COEUR d'ALENE - Strangers' reactions were brief but warm as Nancy Herman did her thing on Thursday evening.

"Merry Christmas!" she shot out to a passing woman, who glanced up in surprise and smiled.

"Have a Merry Christmas," she declared to another woman. A nod in return.

No donation, but Herman wasn't phased.

"Hello! Merry Christmas!" she offered once more, and the individual looked up and reached for her wallet.

Not one person missed.

Herman has invested a lot of energy into getting noticed this holiday season, she said.

And most everyone who passes the Salvation Army bell ringer will remember her ... But not because she rings a bell.

The 44-year-old uses her voice instead, to greet folks, to welcome their donations, and to sing.

The singing has definitely earned some attention, she said.

"Nobody asked me or told me to," the Coeur d'Alene woman said as she stood in the chilly Safeway entrance, her scarf wrapped around snugly. "It's something I thought would be nice. It's Christmas. I thought it would be nice to sing some Christmas songs."

She brings her own hymn book from home, a weathered, dog-eared tome that is missing its cover. She keeps it with her plastic bag of necessities, like her water bottle and ear muffs, until she feels it's time, she said, and then plucks it up to exercise her diaphragm.

"I always start with my favorite," Herman said, pointing to the song, "To God Be the Glory."

The day before she had been a vocal force at the Safeway on Fourth Street, where she held the song book open in one hand, her eyebrows lifted with effort as she raised her head to make eye contact with passersby.

Her voice belted, her body bobbing to the rhythm.

Some stopped to listen. Some nodded to her, smiled, and slipped coins into the kettle.

"I don't know," she said of whether her boisterous voice garners more donations. "Sometimes it will."

Herman doesn't have the voice of an angel, she admitted. She has never had singing lessons, never even sung in public before.

"I'm not even a public speaker. I'm really shy, the nervous type," she said. "I sit in the back of the class, versus the front of the class."

But still, despite the harried expressions on customers' faces, she blasts the tunes with energy as she stands alone in retail store entrances, letting the melody lull folks to slow down.

"I just try," Herman said. "The Lord gave me the talent and I use it the best I can, to sing as bold and the best I can."

Bob Tupper, a sales clerk at Safeway, said he sees folks dragging into the store with grouchy expressions, only to perk into a smile when they see the Salvation soloist.

"This time of year, it's rough," Tupper said. "People are sick of shopping. Her singing, it's very uplifting."

Herman puts a rare kind of effort into her seasonal job, he added, offering him a jolly greeting even as he comes and goes from breaks.

He even enjoys the singing, though Safeway is blaring holiday music all day.

"I don't mind," Tupper said. "It's the best time of year."

Herman said she isn't sure if the donations she has received are typical, since this is her first time being seasonally employed by the Salvation Army.

She was let go from two jobs in the last couple years, she said. With four of their six kids still living at home, the youngest 9, she and her husband are making extra efforts to get by, she said.

"I wouldn't say its been hard, but its been rough at times. But we muddle through the best we can," Herman said. "You can live life two ways. You can try to be happy and do the best you can, or be sad and depressed and miserable. I've tried the miserable part, and it doesn't work too well."

Her last days by the kettle are this weekend, she said, and then the job ends. She is excited to see her whole family together, including her two grandchildren, for a hearty Christmas meal.

Maybe things will get better from here for Herman, or maybe next year will bring more obstacles.

But on Thursday, her mind was simply on the kettle to her side, and the folks passing by.

Once she was ready, she said, she would pick up the song book again.

"I trust in God, and the fact that he gives me the ability to sing in front of people," she said. "I just do it."