Anyone do volunteer work?

jf198400

I used to do volunteering in highschool and college, stuff like after school care for city kids and serving meals at the soup kitchen.  I would really like to do volunteering again.  I'm just not sure how to find the time or weekend opportunities.  I'm just curious how other working moms find the time to do volunteer work, when do you volunteer, how often, what type of service?

wychets

jf198400:

I used to do volunteering in highschool and college, stuff like after school care for city kids and serving meals at the soup kitchen.  I would really like to do volunteering again.  I'm just not sure how to find the time or weekend opportunities.  I'm just curious how other working moms find the time to do volunteer work, when do you volunteer, how often, what type of service?

I just started again this month with the American Cancer Society. We basically just call people to remind them of the Breast Cancer Walk. I am signed up for Saturdays 9-12p.

Brit's Luna154

I'm lucky that my employer encourages us to volunteer during work hours. They actually track who is doing it and how many hours you have put in and each department has a target number of hours that they are supposed to reach. Over the past few years I have done all kinds of things from helping out with Habitat houses to hanging and racking clothes for our local version of a Goodwill store. My favorite opportunity so far has been to help design a transportation solution for people who live in rural neighborhoods and need help getting to work.

ETA: Another really cool thing that I've done is work with my local chapter of Girls on the Run. It is an organization that teaches girls about good self esteem and good body image through physical activity, specifically training for a 5K race. I'm an avid runner, so this one really spoke to me.

happy_un-bride

DH and I volunteer for a local baseball team.  My work is actually very supportive of volunteering, I had arrangements to leave early on gamedays to ensure I had ample time to get there.  Work even provides me at least 2 days off per year for volunteering. 

I'm not a mom, yet.  But I think the volunteering we do should be able to work for us when LO arrives.  As we should be able to bring him allong.

I would see if your work would support your volunteering and provide a little flexibilty in hours to help accomodate.  Or seek out other volunteering options when you might be able to incorporate your family.

Good Luck!

Brit's Luna154

happy_un-bride:

I would see if your work would support your volunteering and provide a little flexibilty in hours to help accomodate. 

You might be able to sell it as a team building activity. My employer sees it as being something that is good for our community and good for them as it is a good way to get employees of all levels interacting and getting to know each other.

Breezy8407

I plan on starting up again next year. Right now I barely have time to breathe, let alone volunteer.

Before babies, I had started volunteering with a local running race organization here called Team Ortho. The nice thing is that I earn "points" from volunteering that I can use towards race fees.

My employer also organizes volunteer opportunities. There are a few neighborhood clean-ups and a few Habitat for Humanity events.  

Zimger

I volunteer with our local cat rescue. I mainly do picture editing, follow up calls, and short meetings. I haven't been to an actual adoption in a while though

bearkatjen

I'm on the board of directors for my local library's friends group. I take a long lunch once a month to make the meetings, and I help with book sales and other library events when I can. We have about three book sales a year, and some annual events that we host, like the library's holiday open house. The group is mostly made up of retirees, so it's not a big deal if I cannot help out during business hours. There are plenty of opportunities to help on the weekend and in the evening.

DH watches DS, or if it's something that I could really use his help with as well, we get a sitter. 

caitie2002

I am a member of my local Junior Auxiliary.  My chapter requires 40 service hours per year.  Our mission is to serve children in our county.  Today 4 of us went out to a group home for orphans/foster children and had a pizza party and helped them carve pumpkins.  Everybody had a great time!  Last year my project was reading to a couple of first graders once a week for an hour.  That was really rewarding because I got to know my 2 kids!

DallasHorn

I'm a member of the Junior League. Your placement drives when and how concentrated volunteer hours are, but in each year, the estimate is around 50-60 hours total. This includes time in meetings, events, independent "prep", etc.

 Sometimes it's hard to find the time and sometimes DH gets annoyed that he is "on duty" while I'm off at JL things, but overall, it's just something that I schedule and know typically 1-2 times per month, I have something going on.