What Can *I* Do? Hurricane Sandy Relief

I live in Nebraska, so although I have seen the devastation of hurricane Sandy on the news…it really doesn’t seem real.  I don’t know anyone there, so I haven’t heard any personal accounts.  It’s almost (almost) easy to pretend that it’s not real…kind of like how I like to ignore most of the terrifying things on the news.

But it is real.  People’s homes and lives have been destroyed.  Even if their homes are intact, many have lost power and to top it off, it snows.  Sometimes I wonder, with all due respect, why God’s allowing this to happen.  Of course with a blink of an eye it can all go away and we can be living in a perfect world.  Why do these things happen?

So we can help.  So that I can realize life’s not just about me and my Chemistry issues.  Or a test I should really be studying for right now.  Or how tired I am.  I have an opportunity to be a blessing to others and many times I ignore the nudge to do something, but not today.  I can get outside of my little world of worries and do something bigger than myself.

God takes care of me, so I need to take care of others.  I am now babysitting for a living and somehow it’s working.  Yes, I have a pretty great care.com profile and yes, I’ve worked hard to establish myself in the babysitting world (yep, that’s a thing), but there is no real guarantee outside of the 10 hours a week I babysit for my regular family.  All the extra babysitting seems to find me JUST when I need it.  (Thanks God!)

Plus I just got a couple of little checks from my wing-n-beer job that I hadn’t picked up.  Nudge nudge Amanda.

Source: Help Orlando Fernandez

It’s not feasible at this time for me to physically go and help out the Sandy hurricane victims, but I can make a little room in the college girl budget to help others who are without homes. 

I saw my friend Katie sending out a box of supplies to a friend (which seeing that was definitely a nudge in the right direction) and asked how I could help.  I told Dave (the BF) about it and he was a little wary of sending a box to someone I didn’t even know.  Okay Dave, I will figure out a “legit” way to help…

I found a couple of websites from Katelyn’s blog post:

Amazon gift registry (that doesn’t have any items on it) which I’m assuming is there for the address (yes, I made sure this person was a legit representative/address).
You could send any number of items, but some ideas are:

• flashlights with batteries
• candles, matches
• hand warmers
• blankets
• pillows
• food
• hygiene supplies like soap and shampoo

American Red Cross.  Of course they are the main organization (that I’m aware of) that is helping out with the hurricane Sandy relief and could use all the funds possible.  I’m sure blood donations would be just as helpful.

The NYC Mayor’s Fund.  They are using 100% of donations for hurricane relief.

I think I will do some combination of the three since I really do want to send some specific items (I do like shopping on Amazon), and Red Cross is a great organization to donate to anyways, AND who can beat 100% of donations going to Sandy hurricane relief with the mayor’s fund?

I am not posting this to say that I am super awesome for helping.  I am far from it.  Here’s why I’m posting this:

• I want to be held accountable for helping (if I write this post, I can’t NOT do something).
• I want to encourage YOU to help too.  Every little bit counts.  Always.  
• I can guarantee that I’m not sending some ginormous check.  Poor college student, remember.  But I can’t just sit here on my laptop in my warm home eating hot meals and NOT do anything.  Not this time.

I hope this helps!  And maybe it’s the little nudge that you needed.

Thanks again to my friend Katie for her nudge. 3>

If you have any other ideas or organizations to donate to, please please comment below!

UPDATE:  Lindsay at the Lean Green Bean is also organizing something pretty cool for Foodie Penpals that I’ve participated in the past.  Check out her post about how to get involved in Foodie Penpals for Charity!

Thanks Calee for letting me know about this!! 🙂  Keep the suggestions coming!

PS Amidst the devastation of hurricane Sandy, how amazing is it to see our country get together to help people we don’t even know?
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I was looking up on the web to try to figure out the bible story where Jesus told his disciples that this misfortune (an ailment of some sort) did not happen because the man had sinned, but so that everyone could see the glory of God as Jesus healed him.  (If you know what I’m talking about and know the bible verse, let me know!)

Lazarus was one of the stories that came up, which Jesus said something similar, but I also found this link: “Bad Things that Happen to Good People” and it basically referenced a bunch of bible verses that I thought was interesting.  (Only the top ones seem to be really relevant, but a good look in case you are wrestling with the thought “Why did God let this happen?”)