“Shelters are one of the saddest places to walk into, but for really lucky people it can be one of the happiest places to walk back out of. Why? For those lucky people, like me, you find a best friend staring back at you from the inside of a cage.”

So writes 14-year-old Alexa Wirfs about finding her cat Chaz, a flame point Siamese, who had lived at SafeHaven Humane Society in Albany, Oregon. Alexa’s moving essay for Freekibble.com’s Kibble Krusaders Kontest made her shelter a winner of $1,000 worth of Halo Dinner Party.

“It feels really good to help the pets at the shelter,” she says. “I don’t know how I would feel day after day waiting to be taken home to a special place.”

Yet Alexa’s motivation to write the essay was not just to help the cats and dogs at SafeHaven. “I want to let other kids know,” she says, “that they can make their own difference in the world with animals.”

This sentiment clearly moved Christiana Gunderson, director of operations at SafeHaven. “It’s a big deal to us for a kid to take it upon herself to do this for the animals,” says Gunderson, whose shelter has over 1,200 dog and cat adoptions annually. “I think that was great.” Gunderson has set aside the Halo gift for “pets who are depressed or whose appetite is down,” she says. “I have a foster dog right now and put it on his food to entice him to eat.”

Alexa, a ninth-grader from Lebanon, Oregon, feels the pain of animals like Gunderson’s foster dog. Despite wanting to volunteer at her shelter, she finds it difficult to visit. “When I see the animals begging at their doors, I want to take them all home,” she says. “I say, ‘Mom, please let me take them home, they all need a home.’

“I don’t like seeing a hurt animal because it hurts me,” continues Alexa, who would love to find a job working with cats that pays well. “I’m a quiet person outward, but inward I want to doalot of things, I just don’t know where to start.”

Her freekibble.com essay, however, is a good start. Its ending — “The friendly staff and volunteers at SafeHaven complete families.” — won the heart of freekibble.com founder Mimi Ausland, 13.

“I love that last sentence, that really touched me and my mom and dad, that the friendly staff complete families, shelters like SafeHaven and other shelters do complete families,” says Mimi. “It makes you want to go to SafeHaven now, and see if you can find your new friend. It is really touching.”

Click here to read Alexa’s entire essay.