Charitable Gift Giving

Okay, everyone sing along with me…

“Lollipop, lollipop, oh, lolli, lolli, lolli, lollipop, lollipop, oh, lolli, lolli, lolli, lollipop!”

(pop)

This impromptu musical interlude was brought to you in honor of National Lollipop Day, which is coming up on July 20, 2013.

I scoured the Internets looking for the history of National Lollipop Day, but didn’t find a thing. The National Confectioner’s Association (the industry trade group for sweets) says this is not uncommon; usually these holidays get started when an individual store or a candy maker run a promotion, and over the years it sticks (no pun intended). If you’re looking for excuses to eat all kinds of sweets, check out their calendar. You’ve got National Milk Chocolate Day a week later and National Toasted Marshmellow Day in a month (in the middle, not surprisingly, is National S’mores Day).

While candy makers all over are of course cashing in on National Lollipop Day (you can get a free lollipop at See’s Candy all day on 7/20), there’s one charity that you should really check out: The Lollipop Theater Network.

There have been a lot of great movies out this summer; in the past two weeks alone I’ve seen Despicable Me 2, Star Trek, The Great Gatsby, and Monsters University, Man of Steel, and Iron Man 3 are still on the list.

We take a lot for granted, and one of the things we take for granted is being able to just pop into a movie theater on a Friday night and enjoy a movie with popcorn and soda. But think about kids who have serious or terminal illnesses and are stuck in a hospital bed for weeks or months. Sadly, while the rest of us are enjoying brand new, first-run movies, they’re not. While it seems like a little thing, it’s just another thing that can make these kids feel isolated and separated from their friends and the world.

The Lollipop Theater Network is a non-profit group started in New York City in 2001. In the pediatric ward of Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in Manhattan, a volunteer named Janis Fischer was able to hold a special movie night for the kids with a special screening copy of How the Grinch Stole Christmas. The experience was immensely impactful; the kids at the screening were filled with joy and excitement and talked about it for days.

Janis, children’s book author Joshua Gaspero were able to get in touch with filmmaker Evelyn Iucolano, and the three of them founded this charity. Fast forward 12 years, and the charity has held special screenings for over 275 films for thousands of sick children across the country. It’s not just an empty phrase that laughter is the best medicine: by providing these kids with such joy and excitement, it can provide them and their families with a little brightness in an otherwise bleak time.

The program has expanded to include other programs, such as arts and crafts events and music programs that continue to brighten children’s lives. It has also attracted celebrities who attend screenings and help support the programs, such as the incomparable Anne Hathaway (also a board member), Julius the Sock Monkey, and the Amazing Spider Man.

 How can you support this great charity? See those awesome lollipops at the top of this post? You can buy It’s Sugar, and proceeds will go to the Lollipop Theater Network. Or, there are other ways to get involved directly.

The Urgency Network is a new idea in charity fundraising and awareness-raising that’s built for the Social Media generation. It sort of takes the idea of an old fashioned raffle and brings it into the 21st Century.

Here’s how it works. There’ll be a bunch of “Grand Prizes” you can win. These prizes won’t just be your standard run-of-the-mill charity prizes, but will be, in their own words “Larger than life” experiences. As of the launch date today, the prices consist of the following:

• A personal meeting with Sir Paul McCartney. You can win roundtrip airfare for two to San Francisco, VIP passes to the 2013 Outside Lands Festival, 4 nights accommodations, attending Paul McCartney’s soundcheck, dinner backstage, and a signed copy of “Wings Over America”.
• A personal meeting with Sir Richard Branson. You can win roundtrip airfare for two to New York, 2 nights accommodations, and and meet and greet with Sir Richard Branson and many of the leaders in the environmental industry.
• A personal meeting with Sir Linkin Park. Okay, Linkin Park has not got their knighthood (yet), but you can win a trip to Tokyo and rock out at the 2013 Summer Sonic Festival to Metallica, Nas, M.I.A., Fall Out Boy, Alt-J, Linkin Park, and more.

The raffles support all kinds of campaigns, from Greenpeace’s Save the Arctic to Carbon War Room’s Ten Island Renewable Challenge to Power the World’s efforts to get safe, clean energy to the world’s poor. As time goes by, we’ll no doubt be seeing many more charities and grand prizes (including, it appears from the video below, a trip to space courtesy of the aforementioned Sir Richard Branson).

Additionally, The Urgency Network will provide top-performing campaigns an opportunity to win a portion of The Jackpot, which is fueled by foundations and corporate sponsors. The first Jackpot up for grabs will be a $1 million dollar media grant provided by PVBLIC Foundation who harnesses the power of unused media space to help nonprofits amplify their message.

