Donate Without Spending a Dime

Stick to your budget and still support great organizations all over the world. In fact, these suggestions don't require a dime... just a little time and coordination!

"Click to Give" websites use advertising money to fund charities. Through GreaterGood.com, you can choose your favorite: hunger, breast cancer, child health, animal rescue, rainforest or literacy! Just a click a day will support some very worthy causes!

If you want something a little more challenging, try FreeRice.com. Simply answer trivia or vocabulary questions. For every answer you get right, sponsors donate 10 grains of rice to the World Food Programme. Learn art, history, math or a foreign language!

How about donating to your favorite cause while surfing the web? GoodSearch.com and iGive.com will donate every time you use their search engine. Select your charity and browse away!

Have furniture or clothing to donate, but no time to drive to the nearest thrift store or church? Call for a pickup from Vietnam Veterans of America. Log on, schedule time and leave your items by the street. Now that's convenient!

New Eyes for the Needy will take your old eyeglasses and redistribute them to poor children and adults in the US and in developing nations worldwide.

What to do with all those old cell phones? Donate them to a good cause, of course, and there are plenty out there. Two national organizations make it easy: National Coalition Against Domestic Violence and Cell Phones for Soldiers.

Tired of making hair appointments? Take a hiatus for a good cause. Grow your hair and give to Locks of Love, an organization that provides wigs to kids with cancer and other medical long-term hair loss.

If you're not squeamish about needles, donate blood through the American Red Cross. Only 3 out of 100 Americans donate blood and the need is tremendous.

Hop on board and help make a difference!

February Charity Selected

Several weeks ago, we had a pretty good selection of organizations for our charity project: animal shelters, wildlife protection, childrens agencies, all sorts of noble and worthy entities. We had a fairly good idea of who we were going to support.

That was, until the Haitian Disaster. Hundreds of thousands of people are helping in any way they can - either by funding, clothing and medical collections, or volunteering. It occured to us that millions of dollars are providing food, water, and medicine. But, who is passing out the food, who is driving to remote areas to supply water, who is administering the medicines?

That's why this month, we chose to support International Relief Teams. IRT is "an international relief organization dedicated to organizing volunteer teams to provide medical and non-medical assistance to victims of disaster and profound poverty worldwide." Within days of the earthquake, they sent a team of ER physicians to work at the general hospital, they shipped over 1,200 family tents, they airlifted 100,000 meals of shelf-stable food and sent $160,000 in medicines & medical supplies. They are a 23 year old organization and a 4-star Charity Navigator agency. They also have some inspiring stories and photos on the IRT Facebook Page.

We're very happy to know that our small donation will help such incredible and necessary efforts. Congratulations to International Relief Teams: our February Charity of the Month!

Want to learn more about IRT and their efforts in Haiti? Watch this incredible video of IRT volunteer Colleen Buono of MD providing medical attention to a boy pulled from the rubble of a collapsed home after 4 days - inspiring!

To learn more about making your own donation to IRT, visit the donation page of their website. To learn more about other organizations providing relief in Haiti, view this article on CNN with a list of worthy causes.