Author: Amy Sikes

Now through December 2, 2020, DCIN is accepting orders for the 2021 8.5″ by 11″ full-color twelve-month DCIN Extra-Sweet Kitties wall calendar! The prices listed below include mailing costs. (HARD DEADLINE).

To order via PayPal (paypal.com):

1) Choose the blue “Send” button (after you log in).
2) Enter calendar@dcin.info in the field that asks for name, email or mobile number. Click “next.”
3) Type in the total amount for the number of calendars you’re ordering. (See below for prices.)
4) Use the “add a note” box below the donation field to give us the number of calendars ordered, the mailing address, and your email address. Click “continue.”
5) Below the amount field, make sure it says “sending to a friend” and not “paying for an item or service.” If it says “paying for an item or service”, please click “Change” and select “sending to a friend” to keep DCIN from paying Seller fees. Make sure the note field below that contains your mailing address and email address – we can’t mail to you or contact you otherwise!
6) Choose if you are going to pay with your linked account or with a credit card – Please choose to pay the fees associated with a credit card so DCIN does not have to pay them.
7) Click “Send payment now.”
8) Send us an additional email to calendar @dcin.info with your mailing address and email address – PayPal is NOT always including the Note field with your payment! THIS IS A CRITICAL STEP SO WE CAN MAIL YOUR CALENDAR!!

If you do not use PayPal, please email calendar@dcin.info with your intent to pay by check and include the number of calendars you’re ordering and your/your recipient’s mailing address. Then send your full payment to

Diabetic Cats in Need
P.O. Box 21
Minot, ME 04258-0021

Pricing (includes postage):

• US mailings —$28 per calendar
• Canadian mailings — $33 per calendar – please pay in US$!
• Other international mailings –– $38 per calendar – please pay in US$! PLEASE SEE NOTE BELOW.

The higher costs for Canada and other international locations are because of the higher mailing costs to those places. PLEASE NOTE: DUE TO COVID-19, THERE ARE INTERNATIONAL LOCATIONS WE CANNOT SHIP TO. PLEASE CHECK WITH US PRIOR TO ORDERING.

DCIN is accepting orders for the 2021 calendar through December 2, 2020 (HARD DEADLINE). We will make every effort to mail these so you’ll receive them in time for Christmas, but we can’t make any promises, as we must rely on the printing company to get them to us for distribution and the USPS is exceptionally slow this year.

Thank you all so much for supporting DCIN’s 2021 Extra-Sweet Kitties Calendar!

If you have questions, please contact me at amy@dcin.info.

~Amy

Hello, DCIN Friends! The DCIN Team is asking for goods and services to be donated for our 7th online auction.

Auction items should sell at a reasonable price: $8 to $100, including postage. We are looking for services of any kind that might have international appeal and items in good to excellent condition that are not so fragile they might break with mailing through the United States Postal Service. We especially love items with a cat theme or that are for cats (catnip toys, mats, and blankets are always big hits!). You can see the types of items donated and sold in 2018’s auction album. PLEASE NOTE: This year, we will be vetting each item offered to be sure it has a good chance of selling based on previous years’ results. We appreciate all offers, but with such a small team to handle all the work, we need to make sure we spend our time creating item entries for things that are likely to sell.

Donors keep their items until there is a successful auction winner who has paid DCIN directly for their items. A DCIN Auction Team member will then contact the donors to let them know that the items are ready to mail and provide them with the name and mailing address of their item’s winner.

To list items in the auction, the Auction Team needs the following from the donors emailed to Auction@dcin.info:

• A clear, preferably high-resolution photo of the individual goods being donated, displayed in an appealing manner. Multiple photos of the same item are welcome, especially those that show different sides of the same item.
• A brief but detailed description of the goods or services being donated, including condition and size.
• The minimum bid amount for the individual goods or services being donated. If you know the regular retail value or the item, please include that.
• Whether you also will be donating the cost of postage for the goods mailed within your country. (If you aren’t, DCIN will arrange postage reimbursement for you with provision of postage receipt.)
• If you will not be donating the cost of postage, the approximate mailing costs.
• Currently, we plan to start the auction on Sunday, February 16, 2020, at noon Eastern and end on Saturday, February 22, 2020, at 3 PM Eastern. We MUST HAVE your photos and information about your auction donations by Sunday, January 26, 2020.

Thanks so much to all who are considering donating items for this auction!

~Amy, DCIN Development Director

Now through December 5, 2019, DCIN is accepting orders for the 2020 8.5″ by 11″ full-color twelve-month DCIN Extra-Sweet Kitties wall calendar! The prices listed below include mailing costs. (HARD DEADLINE).

