In Kind Boxes

Because every mom deserves quality postpartum care.

Journal

Kindness Rocks Fundraiser

by

Are you looking for a beautiful gift that gives back this holiday season? We’re here to help!

We’re so excited to announce this partnership with Elyse Ryan Jewelry! Elyse has designed this beautiful “Kindness Rocks” bracelet, to shine a light on the work we’re doing to support postpartum moms in need. For every bracelet sold, $10 will be donated back to In Kind Boxes.

Featuring a Swarovski crystal, and 14 karat gold beads, this bracelet makes an amazing gift! If you’re looking for an extra special gift to give this holiday season, please consider shopping with this incredible mom owned business, and give the “Kindness Rocks” bracelet. To learn more about Elyse, and her passion for helping others through her jewelry please tune into our “Mamas Making an Impact” series on Instagram Live Friday, November 5.

October Update

by

We have officially donated 500 boxes in 2021, and 1000 gift boxes since our first boxes were available in November 2019!!!

We started our month with a delivery of 20 gift boxes to the Virginia Garcia Memorial Health Center Women’s Clinic. We also sent 6 gift boxes to the BeLoved Black Birth Centering program in California. The Mother and Child Education Center in Portland was given a donation of 10 gift boxes. We ended the month with a new partnership! We’re excited to be working with the Washington County District Attorney’s Office in support of their Cribs for Kids program. We donated 20 gift boxes to pair with the cribs and other materials their office is providing.

In honor of the amazing work that Doulas and Midwives do for families, we re-opened the application for our gift box sponsorship program. This program is for birth workers who offer their services to families in need in their community. We are offering three doulas/midwives a gift box a month for 2022. The deadline to apply was November 1. Winners will be notified by email by November 30.

Our Instagram Live series “Mamas Making an Impact” continues with more amazing guests this month. In this series, we love to highlight moms doing good, and giving back in some way. We also have very real and honest conversations about motherhood, and postpartum. Click through to watch conversations with Bethany Braun Silva, Trae Bodge, and Aliza Friedlander. We were also lucky to have local photographer Ashlie Behm join us for our “Let’s Talk” series where she shared her best tips for taking photos of our kids using our phones.

And finally, we got wonderful news from Fred Meyer, that In Kind Boxes has been accepted into their Community Rewards Program. If you’d like to support In Kind Boxes while shopping at Fred Meyer, please log into your rewards account, and find the Community Rewards section. Simply search for In Kind Boxes, or use code: YS234.

As we head into the holiday season, the demand for our donated boxes increases. We are in need of your support in order to keep up with demand. Please consider donating, and help us show postpartum moms in need that they matter, and that they’re not alone.

Thank you for being part of our village of support. We couldn’t do what we do without you!

~Maria Berglund, Founder of In Kind Boxes

Teaching kids kindness and empathy this holiday season.

by

Every year when the holidays start to roll around, I make it a point to do kind acts with my kids. It is important for me to impart kindness and empathy in them because to me, that’s what matters most about my job as their mother- that they grow up to be kind humans.

I’ve put together a calendar of some of the favorite kindness activities we do together, and posted it on Etsy. This calendar is a great way to get kids doing kind acts at home, school or in the community.

It’s available for you to purchase now. When you do, it will instantly download. You can then print it, and put it up on your fridge (or at least that’s what we do).

Have fun picking out kind acts to do with your kids each day. When you find your favorite, we’d love it if you’d share it on social media, and tag @inkindboxes so we can see!

The $3 fee for the calendar is donated to In Kind Boxes, and will be used to purchase products we fill our gift boxes with.

I hope you have as much fun with this as we do!

~Maria Berglund, Founder of In Kind Boxes

September Update

by

Being kind to ourselves, and spreading kindness and love through out our community is important. It’s something we strive for all year, but love highlighting it with you during this challenge. We loved sharing our Kindness Calendar with you for the #BeKind21 Challenge in partnership with the Born This Way Foundation.

