Welcome to Blog Nosh Magazine’s first special-event carnival, as we share stories of hope this holiday season in support of the Tide Loads of Hope program, a mobile laundromat offering laundry services to families affected by disasters.

Tide Loads of Hope is a traveling breath of fresh air and a sigh of relief for families nationwide suffering from natural disasters such as hurricanes, wildfires, and floods. In times of crisis, Tide has learned that it is the little things that help us maintain what can sometimes feel like our last threads to normalcy. Little things like clean clothes. With this in mind, the Tide Loads of Hope truck is returning to New Orleans this holiday season in order to offer some holiday hope and free laundry services for families still struggling.

We’re celebrating Tide’s efforts in three big ways:

1. We’ve dedicated the whole magazine to Tide Loads of Hope for the Holidays by commissioning some of the most amazing bloggers to write about the importance of hope at the holidays. Their work is brilliant and inspiring. I know you’ll be heartened to read each gorgeous post on our front page.

2. We’re inviting you to lend your own voice to this uprising of hope. Join the blog carnival by sharing your own stories of hope, and enter your own post link in the blog carnival below. Three posts will be selected from carnival participants in the linky to be featured on Blog Nosh Magazine, too. We can’t wait to read your contributions!

3. We’re going to New Orleans to talk with Katrina survivors to tell them about your hopeful messages. We want you to join our live two day event in New Orleans, Sunday and Monday, December 13 and 14, as Blog Nosh founder and editor-in-chief Megan Jordan from Velveteen Mind (whose personal story of natural disaster recovery inspired this partnership), Mishelle Lane from Secret Agent Mama, and Deb Rox from Deb on the Rocks tweet stories of resilience from laundry recipients and volunteers on the ground.

Follow along on twitter via #loadsofhope and be sure to follow @TideLoadsofHope. More importantly, engage with us and tweet back your own messages of hope, helping us show the residents of the Gulf Coast that their voices are still heard and their stories still remembered. The Loads of Hope truck just completed a stop in Atlanta, GA, and will be on their way to Louisville, KY, so help us spread the word and reach out to families in need of a break.

When you join the carnival with your messages of hope, be sure to invite your own readers to participate in this online event by linking to the chocolate-covered center of the carnival here at Blog Nosh Magazine. You are invited to grab any of the Tide Loads of Hope graphics you see here, including the tee shirt badge below (linked to http://tideloadsofhope.com), as all proceeds from sales of Tide Vintage Tees support the truck and keep it on the road, ready to help when disaster strikes nationwide.

Blog carnival hosted by Blog Nosh Magazine, sponsored by Tide Loads of Hope.

As the year draws to a close, we are doing some shuffling of the buffet table here at Blog Nosh Magazine. The new year always brings a fresh crop of new bloggers and new blogs, not to mention new incarnations of old blogs from old bloggers. With that in mind, we are gearing up to launch the remainder of our current channels (Military, Travel and Expats, etc.) and introduce a few new sub-channels, such as an Unemployment section to our Business channel.

Interested in becoming a Channel Editor? Have some ideas for new channels or sub-channels? Start brainstorming and drop your ideas into the comments or email us with your interest. Some of our old editors will be leaving, so all channels will have room available for fresh voices and approaches. It will take a bit for us to get to all of the applications (not to mention follow-up with previous applications on-hold), so bear with us.

Speaking of having the patience of a fine aged wine, we are revamping our submissions process. If you have submitted a post to us in the last couple of months, know that we are working to streamline our review process (your submission is one of hundreds we receive each month) and haven’t forgotten you.

All of these efforts are made possible by the support we receive from writers, editors, and our sponsors. Please take a moment to check out one of our featured sponsors this month, Lamaze International and Mother’s Advocate and their Six Healthy Birth Practices videos (one of which is featured in NoshTube) and print materials. The Six Healthy Birth Practices are:

• • Let labor begin on its own
  • Walk, move around and change positions throughout labor
  • Bring a friend, loved one, or doula for continuous support
  • Avoid interventions that are not medically necessary
  • Avoid giving birth on your back and follow your body’s urges to push
  • Keep mother and baby together - it’s best for the mother, the baby, and breastfeeding

Lamaze isn’t the breathing techniques that are so often associated with it any more. You can see what their birth practices look like when lived out loud in both my own birth plan and then in my birth post. At least, my very best efforts at integrating those birth practices, as I am far from your ideal Lamaze example.

