I’m from Philadelphia, and I’m proud to say that “I Love New Jersey.”  I spent my summers at the shore when I was a child. I have so many happy memories of building sandcastles, jumping waves, boogie boarding and nights on the boardwalk. Last July, my family was a guest of the Atlantic City Alliance for the 4th of July celebrations on the famous Atlantic City boardwalk. And we plan on going back to New Jersey for vacation this summer.

Many moms are joining to show the #JerseyLove. I posted on Babble Cares today about the joint efforts of Social Media Moms and NJ Digital Moms to help with the Hurricane Sandy recovery and to spread the word that the Jersey beaches are open for summer travel. More than 40 bloggers, representing millions of readers, will be tweeting and posting #JerseyLove from June 6-9th.  Please click over to Babble Cares to read the post and to help support their effort.

As the true extent of the damage of Superstorm Sandy is coming to light, the amount of help needed on the East Coast is immense. As hundreds of thousands sit in the dark with little food, others have lost their entire households.

I’ve rounded up some ways that bloggers can help. Please add any links to vetted fundraisers, other ideas to help relief ideas or links to posts you’ve written about Sandy in the comments.

1. Write a post and ask your readers to donate money to the American Red Cross, or another disaster relief organization working to help. I know this is obvious, but it’s also a good solution if you’re in the same situation as me, you want to help but don’t have funds to give.

2. Organize a virtual blood drive. Ask readers to donate blood in their local communities and report back on their donation. Tally the donations to rally your community. Blood banks are reporting shortages. Donate blood and write about it on your social media circles to inspire others to help, too.

3. Start an online charity auction or other fundraising campaign, with proceeds going to Hurricane Sandy victims. A few words of caution: auctions, even for charity, are actually against Facebook rules and setting up an auction using PayPal can also be an issue.

4. Collect items to help Keep in mind many of the larger organizations encourage financial contributions over goods. However, sometimes church groups, smaller charities and other civic groups will take collections.  You could coordinate with a blogger friend in the area to get the items in the hands of neighbors that need them. Blankets, canned goods, toiletries, warm coats and generators are just some of the needed items. You could collect items from readers in your local area and package them all up.

5. Be in it for the long haul. After a few weeks, Superstorm Sandy will be out of the news cycles, but people affected will still need help. Keep telling the story on your blog or social media sites.

Do you know of any relief efforts for the storm in the blogging world? Do you have any ideas to add? 

Everyone seemed to have an opinion about my engagement. I was only twenty, not even old enough to drink legally, when my college boyfriend proposed. I strongly believe women should decide if and when they want to marry, but sadly, the same sentiment is not shared around the world. My friends teased me for being a “child bride,” but real child marriage is not a laughing matter.

Have you ever imagined your perfect wedding? For many children, marriage is already a reality – and there was no dream wedding. You can support the global movement to end child marriage. Learn how by reading my latest post at Babble.com.

It can, and it will.

We are proud to share that some of our own from Bloganthropy have been recognized on the Babble.com list Top 25 Parent Bloggers Who Are Changing the World. Reading the list is refreshing and restorative. Hope is not lost. Rather, it is being built one blog post at a time.

On the list: our Blogathropy co-founder, Debbie Bookstaber as well as two Bloganthropy board members Jennifer James and Chrysula Winegar; Three Bloganthropy Award winners Katherine Stone, Susan Niebur and Devan McGuinness;  Bloganthropy Achievement Award winner Kristine Brite McCormick and 2010 Bloganthropy Finalist Maggie Ginsburg-Schultz.

Their influence covers postpartum depression and the grief that comes from miscarriage and neonatal loss, health and reform advocacy, domestic violence and sexual abuse, cancer awareness, social good, and supporting mothers worldwide. Their reach and encouragement reaches millions.

Check out the full list of World-Changing Bloggers. Thank you for all you do!

McGuinness, the mother of three living children and 12 babies lost through miscarriages and stillbirth, started her blog as a means of helping other families wade through the challenges associated with perinatal and neonatal loss. Additionally, she posts on a secondary blog, www.accustomedchaos.org, and on Disney’s Babble.com, as well as other social media outlets to provide support for and give a voice to grieving parents around the world.