During our Instagram live series Mamas Making an Impact, we got to have some wonderful conversations with amazing moms who are making a positive impact on the world through their work.

In September we chatted with:

This IG Live series has become a favorite part of the content we share on Instagram because of the real and raw conversations we’re having about motherhood. If you haven’t been able to watch one live, don’t worry! We have them all saved to our IGTV. Watch them here.

Our Founder, Maria Berglund, was up to some interesting things this month including:

  • A panelist speaker at Social Media Camp’s Social Media for Non-Profits Summit
  • A guest on MORE Magazine’s Founder to Founder series with MORE’s Founder Arianna Cruz. Find that interview here on their YouTube channel.
  • Ashlie Behm, a local Portland photographer featured Maria in her Womxn Warrior Blog series. Find the full interview here. Ashlie takes amazing photos, and we’re so grateful to be able to share these with you. If you are local please check her out!

We are always so grateful for the opportunity to share about our charity work, and our mission to help moms feel seen and supported on their postpartum journey. If you would like to help shine a light on In Kind Boxes’ work, please feel free to reach out to us! Email: info@inkindboxes.org

This month we donated nearly 50 gift boxes locally!! 30 boxes were donated to Ronald McDonald House in Portland, which will also be distributed to their Bend location, as well as to the Sherwood Family Resource Center in Sherwood, and Raphael House PDX. Donation delivery days are our absolute favorite!!! We also sent gift boxes to Maternity Journey in Houston, Texas to support mamas displaced by hurricane Ida.

Thank you for donating to and supporting In Kind Boxes! We couldn’t do what we do without you.

~Maria

August Update

by

This month we were very fortunate to have been the recipient of fundraising efforts by Kemi Oladimeji and Kendra Scott. We are always so grateful when people and businesses want to support our nonprofit work.

Did you know August 17th is National Nonprofits Day! Thank you to everyone who highlighted our work, and helped us with donations that day!!!

Our Mamas Making an Impact series on Instagram was graced by some amazing moms making a difference in the world. Our guests include: Kemi Oladimeji, Anne Trobaugh, and Nikki Gause. Go and check them out on Instagram. They are saved to In Kind Boxes’ IGTV.

Gift box donations this month went out to Virginia Garcia Memorial Health Center Women’s Clinic, Mamas for Mamas, BeLoved Black Birth Centering, Bottoms Up Diaper Bank, Hiya Baby, and Tree of Life Miami. All of these organizations are doing amazing work to uplift families in need in their area, and show moms the love and support they deserve.

On top of those donated boxes, we sent our our monthly gift boxes that are sponsored. These include boxes to Chicago Birthworks Collective from Chicago, Illinois and to Babies of Homelessness in Bellevue, Washington. Boxes have been sponsored privately, by folks wanting to support postpartum moms in need in their area.

In Kind sends monthly gift boxes to 2 doulas we sponsored this year. Doulas do amazing work supporting families. Recipients of our sponsorship program have programs themselves that offer their services to families in need in their area. Kaytee Crawford helps families in Minnesota, and PNW Doulas are based in Salem, Oregon. Sponsorship application forms will open back up at the start of October, so keep your eyes open for that!

Together we are showing moms that they are not alone, and that they matter.

Thank you for your continued support!

~Maria

January Update

by

In January we launched our Nationwide Gifting Program. We selected seven mamas to give gift boxes to based on their need, and also on the way they are giving back in their own community. Another donation made was to the Virginia Garcia Memorial Health Center Women’s Clinic. They received 25 gift boxes, and we plan to be back again in February, as we’ve been told there is a baby boom happening!

We were very lucky to have connected with Sara Kalish last month. She is an amazing photographer, who specializes in newborn photography. Sara hosted a giveaway on her Instagram page for us, and took some beautiful gift box photos for us that we’ll be sharing soon. Thank you Sara for helping us build awareness for what we’re doing. If you are looking for a newborn photographer go and check out her website– Sara now offers virtual sessions!

