THK's blog tour has started/continued some good talks about what real people can really do.

A wonderful unschooling Mom (WUM) and I were agreeing yesterday that a lot of what is being suggested comes down to being the frugal shoppers or re-users we already are. This was prompted by the thread at Cocking a Snook -- http://cockingasnook.wordpress.com/2007/04/26/can-you-believe-whos-
here-blog-tour-comes-to-snook/ -- and we talked about how we don't always need to reinvent the wheel but just be more encouraging about some of the things a lot of us already do.

For instance, in addition to the name brands of places to make and receive donations -- Freecycle, Goodwill, etc. -- WUM told me about a local place that her Mom helped to start.

We live in an area where there are a lot of extremely affluent people and then the rest of us. The affluent have kids too, it turns out , and when they outgrow or never use clothing, they are sometimes encouraged to donate to an outfit called the 4C Club (a link? yep, they have one -- http://www.the4cclub.org/).

"Caring Children/Clothing Children, Inc. is a charity for children. We are a non-profit, all volunteer organization which collects very good clothing that school children have outgrown. These clothes are passed to needy children by way of The 4-C Club store which is located in Stuart, Florida.

"The clothing is collected, sorted, and presented in a department store fashion by an army of volunteers. The recipients are qualified by recognized charitable agencies that provide children with vouchers to shop free for three outfits each including new shoes, socks and underwear. Used athletic equipment, children's books, stuffed animals, novelties and baby items are also available."

It's a local project that I had never heard of and there are probably a lot of these things we could all become more aware of.

Nance