Of course, every birth is different, just as every mother is different, so in our ever-irreverent spirit here at Blog Nosh Magazine, we are revisiting one of our favorite Birth & Adoption posts by Baby on Bored. What makes our community so delicious is our diversity of voices, so be sure to check out ways to have a healthy, safe, and natural birth with Lamaze International and Mother’s Advocate and then get your laugh on with the cheeky humor of Stefanie Wilder-Taylor’s Preggo Land.

Nosh on!

Nosh Notes from the Editor by Founder/ Editor-in-Chief Megan Jordan of Velveteen Mind.

{Originally published on Moosh in Indy}

Moosh- your dad is up in bed snoring and moaning like a severely wounded walrus. Today is Father’s Day and I just wanted to let you know, as someone who’s lived with your dad for seven years that the teasing and relentless obnoxiousness will likely never stop. It’s how he shows us that he loves us.

Seriously.

Your shrieks of horror and protest must be music to your dad’s ears or else he wouldn’t insist on pissing you off so often. He never had a brother. We have to forgive him for this. Guy just doesn’t know how to be surrounded by wimmin all the time. It’s made him a little crazy. Good news? Any brothers that you may have will pale in comparison to what your faddah dishes out.

There is a moment in your birth video where he reaches out and touches you really REALLY quick while the nurses are cleaning you off. He didn’t want to get in trouble. You can hear the nurses say “It’s okay dad, she’s yours, you can touch her all you want.” Later when he told me that he got to be the first! to! touch! you! was the first time I ever saw him weakened with the power a little girl holds over her daddy. He hasn’t recovered since. You are his world.

In another hour he will get up and start teasing us. And poking us. And annoying us. This is how boys show they like you. From kindergarten to high school to marriage. The more they pick on you the more smitten they are.

I think it would be impossible for daddy to be any more smitten with us.

We’re lucky ladies.

Happy Father’s Day dude.

The funny thing about blogging is that life sometimes gets in the way. Blogging is supposed to be about our lives, though, right? So if we don’t get out there and live them, our blogs will be serpents eating their own tails: seemingly interesting at first, then very monotonous and repetitive.

Just as life can sometimes distract you from getting things done, our solutions are often monotonous stop-gaps. Nothing memorable and hardly worth the effort. Which reminds us… Father’s Day is this Sunday! Did you forget to get Dad that amazing gift? No problem, we have you covered and with sprinkles on top.

Blog Nosh Magazine is proud to present our favorite solution to those last-minute Father’s Day gift panics in the form of what we love best: MAGAZINES!

If the dads in your life are anything like the dads in mine, they enjoy splashy pictures, punchy stories, and gorgeous women. That’s putting it politely. I gave my husband a subscription to Men’s Health one year and he thanked me every month, no fail. The best part? I absolutely loved Men’s Health and just about beat him to it each time it arrived. I’d like to say that peeking into the mind of men made me a better wife, but I think it might have just made me more tolerant and patient because, wow, it’s all pretty much about desire for men. Desire to improve, desire to build a better life, and desire for, well, we are talking about our men.

In honor of Father’s Day, Blog Nosh Magazine is giving away a prize pack courtesy of MagsDirect.com that includes subscriptions to the daddy of all magazines: Sports Illustrated, GQ, and (my favorite) Men’s Health. All you have to do to win is be a US resident and either tweet about the giveaway using the keyword “@blognoshmag” or leave a comment below. The winner will be announced Saturday morning, June 20, 2009.

Update: The winner is @flesworthy! Her tweet about the giveaway was randomly selected from all of the tweets and comments. Follow her on twitter and check out her blog: flesworthy. Thanks for entering!

Sold on the idea of giving Dad a magazine subscription? Seriously, my husband asks for me to renew his subscriptions every year in lieu of another tie or coffee mug. Check out MagsDirect.com for cheap magazines and you’ll absolutely thrill him with your thoughtfulness.

