Haiti Earthquake - Please Give

Sometimes things so horribly unthinkable happen and make you sit back and count your blessings. The Haiti earthquake toll looks set to pass 100,000. Even though we're so far away, we can still do our bit to help - the Australian government have already pledged $10 million in aid, and you can add your donation at any of the following sites:

Medecins Sans Frontieres Australia
Red Cross Australia
UNICEF
Oxfam Australia
World Vision Australia

or by calling 1800 760 011. The go and hug someone you love.

Kiva for Christmas

This year, instead of sending out the usual cute trinkets and cards to all our lovely Frock You associates and regular customers, we decided to save a couple of trees by sending a funny and slightly rude e-card (everyone cyber-giggled though, so it's ok) and used our Christmas funds to donate to Kiva.org, which you may remember I waxed lyrcial about last Christmas.

Kiva aims to help fund entrepreneurs in the third world. You can donate as little as $25 to any person or business group that you choose (the lists are huge!) and the funds go straight to those people. At checkout, you can give Kiva themselves a voluntary donation so that they can keep their very worthy organisation running. The funds work as a loan, so you do get paid back eventually, at which point you can then re-donate if you wish.

We chose two businesswomen who had nearly reached their loan target to donate to, so that they are now fully funded. And look, I set up a lender page so that everyone can keep track of our donations!

Our Frock You associates were hugely appreciative of our 'gift', and several have now set up their own lending pages for their companies which is absolutely fantastic! Restores a little faith in humanity, doesn't it?