I am back with renewed energy and motivation to once again
bring you all a weekly blog on easy ways to help others. I thought I would come
back with a big bang and start it off with a recap of the past two year’s
entries; I’m doing it in two segments so it is not too long. This recap will only
include the entries from the past that are still active today and waiting for
you all to take part. I’m hoping with my renewed energy I will gain more
viewers which is where I ask you, my loyal readers, to pass this on to your
friends and family. I try and keep it light and short, minus this blog, and
give you easy ways to help others. I named my blog,
The
Little Things Do Matter, because they truly do. For each reader that takes
part in the week’s entry, that is one more person than before taking part and
as you know things add up! So here are the short explanations recapping the
last two years. Enjoy and be sure to share!
Year One:
Donate money towards hunger, mammograms, animals, veterans,
autism research, child health, literacy, and the rainforest by simply clicking
a button every day.
Enter the code on your coke bottle or container the cans
come in for points that can be donated to many causes, including schools, the
special Olympics, and our troops.
Answer questions on many different subjects and for every
question answered right, 10 grains of rice are donated to the United Nations
World Food Program.
You can send in your used cards to St. Judes Ranch and they
will take them, make them into new cards, and sell them to help raise funds.
The children at the ranch help with the card project learning many valuable
skills.
On the top of many different food and household products are
box top labels. They are worth ten cents for each label and can be taken to
most schools to help them raise funds.
Answer two questions every day, one about dogs and one about
cats. Whether you answer the questions right or wrong, 10 pieces of kibble are
donated to shelters all over the United States.
This is very much like box tops however it is labels for
education and the schools are given points and not money. The points can be
turned into items from a catalog that they have.
Places are always looking for prom type dresses to be
donated and what better time than right before we get into prom season! Donate
my dress has compiled a list, by state, of different places that take dresses
and then donate them to girls who need them.
You help entrepreneurs start and/or expand their businesses
that usually are not able to. The cool thing about this site is once you are
repaid you can either reinvest your money into a new borrower or take your
money back. You have the power to be able to help many people.
Good search is a search engine like Yahoo and Google yet
when you use good search one cent is donated, for every search, to a nonprofit or
school of your choice.
Jamie Oliver has created a mission to help educate people on
healthier ways to eat. He focuses on school lunch and you can help him by
signing his petition to help bring better and fresher food to schools.
Daily feats allows you to check in the good feats that you
do daily, like flossing, drinking orange juice, reading, working out, and so
many more. You get points for every feat you enter and can get fun things with
your points as well as donate your points to Save the Children, Companions for
Heroes, JDRF, and the Prevent Cancer Foundation.
Nike takes old shoes that can no longer be worn and makes
them into things that can still be used like track surfaces, gym floors,
basketball and tennis courts, and even new Nike products. You can drop your
shoes off at Nike and Converse stores and can also mail them in if you do not
live near a drop off location.
All of the post tax proceeds from Newman’s own food products
go to the foundation which has donated millions of dollars to thousands of
charities.
Little acts of
kindness
Little acts of kindness are something that can brighten
someone’s day and bring a smile to a sad face. Whether it is smiling at someone
walking down the street, giving water or food to someone on the streets or
bringing holiday cheer to those less fortunate try and go offline every
once-in-awhile and bring happiness and cheer to others.
Terracycle takes materials that usually cannot be recycled
and recycles them into items that can once again be used. The nonprofits,
schools, or individuals that are collecting the waste receive $.02 for each item
sent in and can either donate the money to charitable causes on the website or
can use it for their own nonprofit charity or school.
Roozt promotes socially responsible buying by offering deals
from companies that are making a positive impact in their community,
environment, with their employees, and humanity as a whole. For every person
that joins, they will donate a meal to a person in need.
Better world shopper has graded hundreds of companies on
five different categories that can help people shop more ethically. The five
categories that they judge companies on are human rights, the environment,
animal protection, community involvement, and social justice.
You can make sleeping mats for the homeless out of plastic
bags so that they can stay out of landfills and continue to be used. The
youtube video shows you how to make the yarn for the mats and the mats
themselves.
We give books allows you to read children’s books online
while donating a book to children who don’t usually have many, if any, books to
read. You can pick the campaign that you want to read for and even if you don’t
have children it is still fun to read the many books that they have available.
Cards that give back
The holidays are past but you can always think about buying
cards that help great causes. There are many different cards that can help
other people. The three that I blogged about were
Phoenix Children’s Hospital cards,
St. Jude’s Ranch, and
Cards
from Africa. These are three wonderful organizations that are doing a lot
with the money they receive.
Donate your hair to wonderful causes that create wigs for
children with cancer (locks of love – 10+ inches) and women with cancer
(pantene’s beautiful lengths – 8+ inches).
Music
Music is such an awesome thing and there are so many ways
music helps people. There are many songs and CDs that can be purchased that
help good causes like broadways Carols for a Cure, Playing for Change, and
African Children’s Choir.
Care2 is a site that has the daily clicks to help good
causes as well as petitions that you can sign and daily actions that can be
done to help others and our environment.
Sevenly is working on raising capital and awareness to many
organizations doing good throughout our world with the help of a weekly shirt.
Each week they choose a different organization, make a unique design for that
cause and sell clothing with the design for a week and $7 of each shirt sale goes
to the organization being recognized.