The race itself is very fun, and the day’s events include a silent auction and celebrity sightings of Jane Lynch of Glee and Carrie-Ann Inaba of Dancing With The Stars. The Kids’ Fun Run is an extra bonus where every kid who participates gets a medal. (And it’s short, so most kids can do it easily.)

The fundraising is going strong, but could be doing better, of course. My friend’s team still needs people to join and walk with us. It’s called Your Industry Insider and here’s the direct link for joining the team.

Please consider helping out the fluffy little creatures – oh and getting some exercise at the same time.

Race For The Rescues, Sunday, October 24th at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena

If you’re a mom, diapers are a large part of your life, and even though I’m thankfully done changing them in my house (whew!), I haven’t forgotten how important they are. Knowing that some moms have to go without them is really a heartbreaking thought.

So it was especially heartwarming to discover what goes on at the Anne Douglas Center. Mondays – Fridays, from 10:30 to 5pm, the Center, located on Skid Row,  gives out diapers to moms who need them. But they can only do so much on their own. Diapers get used up awfully quickly, as you know, so donations are always needed. The 40,000 Huggies donated yesterday will be depleted before you know it. Please donate diapers to the Center whenever you can. There are also other diaper banks in Los Angeles and Help A Mother Out’s website has a list of them here.

Julia Frey (of Safety Graphic Fun), Tania (of Pure Natural Diva) and Catalina (of Catalina In LA) were also on hand to help distribute the diapers — and Julia and Tania co-hosted a diaper drive with Kim a few months ago. These Ladies are committed to the cause.

While we were at the Center, we got a tour of the facility and learned more about the Mission’s, um, mission. It’s such important work they’re doing. I was humbled and moved to help out, so I’ll be doing what I can. The Anne Douglas Center offers a live-in facility for women who want to change their lives, get clean & sober, or just get off the streets. It’s a year-long program offering classes, counseling, job training, and above all, an amazing, safe support system for the women who’ve made the commitment to change their lives.

The Center also offers services to women in the community who can only stop in to get help. Besides the diapers, the Center also gives women on the street a place to get cleaned up and find some clothes and food, and maybe have a moment of privacy. On Saturdays they have a Mommy and Me time, where moms can bring their kids for a clean-up and get a hot breakfast, too. The Anne Douglas Center accepts and welcomes donations of all sizes. They need women’s and children’s clothing, toiletry items, and money. Money is always welcome — as are volunteers. Please contact the Center to find out how you can be of service: (213) 614-0743.

PUR has partnered with the Children’s Safe Drinking Water Program to help work for clean drinking water around the world. According to their website, every day more than 4,00 children die in the developing world because they don’t have clean drinking water. That’s a horribly large number. Let’s help them make it smaller.

They have created this water purification packet that’s pretty incredible-looking in action. Here’s a video showing how it works. It’s a long video, but it’s amazing to see the before-and-after results. PUR has donated 6 million PUR packets to Haiti — that’s 60 million liters of water. Here’s a Flikr stream with photos from Port au Prince.

I applaud anybody doing anything to solve a giant problem like clean drinking water, and if it happens to be a large corporation doing it, so much the better. They can do more than I could do alone and I’m happy to help them. They are a very generous company — they also want to give a water pitcher to one of my readers. You can win a PUR water pitcher of your very own by leaving a comment here before 12 Noon (PST) on Monday, February 8th — and by becoming a fan of their fan page (hey, I want to get more water donated, people).

One entry per email address, please, but feel free to tell everyone you know about the Fan Page!

UPDATE: The contest is over and John Cowburn has won. Congrats! I’ll be in touch about your prize…

Plus, I got an extra 10Again T-shirt to give away. Bonus! If you’d like the shirt — and who doesn’t like a 70′s Wacky Packages reference?Just leave a comment and make sure your mailing address is within the US so I can send it to you when you win. One comment per email address, please.  Contest runs from Saturday, January 23rd to Saturday, January 30 at 12 Noon Pacific Time. Winner will be announced here. Close-up of the shirt, which is a kids size large and seems like it would fit a trim adult woman as well: (If you don’t win but would still like to get one of their cute shirts, check out their site and use this special discount code when you shop: MOMSROCK1.)

UPDATE 1/30/10: The contest is over and Caroline won! Congrats!!