Plus, you can do it Sunday morning if you forget poor ole dad.

{Originally published on Pensieve}

She will haunt me, this I know.

“I am happy,” she says, and she means it. Even if she did not speak those words, her countenance belies this simple truth: She is happy.

Kiran invited us to her home today, a 4′ x 6′ shoebox in the heart of Kolkata’s slums, blocks away from the glow and lure of proverbial red lights and painted women. Girls, actually, some even younger than Kiran. Simple math tells me 175 of her houses could fit into mine.

She is the only Compassion International sponsored child we visited this week who didn’t have a parent home with her.

A little over a month ago, one of our most beloved editors suffered the greatest loss any parent can imagine: Her daughter, Maddie, passed away. The hearts of the blogosphere went out to Maddie Spohr’s family in a way that our bodies could not, separated by miles but not compassion.

In just a matter of weeks, tens of thousands of dollars were donated in Maddie’s name to the Spohr family’s charity of choice, the March of Dimes. Bits of support were drummed up here and there to help support the family directly, as well, through not only financial support for funeral costs, but deliveries of food (including gift certificates for delivery from those too far away to deliver it themselves) to warm the family’s bellies and help take their minds off responsibilities for just a moment longer.

All accomplished through the compassion and, more importantly, passion of bloggers. And this wasn’t the first time bloggers have rallied together, nor will it be the last time.

As Blog Nosh Magazine transitions back into our regular publishing schedule after a month of our front page dedicated to Maddie, we would like to take one more opportunity to highlight the efforts and successes of blogger outreach. Benefiting charities, movements, families, and causes across the board, the power of bloggers is immeasurable. As a magazine championing bloggers’ skills and value, we ask that you take a moment to consider some of the more tangible good that bloggers are capable of setting into motion.

This week is dedicated to those bloggers using their thoughtful influence and their passion to make a difference. One of our own, Robin from Pensieve and Channel Editor of Religion and Philosophy, has been knocking us out with stories of her recent trip to Kolkata, India (pictured right), as a member of a team of bloggers for Compassion International. As you will see, not all compassion is lived out from behind the comfort of our computers.

{Originally Published on MomDot}

While we are all so invested deeply in reviews and giveaways chit chat, I wanted to take some time to discuss something that MomDot did that spawned into a $10,000 charitable donation project that is still going strong all due to reviews and giveaways. With products floating around the net daily and bloggers being offered the majority of them, we realized we had a perfect opportunity to do some good with the pitches.

We opened up what was to become Bloggers Give, an organization that asks review and giveaway bloggers whom work with companies to have them send an extra product directly to us, where we donate them all to a predesignated charity.

In the beginning, we asked our site for charity suggestions and I made phone calls to some of them and ended up speaking with Stormi from The Center for Courageous Kids. The Center for Courageous Kids is a camp for children and their families facing difficult medical situations, to come for a week and have their minds off of that and into some fun. The camp has a full medical facility, access to a hospital, horseback riding, and more. Even better, the camp had a need for products, any kinds. We knew we could pass them all the donated products and what they couldn’t use in the camp in day to day operations, they could distribute to the families that attended their camp as assistance.

{Originally published on Loralee’s Looney Tunes}

This was not the post I thought I would be writing today. I actually didn’t think I would be writing any post today as my computer isn’t coming until tomorrow, but my heart, head and eyes are so full I bundled myself up late at night and went in search of a computer, any computer I could use to get my feelings out.

I was at the hospital in the middle of an icky 4-hour ultrasound and OBGYN appointment when I got a call from Casey that shattered my heart.

Maddie Spohr passed away yesterday.

She was 17-months old.

Have you ever seen such a spunky, lively, beautiful little angel? I know when I first saw this photo, my heart MELTED. She’s always been such a beautiful little elf that seemed to get more gorgeous with each passing photo I saw.

Maddie’s mom, Heather is a dear friend and I love her. She has always been there to lend an ear, be a dork with me on Twitter late into the night and she listened to me talk about my son Matthew that passed away. Maddie was 11 wks premature and though she was still with Heather, she could understand much of what I went through because a very ill baby gives you much more insight than most people.

