Now then: without wanting to gush, one of the great pleasures of toiling at Mumsnet is watching how much you all give to one another - in terms of advice, humour and friendship, obviously, but very often in material ways, too.
Over the years, we've made a few ad hoc donations to causes and charities close to Mumsnetters' hearts, but I've been pondering how we might formalise the goodwill and try to do a bit more. And I thought it might be an idea to give a Mumsnet Giving Week a go.
Here's how it could work... (and do bear in mind that this is a first pass and we're very much open to suggestions on how to improve/refine the idea; if it works well, we'd like to make it an annual event). Together, we settle on some deserving causes that could do with our collective support: maybe you're trying to bring a community garden back into bloom, for example, or want to start a support group for parents of children with SEN, or are trying to raise funds to buy a piece of vital equipment for a good cause. Or there might simply be a deserving small charity that you want to support.
Once we've agreed who we'd like to back, we'll then have a week in which we promote and highlight them, and in which Mumsnetters can donate as much or as little as they choose, via a Yimby crowdfunding page (here's a bit more about Yimby.com, a new crowdfunding community for social good).
At the end of the week, MNHQ will match your donations (although I think we'll have to set a £25k limit for match funding, just in case one of you turns out to be Bill Gates and drops a million - which of course would be marvellous, but would also leave us struggling to meet the payroll).
If this all sounds ok to you, we'd like your suggestions for projects we should support on this thread. They don't have to be registered charities; indeed, our feeling is that national charities don't tend to struggle for exposure and are probably not in most need of our support. Instead, we'd love to use this as an opportunity to give smaller organisations and community projects some airtime. And because we also want to make sure that the causes are ones that existing Mumsnetters have settled on, we're only going to shortlist projects suggested by members who are registered as of now. (Apologies to newbies who join after this point, but there's always next year.)
After this thread's been up for a bit, we'll go through it, pick a shortlist of five and ask the Mumsnetters who submitted the ideas to start a Yimby crowdfunding page in support of them. We'll then - with much fanfare - announce the start of the Giving Week, during which we'll encourage everyone to donate. And at the end of the week, we'll match what's raised.
Do hope you think this is a good idea - please shout if you think it's lousy or we've missed a trick... Otherwise, please submit your nominations for deserving projects below.