Browsing “Charity”

BC Children’s Hospital Miracle Weekend (June 1 and 2) is a celebration of hope, courage and remarkable people – or Superheroes – who are making a difference for BC Children’s Hospital.

The two kids pictured below (Arlo and Sadie) are our Superheroes. They belong to two different families that contribute to V.I.A. (the Kronbauers and the Overgaauws) and they’re both regular fixtures on our web site and in our magazine. In their few short years on this earth they’ve both been in to BC Children’s Hospital multiple times for relatively minor procedures, as well as ER visits. Both families have had nothing but fabulous experiences at BC Children’s and they count themselves lucky that the kids are healthy and haven’t had to undergo major treatment that so many with serious illnesses do.

We at Vancouver Is Awesome have joined forces with the Miracle Makers to raise money to provide the best possible care to children across the province. Please join Arlo, Sadie and the rest of us in making a difference. Visit miraclemaker.ca/vancouverisawesome for our team page, to learn more, and to make a donation to help the kids. And look for us on TV on Miracle Weekend when we’ll be presenting BC Children’s Hospital with the money we’ve raised!

A new kitty once a week! Click here to find out how your cat can appear on Van City Kitty.

Every month we feature a few kitties who are looking for their forever home. Today we have an adoptable Himalayan from Katie’s Place!

Katie’s Place is a volunteer-run no-kill animal shelter in Maple Ridge.Two principals guide them: all life is valuable, and we are responsible for improving the quality of life for all those in our care. They make no judgment on whose life is worth rescuing; the sick, elderly and homely are as precious as the healthy, young and attractive. Katie’s Place started helping animals in January of 2001 and became a registered charity in 2005. Katie’s Place funding comes entirely from donations, fundraising and applying for grants. The funds go directly to animal care. Less than 3% is spent on admin/maintenance (eg. phone, bank charges, insurance). They are entirely volunteer run. Learn more about Katie’s Place here.

Tomorrow is Jeans Day in BC! What this means is that people all across the province show their support for BC Children’s Hospital Foundation by wearing their jeans as well as a pin or a button that they bought (for $5 or $20, respectively), with proceeds going back to the Foundation.

Last year I made THIS POST sharing a photo of my then-3-year-old son, Arlo, in support of Jeans Day. He’s now 4, he still loves cookies, and he’s still a kid who has visited this hospital as a patient and has directly benefited from generous people like you who have helped them out. Visit one of THESE retailers and get your button or pin in support!

Find Jeans Day on Facebook at fb.com/jeansday and Twitter at @BCJeansDay, AND find them at the Vancouver Art Gallery on Thursday where they’re holding a BBQ (DETAILS HERE) from 11:30AM-1:30PM!

Arlo’s photo was, of course, inspired by the Vancouver Canucks’ Sedin twins and their ongoing support of the hospital and specifically of Jeans Day. These former Vancouver Canucks captains below – Trevor Linden, Stan Smyl and Orland Kurtenbach – and their photo for Jeans Day 2013 brought inspiration as well!

Photo courtesy BCCHF

Mountains, ocean and nature. These are some of the things you think of when you think about our lovely city, Vancouver. Then you also think, expensive, no fun and not friendly. Right?

When I came to Vancouver 5 years ago, I arrived young and starry eyed after three ferocious years in the hustle and bustle of Toronto, a city known for it’s excitement, but also known for it’s lack of neighborliness.  I was lucky. I immediately fell in to several tight friend groups and it also helps that I am a pretty social person. This doesn’t seem to be the case for everyone. Whenever I’m out with my friends, I always hear the same thing, it’s hard to make new friends in this city. I hear about how Vancouverites are rude, don’t make eye contact and don’t want to offer even a smile. I found this surprising, as I was having the opposite experience. Here I am, five years later and I am still feeling the love in this gorgeous city.

After a lot of thought, I started to consider what I could do that would show other Vancouverites and others considering a move or a visit to our fine city, that Vancouver has some of the most generous, friendly, ambitious and kind people in the Country. The thought started when I was watching a documentary called ‘Craigslist Joe’ about a man who gets absolutely everything that he needs to live off of Craigslist.com. I won’t get in to the details, (you’ll have to check out the movie for yourself), but he ends up having some of the most profound experiences of his life. I knew that same generosity existed in this city, and that’s when I decided to start a little social experiment.