{Originally published on A Smeddling Kiss}

Today I learned of the death of a beautiful little girl.

One of my fellow Blog Nosh editors is Heather Spohr, who has chronicled her difficult pregnancy and life with her husband and darling premature daughter on her blog The Spohrs Are Multiplying. Madeline Alice Spohr passed away yesterday, sometime after Heather tweeted from the hospital, “They are going to intubate her. I’m freaking out.”

I rarely pray, because I’m not sure who I’m praying to, but sometimes when things get scary I fall back onto my Catholic upbringing and find myself repeating the Lord’s Prayer over and over, just sending it out there in case it might help. I did it the morning of 9/11/01, I did it when my dad was in surgery, and I found myself doing it last night after reading that tweet.

The terrible news about Maddie stopped me in my tracks this morning. I forget after 9 years that Pepper was a preemie, too - 6 weeks early - and so I made my way over to Maddie’s March of Dimes page to make a donation. I urge anyone who reads this to do the same.

I realized I hadn’t posted anything in a week, and while looking for something to post, I found a draft I started last month titled “Heartsore” about all the ways I am worried for my daughter. She and I have been having a difficult time lately. She is grumpy and whiny and ungrateful and I am often at a loss how to deal with all of these negative emotions.

As you night expect, re-reading it after learning of Maddie’s death flipped my perspective. I have a beautiful 9 year old girl, smart as a whip and full of neurosis and overflowing with emotions, and I am so grateful. So lucky. And that is what I will tell her tonight when she starts yelling at the computer or whining about bedtime or making faces at the dinner I have prepared for her. I’m going to tell her, “I’m so lucky to have you.” She’ll probably think I’m teasing her at first, but I won’t be, and by the time she falls asleep tonight, I’m going to make sure she understands how much I mean it.

Tomorrow morning, I’ll wake her up for school and she will groan at me and whine about brushing her hair. It will all start all over again, the crying and the lecturing and the love and the anger, and it is difficult to put into word how grateful I am for that.

Heather Spohr was one of our very first editors, joining our Overcoming Adversity channel before our launch thanks to a “bloggy” friendship we struck up while her daughter Maddie was in the hospital. Heather’s husband, Mike, was one of our very first bloggers, sharing with us a post he wrote about what it’s like being a stay-at-home dad caring for a preemie baby daughter. It was, to say the least, hilarious.

A strong sense of humor defines the Spohr family. It bonds them. It defined their daughter, Maddie.

Madeline Alice Spohr, daughter to Heather and Mike Spohr, passed away on April 7, 2009. As bloggers, all we can do is rock collectively in disbelief and then scramble to do what we can to send support across the ether that is our relationships.

So Blog Nosh Magazine is filling our table with the bounty that was Maddie. What follows below is what I consider to be the definitive Maddie post, written by her mother about a man that Maddie and I both felt belonged to us. Yes, that’s right: Matt Lauer.

I officially bow down to you, Maddie. Your smile was always brighter and your eyes always more mesmerizing than mine anyway. Enjoy watching him shower naked from now on. You win.

PS- Below every post about Maddie that will appear, you will find links to a PayPal account set up for the Spohrs. In addition, in lieu of flowers, the Spohr family ask that you donate to the March of Dimes. We’re doing what we can to send a little support their way, with a cherry on top from Blog Nosh Magazine.

***

Mad Lauer {Originally published on The Spohrs Are Multiplying}

When I was seven years old, I got my first crush - David Witherspoon from the TV show Our House (and yes I now know Chad Allen is gay). I eventually moved on to Kevin Arnold from The Wonder Years, then Johnny Depp from 21 Jump Street, and the list goes on from there. I knew Maddie would eventually have a crush on a TV personality, but I figured she would be around seven years old like me - not seven MONTHS old.

Madeline has a mad crush on Matt Lauer.

We started to notice it a few months ago. In the mornings she’s fussy, but the second she’d hear Matt Lauer’s voice, she would stop whining and turn her whole body toward the sound of Matt joking with Meredith. We’ve even recorded The Today Show on our DVR so we can play it when she’s especially wound up. It works every time.

Hilarious photos of Maddie follow, so be sure to continue reading…