This is the first time the Bloganthropy Awards were held at BlogHer, the world’s largest conference for women in social media. Founded in 2009 by Debbie Bookstaber and Candace Lindemann of Mamanista.com, with pro-bono support from Child’s Play Communications, a public relations agency exclusively focused on the influential mom market, the unique awards program is dedicated to recognizing women bloggers who support good causes.

In addition to Devon McGuinness, a special Bloganthropy Achievement Award was given to Kristine Brite McCormick. Kristine was recognized as a Bloganthropy Awards Finalist in 2010 for the creation of Cora’s Story, a blog that chronicles her thoughts and feelings surrounding the unexpected 2009 death of her newborn daughter from an undetected congenital heart defect (CHD). Kristine is now a sought-after author, advocate and speaker on both a national and global level who has testified before federal advisory committees, state-level legislative committees, parent advocates, hospitals and physicians. Kristine successfully advocated for legislation in her home state of Indiana, which made pulse oximetry (newborn heart screening) law in April 2011. She continues to help grieving parents in other states work to make pulse oximetry the standard of care through her grassroots organization, Pulse Ox Advocacy.

In addition to McGuinness and McCormick, four finalists were recognized for making a difference in their communities using social media. They are:

Lisa Lightner, A Day in Our Shoes
A board certified special education advocate, Lisa’s son was diagnosed with Dup15Q at an early age. Inspired by him, she helps families navigate the overwhelming world of Special Education and the IEP process through her blog. Lisa was named a “2012 Advocate of the Year” by her local The Arc chapter and also serves as the social media/PR contact for the National Special Education Advocacy Institute.

Dresden Shumaker, Creating Motherhood
During the recent economic downturn, Dresden and her family found themselves homeless and in need of government assistance. After becoming self-sufficient, she started her blog as a way of helping other families navigate the welfare system and initiated the ‘In Times Like These’ series where guest bloggers could post, which built a greater sense of community. As a result of her efforts, Dresden has been asked to speak at the National Anti Hunger Policy convention in Washington D.C. and serve as an ambassador for Feeding America.

Emily Vanek, Colorado Moms
As a means of connecting and building a community of parents across Colorado, Emily started her blog in May 2005. When it started to gain traction and as its audience grew, Emily used Colorado Moms are a platform to draw attention to autism (her youngest child was diagnosed at an early age) and be an information resource to other families. A noted advocate for special needs children and their families, she is a regular contributor to 5minutesforSpecialNeeds.com, SavvySource.com and TimetoPlayMag.com where she writes a toy guide focusing on therapeutic uses for popular toys.

Gaby Dalkin and Maggy Keet, Food Blogger Bake Sale
A passionate cook, private chef and publisher of the blog What’s Gaby Cooking, Gaby Dalkin launched the Food Blogger Bake Sale in 2010 to spread the word about Share Our Strength’s Great American Bake Sale, a national campaign. Gaby inspired hundreds of bloggers, and the Food Blogger Bake Sale raised over $25,000 in 2011. In 2012, Maggy Keet of Bloggers Without Borders joined Gaby to expand the program, setting a fundraising goal of $50,000 and bake sales in all 50 states. With just one dollar entitling a child to 10 meals, the Food Blogger Bake Sale makes a significant impact in communities.

Previous winners of the Bloganthropy awards include Katherine Stone (2010) and Susan Niebur (2011). Stone writes Postpartum Progress, the most popular blog about postpartum depression and mental disorders. After her own feelings of loneliness and isolation after giving birth, she began actively encouraging other women battling postpartum depression, anxiety and psychosis. At 34, Susan Niebur was diagnosed with inflammatory breast cancer. She used her blog, Toddler Planet, and social networks to raise funds for research, create awareness of and educate women about inflammatory breast cancer. Niebur, who chronicled her illness and gave hope to millions of women, lost her life to the disease on February 6, 2012.

Previous winners of the Bloganthropy awards include Katherine Stone (2010) and Susan Niebur (2011). Katherine Stone writes Postpartum Progress, the most widely-read blog about postpartum depression and all other mental illnesses related to pregnancy and childbirth. Susan Niebur, who chronicled her fight against inflammatory breast cancer and gave hope to millions of women, lost her life to the disease on February 6, 2012. She used her blog, Toddler Planet, and social networks to raise funds for research, to advocate and to educate women about inflammatory breast cancer.

The 2012 Bloganthropy Award Finalists are: Lisa Lightner, Devan McGuinness, Dresden Shumaker, Emily Vanek, Gaby Dalkin and Maggy Keet.