In other exciting news, our gift box sponsorship program is now up and running in both Chicago, and Seattle. In Chicago gift boxes are being sent monthly to Chicago Birthworks Collective, and in Seattle, Babies of Homelessness. 

We look forward to expanding our reach across the United States, and helping more moms feel loved through the gift of our boxes. Thank you for your continued support. We can’t wait to see what this year brings!

November Update

by

We kicked off November with the announcement of our gift box donation drive. The holiday season brings a large demand for our gift boxes. As always, we want to help as many families as we can, so we asked for extra help from you. Your donations are important because we use those funds to purchase the products that go inside our boxes. Donated gift boxes contain the same items as the ones we donate. We believe very mama and baby deserves the same high standard of care. To make donated gift boxes extra special, we are including a special card that wishes mamas hope and joy for the holidays~ and it’s signed with the name of the mama it was donated on behalf of, or the name of the generous business who made a donation to In Kind. We are so grateful for our kind and supportive community.

The day we posted about our donation drive, something wonderful happened. Cat & Nat shared about In Kind’s mission in their Instagram stories!!! We had an outpouring of support over the coming days and weeks. Our second and third biggest days on record for website traffic came because of that act of kindness from them. We are so grateful to Cat & Nat for giving us love. We love following Cat & Nat on social media. They are such a source of laughter and fun, and they set an amazing example of being kind, and lifting others up along with them.

Here is a random fact for you about our Instagram audience- Toronto, Canada is ranked #2 in our top locations of followers. Portland, Oregon is #1, and Sherwood, Oregon (where we’re based) is #3. We’re very thankful to these special Ontarians Cat & Nat, and Sarah Nicole Landry of @thebirdspapaya for sharing about In Kind this year. That may have something to do with it 😉

In November we made gift box donation deliveries to several organizations. Baby Blues Connection does amazing work with moms and families experiencing depression, anxiety or stress and provides them with support. At baby Blue Connection our gift boxes are given to mamas needing an emotional boost. Our gift boxes help mamas feel loved, cared for, and not alone. Next we made a delivery to PDX Diaper Bank. The diaper bank has a cloth diapering program they offer to families, which is a great resource for reducing waste, and diapering on a budget. Families receive our gift boxes as participants in the program to supplement the cloth diapers they receive. What a great gift to new parents!

Our next delivery was to the SHARE- Sherwood Family Resource Center. I was lucky enough to get a tour of their new space while I was visiting. The ladies there have been working really hard to make a great “shopping” experience at their clothing closet. The SHARE center is a resource through the local school district, and we’re so happy to provide young families with gift boxes, to help get them off to a great start. Our final gift box donation was to the Domestic Violence Resource Center. The DVRC provides education, support and empowerment to survivors and their children, who are affected by partner violence. They offer counseling, advocacy, shelter services and community outreach. New or expecting mamas seeking support from DVRC are given a gift box as part of the support they receive.

Other items we were able to pass along to the DVRC were dozens of full size sticks of Earth Mama Organics deodorant. Megan from DVRC mentioned how thankful they are for these because they have a current need for deodorant to add to the hygiene kits they give to families. We’re very thankful to Earth Mama for donating several boxes of deodorant, baby oil, and other miscellaneous products. We’ve been working hard to pass these items along to local families, and other organizations in our community.

We gave multiple boxes of deodorant to Rahab’s Sisters in Portland, boxes of deodorant to families displaced from the forest fires in Otis, who are currently living in hotels. South Portland Young Lives received three boxes including deodorant, and several items for new mamas and babies. Possible with God donation closet also received a box of deodorant. This time of year is when many organizations are in need of hygiene items. We were so happy to pass these products along to those in need. If you are a local organization in need of deodorant please let us know! We would love to get some to you. Reach out to us via email at info@inkindboxes.org.

In November we gave thanks to the wonderful businesses who donated their products to include in our gift boxes this year. We featured a new business each week for the first three weeks of November, highlighting their item as a bonus. Thank you to Bumkins Baby for donating your waterproof bibs, Hvnly Boutique for donating your handmade gemstone earrings, and Lamaze Organics for donating your organic cotton onesies. Your generosity means so much, especially during the craziness that was 2020.

