http://www.hungersite.com/) and its partners, purchase an item and donations will be made to a worthy cause. For example, when you buy a handcrafted tote bag made by a women's cooperative in New Delhi ($38), 50 cups of food will be donated where needed.

Note: Some organizations, such as Save the Children, post on their Web sites how much income goes to programs (90%), management (4%) and fund raising (6%). For those that do not, you will need to call for details.