Lisa Lightner, a Board Certified Special Education Advocate, has a son who was diagnosed with Dup15Q at a very young age. Inspired by him, she helps families navigate the impossibly frustrating, confusing, and overwhelming world of Special Education and the IEP process. She created her blog, [“A Day in Our Shoes,” to explain the laws, rules, and services in plain language, always remaining child focused. She always stands by her number one rule of posting on the blog: every post must have a positive ending or offer a solution to a problem. The blog allows her to take her advocacy beyond one individual and institute more systems advocacy and reach more people. Lisa named a “2012 Advocate of the Year” by her local Arc and also serves as the social media/PR person for the National Special Education Advocacy Institute.

Devan McGuinness, proud mother of three living children and 12 babies gone to soon, has used her miscarriage and stillbirth experience to help other families wade through the challenges associated with perinatal and neonatal loss. Devan began [Unspoken Grief as a gathering place for anyone touched directly or indirectly by perinatal grief to gain support, find resources and a build a supportive community which are vitally necessary for healing and understanding. Additionally, she uses her blog Accustomed Chaos, platform on Disney’s Babble.com and social media outlets to advocate support for grieving parents around the world.

Dresden Shumaker blogs daily at CreatingMotherhood.com(a site she created to chronicle her path to single parenthood). Two years ago Dresden and her family found themselves suddenly homeless and in need of government assistance. The assistance was like a trampoline – never letting her family hit the ground. When they no longer qualified for help Dresden was ready to blog about it. She wrote several posts that went viral (Food Stamp Etiquette being the most popular). She then opened up her blog to others to share their own stories. Putting a face to the welfare system changes how you perceive it. The ‘In Times Like These’ Series has had over a dozen first person stories about growing up on food stamps or currently being on government assistance. It’s in the comment section on these posts where you will find the change happening. The shifts. The connections. Because of this series Dresden was asked to speak at the National Anti Hunger Policy convention in Washington DC and has become an ambassador for Feeding America.

Emily Vanek is the owner and editor-in-chief of ColoradoMoms.com. Her work is also featured on 5minutesforSpecialNeeds.com, SavvySource.com and TimetoPlayMag.com. Her youngest child is on the Autism Spectrum, so she is passionate about connecting with parents with special needs. Emily has had a number of popular posts on her blog which have inspired and comfort individuals with similar heartache for those with special needs. Emily has written about special needs for multiple publications, including TimetoPlaymag.com, where she writes a toy guide helping to find therapeutic uses for typical toys.

Gaby Dalkin, of What’s Gaby Cooking, started the Food Blogger Bake Sale in 2010 to spread the word about Share Our Strength’s Great American Bake Sale. In 2012, Maggy Keet of Bloggers Without Borders joined her to expand the Food Blogger Bake Sale. In 2011, the Food Blogger Bake Sale raised $25,000 through 26 bake sales. Share Our Strength set a challenge to raise $50,000 with the help of bloggers from all 50 states in 2012. With just $1 connecting a child to 10 meals, the Food Blogger Bake Sale has a strong impact in the community.

Bloganthropy.org was founded in 2009 by Debbie Bookstaber and Candace Lindemann of Mamanista.com.“Bloganthropy.org’s goal is to encourage bloggers to use their social media savvy to help charities and people in need,” explains Debbie Bookstaber, co-founder of Bloganthropy.org. “The finalists for this year’s Bloganthropy Awards are passionate advocates. They are respected by their peers and have made a significant impact in their communities.” The 2012 Award Winner will be selected by the Bloganthropy.org Advisory Board, which consists of 35+ prominent female bloggers active in social good efforts.

About Bloganthropy:  Bloganthropy.org aims to empower bloggers to become philanthropic leaders in their communities. The annual Bloganthropy Awards recognize those who have made a difference by using social media to effectively promote a cause or charity.

As bloggers, we can use Pinterest to further our favorite causes. I’m highly active in the congenital heart defect community. CHD is when a baby is born with a heart problem that develops in utero. I brainstormed for a while about how to use Pinterest to a. curate content for the congenital heart defect community and b. raise awareness and motivate people to visit my blog, or other sites, to learn more and take action. If you aren’t on Pinterest yet, this post might be a bit overwhelming.

