How we give

          The kids each have a bank called moonjar, from a local company. It has three sections, one each for share, spend and save. The idea is that when they get their allowance, they can divide it up into the three categories. (Yes, we are back into our Saturday morning routine of family meeting followed by cleaning and allowances. It makes such a difference!)

Chris and I are also inspired by the moonjar categories. Of course, ours aren't so equally distributed, but it's important to both of us to support organizations that we believe are doing good work in the world.

Our charitable giving wasn't always very organized. I realized at one point that I was giving a lot of organizations $20 each, which is not a very effective way of supporting an organization or an effective way of using our money.

Last year we came up with a system that worked well for us and this year we are going to continue it. At the beginning of the year we set aside a lump sum of charitable donation money for the year in a separate bank account. (Our credit union lets us set up as many accounts as we would like, which is another reason why we love them.)

Then each month, we choose an organization to support, and I use our charity account to make the donation. I have a spreadsheet where I keep track of the name of the organization, how much we donated (it's an equal amount each month) and what needs the organization addresses. That way I can keep a balance between local organizations and national or internationals, and a balance of which of the many important needs of the world that are being addressed.

I'm glad that we came up with this system as it seems like a smarter way to be generous and actually contribute in the best ways we can.