So how can you enter the contest? Well, each time you “take action”, you’ll get another entry into the raffle. “Action” can take many forms, from donating money to signing a petition to watching a video to “liking” the charity on Facebook or following it on Twitter,  to telling a friend about it. The more actions you take, the more entries you’ll get.

You can also buy merchandise on the site, which will also get you entries. As of this writing, the merchandise ranges from a $25 water bottle to a $15,000 drum set owned by Linkin Park’s own Rob Bourdon. There are also cool little prizes scattered about; for $100, you can have Linkin Park mention you in a Tweet!

Here’s more information about it:

The ingenious part about this idea is that it taps into our constantly plugged-in culture. Instead of Tweeting about what you had for breakfast today, how about a Tweet that helps a great cause, and may get you the experience of a lifetime?

From June 25 to June 27, 2013, you can get 35% off an apron at FlirtyAprons.com by using promo code ADLER. If, like me, you tend to make a mess while cooking, grilling, or doing work around the house, these aprons are among the most stylish you’ll see anywhere. There’s everything from a “little black dress” (complete with string of pearls) to a chic pink outfit that looks more like a fashionable thing to wear around town than something to be worn in the kitchen.

Why promo code ADLER? Because it’s in honor of Adler, a 7 year-old who was diagnosed with Stage 3 Kidney Cancer back in March. Sadly, his family had no insurance and at times haven’t even been able to take him to the hospital, much less give him the chemotherapy and treatment he needs.

There’s a growing number of supporters, and a Facebook page set up at https://www.facebook.com/HopeForAdler/ where you can make a direct donation.

$5 of each apron sold using this promo code on these days will go to Adler and his family.

As you’re planning your 2013 Super Bowl snacking this year, I’d like to suggest a company that did some really extraordinary things in 2012.

Last year, Fischer & Wieser Specialty Foods, based in Fredericksburg, Texas, partnered with LIFE Community Classroom, a privately funded non-profit organization that serves students with intellectual disabilities and/or special needs.

Cooking is one of many skills that the school teaches to its students, helping them to become self-sufficient members of society. Some students of LIFE Community Classroom with a passion for cooking ended up creating a delicious salsa which they called “Life Community Classroom Traditional Salsa”. With teachers’ support, these students with culinary skills also became entrepreneurs. They sold their salsa to raise funds and awareness for the school. Their salsa was a huge success: each batch they created sold out quickly.

Founder and executive director of LIFE Community Classroom, Angel Wiggins, contacted COO Jenny Wieser and President and CEO Case Fischer to see if they would be willing to collaborate on a product. Fischer and Wieser came through in a big way: they worked with the students to help develop their product into an actual product for sale throughout Texas Hill Country.

You can purchase LIFE Community Classroom Traditional Salsa at the following brick-and-mortar locations:

.         Fischer & Wieser on Main
.         Fischer & Wieser Das Peach Haus
.         The Shops on Llano
.         Woerner Feed Store
.         Smitten
.         Sugar and Smoke

I had a chance to taste some of the salsa, and it is really amazing. It’s incredibly fresh, with chunky bits of tomatoes and a deep, rich flavor. It’s thicker than the mass-produced goo you find in most supermarket aisles. It also has an impressive kick that you’ll be hard pressed to find in conventional salsas that includes three kinds of peppers. The list of ingredients is simple: vine-ripened fresh tomatoes, extra heavy tomato puree, cilantro, onion, japaleno peppers, salt, garlic, serrano peppers, black pepper.

Even the jar itself was designed with input from the students. The Fischer & Wieser design team created several options for the students to vote on; they selected the ultimate logo above- an image of a cactus heart with a Texas flower adorning the top right corner.

If you’re not lucky enough to be in Texas Hill Country, you can still get a taste of Fischer and Wieser salsa at your local specialty grocery store. Check out the store locator on their site to find where you can find out where to buy one of nine other salsa flavors they sell nationwide.

I had the pleasure of tasting their Hatch Chile and Pineapple Salsa.

Check out how fresh and delicious it looks right out of the jar.

Yes, it tastes as good as it looks. It had a very fresh scent of sweet, fresh tomatoes. You can taste the sweetness of the pineapple when you first bite it, followed up by the bite of the chili. The sweetness of this flavor makes it a great choice for kids, and it was excellent with tortilla chips; I ended up eating a lot more than I probably should have!

The jar is helpful as well, giving tops on how to rescue stale chips, as well as giving tips on other uses for the salsa, such as using it for grilling chicken, pork, or fish, or as a topping for burgers and hot dogs.

Overall, I was very impressed with the freshness of both salsas. To get yours, visit Fischer and Wieser’s Web site at the very easy-to-remember URL www.jelly.com.