I started a “hearts” board to rally people in the community. Many people in the CHD community are drawn to everything heart-shaped. I opened the board up to contributors and pin heart-shaped or related items. I imagined it as a mechanism to promote unity, and to express ourselves in a positive way. The hearts are art to us.

Putting a Face to Your Cause

A few weeks before February and heart month started, some fellow CHD bloggers, Ruth at A Trip to Holland (http://atriptoholland.net) and Stefenie from When Life Hands You a Broken Heart put together and executed a genius idea. They started a board called “The Faces of CHD.”Parents and patients could send in pictures, with a link to a blog post telling their story. The board has over 1000 followers. I wondered how many people would want to pin or repin pictures of these children and adults, and was really surprised at the outcome. My daughter’s picture had over 200 repins, and drove thousands of page views to my blog.

I looked through the pins to see if I could figure out what made a pin get repined more often and came up with these common themes:

• Pins with high repins were attractive to more than one audience. My daughter’s picture was also posted on boards marked “cute,” “photography,” and “baby.”
• Professional-quality pictures seemed to do better.
• The shorter the story underneath the photo, the more likely it was to get repined.

There’s much to learn from the “Faces of CHD” awareness project. I think knowing who you’re targeting,making a plan to reach that audience, and doing so in an authentic, non-spammy way are important for every social media platform for causes and nonprofits, but especially so on Pinterest.

How are you as a blogger using Pinterest for your cause?

Kristine Brite McCormick is a Bloganthropy advisory board member. She started using her blog for good after she lost her newborn daughter, Cora, to an undiagnosed heart defect. You can read more about Cora at http://www.corasstory.com. She’s on Pinterest at http://www.pinterest.com/kristinebrite.

Join Bloganthropy at BlogHer, the world’s largest blogging conference for women, for a panel discussion about how to leverage your social media influence for social good. The 2012 Bloganthropy Awards will be given out during the panel, and all five finalists will have the opportunity to speak about their social good projects

From the five finalists, one winner will be selected and awarded a $1000 prize for her cause.

Previous winners of the Bloganthropy awards include Katherine Stone (2010) and Susan Niebur (2011).

Stone writes the most popular blog about postpartum depression and mental disorders, Postpartum Progress. She’s taken an active rule in encouraging other women battling postpartum depression, anxiety and psychosis after her own feelings of loneliness and isolation after giving birth.

At 34, Niebur was diagnosed with inflammatory breast cancer. She used her blog, Toddler Planet, and social networks to raise funds for research, awareness of, and education about inflammatory breast cancer. She chronicled her illness and gave hope to millions of women up until she passed away on February 6, 2012.

“It is remarkable what bloggers can accomplish in raising awareness for meaningful causes,” added Debbie Bookstaber, co-founder, Bloganthropy.org. “We look forward to once again acknowledging these talented women.”

Nominations are open until 5pm PST on July 20th. Finalists will be notified by July 24th and are responsible for all travel and conference costs to attend BlogHer. Anyone can nominate a woman using social media to promote or further a cause. To make a nomination, use the nomination form.

If you have any questions, please contact Debbie Bookstaber deb@mamanista.com.

About Bloganthropy:

Bloganthropy.org aims to empower bloggers to become philanthropic leaders in their communities. The annual Bloganthropy Awards recognize those who have made a difference by using social media to effectively promote a cause or charity.

Here are some comments from Susan’s Bloganthropy Award nomination form:

I cannot think of another member of the blogging community who has done so much to advocate and educate thousands upon thousands of readers about cancer, breast cancer and inflammatory breast cancer.

And she has done it all through fighting the disease FOUR TIMES. She has never let up her battle or her advocacy, even when going through chemo numerous times, radiation, multiple surgeries.

She has worked to increase awareness about lymphedema and obtain important lymphedema sleeves to survivors – as they are usually not covered by health insurance.

She lobbies and sweats and toils for more research, more awareness, more sensitivity for survivors and patients….usually as a patient herself.

Susan Niebur is my hero. And today she just put up a new mantra on her blog, as she gears up to battle cancer again with new treatments and tactics:  “All that survives after our death are publications and people. So look carefully after the words you write, the thoughts and publications you create, and how you love others. For these are the only things that will remain.”

Susan– you will be missed, but you will not be forgotten.

Please click here for information from Susan’s family about how to make a donation in her honor to help cure Inflammatory Breast Cancer.