charitable giving and planting trees
Every time somebody books me to play at their event, I do a little happy dance! Not just because I get to keep doing my dream job, but also because it means I get to help out some fantastic charities that do amazing work.
You may be thinking, ‘But why’? Why have you chosen to donate your hard-earned cash to these charities?
Well, to be totally honest, I’ve always been aware of my privilege in life - to have a secure roof over my head; a supportive family; be able to feed myself and be in good health.
I have always taken part in charity events for as long as I can remember: long runs to raise money for different charities; put myself through stupidly hard situations and just generally test myself to see if I can do things, whilst raising money for amazing causes.
My happy (grimace) face as I spot my other half at mile 25!
This was my biggest challenge to date, the only aim was to finish the damn marathon!
Growing up I’ve raised probably a couple of thousand pounds worth of donations, and over the last year I started to wonder how I could make a difference in my professional life too.
Some of my favourite charities I have previously raised money for are:
My first colourful trip to the hairdresser in 2021!
I grew my hair for a Little Princess Trust donation :)
As you can probably now tell, I love donating to charity in my personal life, raising money and awareness for all sorts of causes. I just want to make the world a better place and try to help in any way I can.
Usually taped up, injured and covered in supports
My first half marathon in the heat of the Manchester sun, 2018!
So!
This year, I have decided to donate a small percentage from each booking and put it towards a charity of my choice!
At the end of every month (or at the start of the next if I forget!!) I do my monthly donation to Shelter, the UK’s housing and homelessness charity. I think this charity has been doing some incredible work and helping so many people, especially this year with the cost of living crisis. In their own words, “Home is a human right. It's our foundation and it's where we thrive. Yet, every day millions of people are being devastated by the housing emergency.
We exist to defend the right to a safe home. Because home is everything.”
You can find out more about Shelter here.
As well as donating to a charity, I really wanted to do something to help our future generations. So what better thing to do, than to plant some trees! Just One Tree are brilliant, as it costs only £1 to plant one tree!
I’m a bit of a nature lover, and a tree hugger, so for every booking I play at, I plant one tree :) it also makes me feel a little better about all the miles I drive getting to and from my gigs!
So far, this is a little experiment to see if I can manage the donations and balance them with my life expenses - next year if they’re manageable I’m wanting to up the percentage of the charity donation and maybe plant two trees per booking. We’ll see how I get on!
The amazing
Tresco Abbey Gardens on The Isles of Scilly
Let me know what charity you’d choose to donate to! And feel free to donate a little on any of the links above - every little helps!
Cat xx