#TweettoEat is Born

What is it? Anything I eat from April 15th until 5pm on April 28th MUST come exclusively from Twitter. HUH? You heard me. I cannot eat any food unless a fellow Twitterer has reached out to me on the social media platform, and from the goodness of their hearts offered to help support me for one meal, one snack, one bit of nutrition for the day.

When my friend Ajay heard about what I was doing, he decided I should have a little gift. A book that has recipes entirely sourced from Twitter! I would love someone to pick one of these recipes and give me the ingredients! How hilarious is that?

How does it work?

It’s very simple (at least I hope so!). Tweet me @VancityAmy with hashtag #TweettoEat and let me know you want to join in and help. You can join in, in a several ways.

1) Donate some groceries (I am a vegetarian which makes this even more of a challenge). Think of things like, a bag of a apples, bananas, SPINACH for salads would be amazing, granola bars, cans of tomato soup, ANYTHING that I can have for those moments where no one is coming to my aid. I have a feeling breakfasts, lunch and snacks will be a bit tricky so having something at my disposal will be most wonderful!

2) Invite me over to experience one of your specialty home cooked meals. I want to meet you, see how you live and learn more about you. What better way than over dinner? Nothing fancy, just what you would normally do on a Tuesday night. Beggars can’t be choosers.

3) Take me out to your favorite local gem, or a restaurant you’ve always wanted to go to! This is an excuse to try something new. I will order something cheap, or you can order for me! SURPRISES WELCOME!

4) Pack me a brown bag lunch of your favorite foods (unless that food is bacon, you can leave that out).

5) Re-tweet my tweets and spread the love! If you are able to follow and RT #TweettoEat that will really help.

So, what? You’re eating for free for two weeks? What a jerk YOU must be!

Hey, hey, hey, I know what you’re thinking. In an effort to give back, the money that I WOULD HAVE spent on groceries over the two week period (about $200), I will be donating towards Save On Meats sandwich tokens. After the experiment is all over, I will gather a group of individuals to distribute the tokens with me around the Downtown East Side. This will give us another opportunity to meet the people in our community and I can connect some of the people I meet on my journey. I would love to see a local business or two come in, get involved and MATCH my donation. If you are interested, I would love to hear from you.

Thank you to Bean Around the World at Main & 20th!

A huge thank you to Bean Around the World at Main St. and 20th Ave. who graciously reached out to me on twitter and offered to caffeinate me each morning. There is a catch though! Each morning, I will also surprise the person behind me with a coffee. I can’t wait for this. Thanks for getting on board and please show them some love on their twitter page.

All of my experiences will be documented here, at Vancouverisawesome.com each day starting April 15th, and also please follow me on twitter @VancityAmy and the hashtag #TweettoEat to follow the journey and donate to the cause. I’m also on Instagram. I can’t wait to meet everyone and taste some new things!

We’re all about good news over here, which is why you didn’t see a blog post to let you know that some misguided fools recently stole a plywood sign and threatened our friends at Save On Meats. That is you didn’t hear about it until now, when some seriously good news came into play.

Save On Meats has created an incredible NEW sign that’s now sitting in front of their restaurant. And for every picture (instagram @saveonmeats), tweet (@saveonmeats) and Facebook share (fb.com/saveonmeats) with the sign they will provide breakfast to one resident at the recently underfunded Rainier Hotel.

Show your support, folks. And have fun doing it. THIS is awesome.

I ran into this guy a couple of days ago in the Village on False Creek as he was hanging out in Urban Fare doing live radio hits with my friend Cory Ashworth and The Peak 102.7FM. They were giving out free samples of food, candy and popsicles, they had a raffle and they were doing face painting and balloon animals.

This coming Friday is another family friendly event at Urban Fare in Southeast False Creek, with the proceeds going towards the BC Children’s Hospital Fund. See below for details! …READ THE REST OF THIS ENTRY>>>