In November we also celebrated our one year anniversary of our first gift box donation delivery. On November 15, 2019 we made our first delivery to the Virginia Garcia Memorial Health Center Women’s Clinic in Hillsboro. We can’t wait to see them in December! We also celebrated picking up our largest order of boxes from production at Packaging Resources Company in Tualatin. The look on their faces when we pulled up to the warehouse with our minivan and SUV was pretty priceless. Next time we’ll have to bring something larger… fingers crossed!

At our board meeting this month, we had the difficult task of selecting two winners for the doula/midwife gift box sponsorship program we’re starting in 2021. Applicants were asked to tell us about their work, and how their programs currently give back, and support families in their communities. We chose one local (Oregon) applicant, and one from another US location. We are excited to announce that Annie from PNW Doulas is our local winner, and Doula Kaytee from Minnesota. Congratulations to you both! We can’t wait to get your first gift boxes on their way!!

I am always so blown away by the kindness, love and generosity In Kind receives. We are so grateful for your support, in all the ways you choose to give back. Thank you for taking the time to read this!

~Maria

October Update

by

We had a great month filled with big gift box donation days, and breaking records in sales thanks to Sarah Landry (@thebirdspapaya). Sarah very graciously shared an unboxing of our gift box in her Instagram stories. In doing so, we had five times our biggest day ever in website traffic, and our biggest day in sales. Even bigger than when we were on the local news around Mother’s Day.

We are always so grateful when women with such a large audience such as hers chooses to share about us, because it has a major impact on our nonprofit. The exposure, and support we gain is amazing. It matters in instances like this because we know that with large influence comes a larger demand from organizations/small shops/brands who want to work with Sarah. It means so much to us that she chose to share about In Kind.

You don’t need to have a blue check or thousands of followers to make an impact. Any time someone chooses to share about In Kind, and our mission to help moms is greatly appreciated. Even the smallest acts such as a follow, like or share means a lot to us. We’re thankful for all of it.

This month we partnered with LGBT Mummies Tribe on Instagram to give away a gift box. They are a community organization connecting women’s families worldwide. They’re working to educate, share and celebrate. We were excited to offer their wonderful community of mamas a gift box.

A second giveaway happened during an Instagram Live with Dr. Jessica Shepherd, and LeToya Luckett. The two ladies discussed pregnancy, delivery and postpartum in a real, honest, and hilarious way. There are so many things that were brought up that you can only learn in conversation with other moms- things you won’t find in pregnancy books. It was a really great Live and is posted on LeToya’s feed on October 18 if you want to go back and watch. During the event Dr. Shepherd discussed our gift box with the audience, and why it makes such a great gift for a new mom. She then offered the gift box as a prize to one lucky participant!

We had a few gift box donation days in October. Virginia Garcia’s Women’s Clinic received their 4th delivery this year, totaling 100 boxes to them so far in 2020. We were also able to deliver to the Mother and Child Education Center in Portland, and a special gift box donation to Sunshine Division. Sunshine Division is working with families displaced from the recent fires in Oregon, and we wanted to help. We donated gift boxes to be given to new/expecting mamas receiving support from Sunshine Division during this crazy time.

We recently decided to start a new program next year. We wanted to help reach more moms, and support the amazing work of doulas/midwives in the process. Our application for the gift box sponsorship program for doulas and midwives was open all month. We are excited to read through the submissions from all over the US. 2 winners will be announced by December 1, 2020. Winners will be receiving a gift box a month in 2021 to support their work with parents within their community.

I have spent this month trying to prepare myself for the holiday shopping season. It’s hard to know how it will go as I don’t have much to compare it to. Our first gift boxes were available for sale right before Thanksgiving last year. With COVID this year, it will be interesting to see how it all goes- especially with shipping!

We have some fun things planned for the coming weeks so stay tuned.

Thank you for being here and for your support.

~Maria