To order via PayPal (paypal.com):

1) Choose the blue “Send” button (after you log in).
2) Enter calendar@dcin.info in the account field. Click “next”.
3) The blue box below the amount field will say “Paying for an item or service.” Click “Change” to keep DCIN from paying Seller fees. Then select “sending to a friend.”
4) Type in the total amount for the number of calendars you’re ordering. (See below for prices.)
5) Use the “add a note” box below the donation field to give us the number of calendars ordered, the mailing address, and your email address.
6) Click “Continue.”
7) Choose if you are going to pay with your linked account or with a credit card – **Please choose to pay the fees associated with a credit card so DCIN does not have to pay them**.
8) Click “Send payment now.”

If you do not use PayPal, please email calendar@dcin.info with your intent to pay by check and include the number of calendars you’re ordering and your/your recipient’s mailing address. Then send your full payment to

Diabetic Cats in Need
P.O. Box 21
Minot, ME 04258-0021

Pricing (includes postage):
* US mailings —$28 per calendar
* Canadian mailings — $33 per calendar – please pay in US$!
* Other international mailings –– $38 per calendar – please pay in US$!

The higher costs for Canada and other international locations are because of the higher mailing costs to those places.

DCIN is accepting orders for the 2020 calendar through December 5, 2019 (HARD DEADLINE). We will make every effort to mail these so you’ll receive them in time for Christmas, but we can’t make any promises, as we must rely on the printing company to get them to us for distribution.

Thank you all so much for supporting DCIN’s 2020 Extra-Sweet Kitties Calendar!

If you have questions, please contact me at amy@dcin.info.

~Amy

 

We at DCIN are incredibly grateful for our supporters!  Without your help, we couldn’t do our important work of assisting diabetic kitties in need, educating people about Feline Diabetes, and helping to rehome diabetic cats.  Your likes, comments, shares, and donations are what make DCIN’s existence possible!

Some people may wonder where their money goes when they donate to our general fund, whether via monthly donations, one-time gifts, or participating in one of our fundraisers, such as the annual auction that just finished.  Our general fund is what pays for our daily operations, which usually consist of sending out “starter kits” and Lantus insulin.  Here’s what we send in a starter kit:

• 1 Arkray glucometer ($10)
• 100 Arkray test strips ($31)
• 100 lancets (~$3, sometimes free if they’ve been donated)
• 50-100 syringes – sometimes more if the situation is dire ($5-10, sometimes free if they’ve been donated)
• 1 rice sock – this helps get the blood flowing in a kitty’s ear and makes testing much easier (~$1)
• 1 catnip toy – because FD kitties deserve to have fun, too! (~$1 – we provide the catnip, and a wonderful woman makes the toys for us)

That’s $56 just for the basic testing kit that every diabetic kitty parent should have.  And that doesn’t include shipping!  Even if we’re sending just the kit, USPS postage can go up to about $10.  So we’re talking $66 per new kitty client.  YOUR contributions make that possible!

What if we have to add in insulin?  Well, we usually send 2 pens of Lantus, which probably cost us about $20 each (again, unless we’ve been lucky enough to have it donated).  Add $1 for ice packs and $4 for the special thermal mailer we use to keep the insulin cool en route, and that’s another $45 to the cost.  If we can use USPS to send (which we do in the cooler months), shipping is still usually about $10. FedEx is a little more expensive, but we’ve recently found a way to cut back on that, so it runs $20-$20 for overnight shipping.

So if we’re shipping FedEx overnight to a new client who needs a starter kit plus insulin, we’re looking at about $130 just for that one package.  YOUR contributions make that possible!

We helped more than 180 kitties last year (plus one dog!), and we’re already helping cats in 2019.  Think of all the cats your contributions have helped and will help!

The general fund also covers costs for insulins such as ProZinc and PZI, which we have to order directly from a company and have sent to the client.  ProZinc is about $125 per vial shipped, and PZI is about $60 for U-40 and about $100 for U-100 shipped.  Without YOUR contributions, we couldn’t provide this additional insulin service to kitties in need.

Another service the general fund provides is assistance to clients with some vet costs.  When these are relatively small, we pull funds rather than doing a YouCaring fundraiser for them – we reserve those for the larger bills and especially the in-crisis kitties.  YOUR contributions allow us to do this!

When you donate to us in some way other than a critical care fundraiser, you’re helping us provide these crucial daily items.  Many of the people we help would have to put their beloved kitties to sleep without our assistance.  A dollar to DCIN is a dollar that directly helps save a life!*

I and the rest of the DCIN Team salute ALL our fans – those who donate and who share, like, and comment on our posts.  You are all life-savers!  Thank you for your neverending support!

~Amy

*No funds go to the people who volunteer for DCIN.  Every dollar we receive goes to support the cats in some way.