Employees have spoken! Here are the Best Places to Work in 2021, according to employees. Did your company make it? Place means to finish in the top three places. The odds for a place bet are shorter than those for a win bet on the same runner, as it is far more likely the runner will finish inside top three than win. Place betting plays an enormous role in betting and is available as a tote betting.

If you’re like most families with kids, you probably have an abundance of toys you no longer need or want. Kids grow out of and get bored with toys, so it’s nice to have an idea of where to donate used toys.

Some places are pretty picky while others are not. There can be issues with cleanliness and other factors that make donation centers leary about accepting used toys.

However, there are still places that will let you donate used toys so they can go to kids that will use and appreciate them. Here are some options.

1. Salvation Army

The Salvation Army has thrift stores located throughout the United States. Besides toys, the Salvation Army accepts clothing, furniture, automobiles, and more.

Note that not all Salvation Army thrift stores or home pickup trucks accept all types of toys or stuffed animals. Your best bet is to call your local Salvation Army or stop by your local Salvation Army thrift store and ask what types of toys they accept.

Profits from the Salvation Army donations and thrift stores go to help veterans, the elderly, and other people groups in need of assistance.

2. Goodwill

Goodwill Industries has been providing help for those in need for over 100 years. When you donate used toys to a Goodwill thrift store, you’ll help Goodwill raise money.

The money it raises goes to help the community in a variety of different ways. They help people find jobs, meet their financial needs, and more.

If you’ve shopped at a Goodwill thrift store you probably already know they accept donations of clothing, household items, and more for resale. However, you can also donate used toys to Goodwill. They accept used games as well. The Goodwill website didn’t specify what kind of toys the thrift stores will accept, however.

I’d check with your local Goodwill thrift store for more details on which types of toys they do and do not accept.

3. Stuffed Animals for Emergencies

Stuffed Animals For Emergencies (SAFE for short) is a charity that gives stuffed animals to children in emergency situations. Such as children who are involved in a domestic violence incident, a house fire, car accident, or other traumatic event.

You can donate gently used stuffed animals to SAFE. However, please be sure that the stuffed animals meet the following guidelines:

• Only gently used stuffed animals
• Stuffed animals that have been properly cleaned (the website has a guide)
• Stuffed animals that were part of a collection, haven’t been played with, and still have tags on are considered “new” even if they’ve been stored cleanly in your home

As referenced in the bullet point section, please see the site’s cleaning guide before you clean a gently used stuffed animal to donate.

4. Vietnam Veterans of America

Vietnam Veterans Of America collects donated items, including used toys, that you can drop off at any of their dozens of U.S. locations. Depending on the local chapter, you might even be able to get them to make a pick up at your home.

When they collect your used toys and other items, they resell them and use the profits to help care for and support Vietnam Veterans. The website says that they’ll pick up “almost anything” you have to donate.

5. Second Chance Toys

Second Chance Toys is a charity that has dropoff locations in New York, New Jersey, Philadelphia, and DC/Northern Virginia.

If you have more than 50 toys to give away, you can call them and they’ll arrange for a dropoff at a location near you. This charity specializes in finding homes for used toys.

Typically, the toys will go to a community organization or child care organization that serves underprivileged kids. The organization has a goal of keeping toys out of landfills and using them to help kids learn and grow via motor skills development.

6. Freecycle or Craigslist “Free” Section

Sites like Freecycle and the free section on Craigslist can be great places to donate used toys. Many families would love to have more toys for their children, but it’s just not in the budget.

As with other sites, be sure the toys are clean, in decent shape, and safe (not broken or dangerous). Specify what minimum age the toys are meant for as well, so that little toys that are choking hazards don’t get into the hands of kids that are too young to have them.

Facebook Marketplace or other sites that are similar to Craigslist can be a good place to give toys away too.

7. Local Domestic Violence Shelters

Each year, an average of 24 people per minute are victims of some type of domestic violence. Sometimes, parents and children who are victims of domestic violence have to leave their homes and stay at a protective shelter where they are protected from abusers.

Many local domestic violence shelters will take donations of gently used toys so that children have toys to play with while they live at the shelter. Domestic violence shelters act as temporary housing while parents work to set up a safe living situation away from their abuser.

8. Resale Stores

Some resale or consignment stores such as Once Upon A Child will take your used toys you wish to donate. You can donate your toys, or in some instances, these sorts of shops will buy them from you at a low price.

Again, be sure they’re gently used and in good shape, with no broken or missing pieces.

9. Local Emergency Childcare Services

Many metropolitan cities have emergency childcare services – often called crisis nurseries – for parents who are in a bind and need occasional child care. For instance, if a parent is trying to get help for addiction, or move, or something similar, they can find childcare for a specified amount of time.

The crisis nursery in our area will allow you to leave your child for emergency care for up to three days and nights. Check with a local crisis nursery in your area to see if they might be in need of donated toys.

Kids placed for care in these types of nurseries could use some toys to play with.

10. Local Hospitals

Another place you might want to check about donating used toys is your local hospital. Both children’s hospitals and all-purpose hospitals that care for children might be able to use your donated toys.

Some kids end up being in the hospital for a few days or sometimes much longer. It’s nice for them to have toys to place with. Our local children’s hospital has a large toy room where kids can get a change of scenery from their small hospital rooms and have a fun place to go and play.

Some ideas for toys your local hospital might like to have donated (in good shape, of course) include puzzles, toddler toys, books, games, educational toys, or just your plain old dolls, cars, and trucks.

Try and avoid donating stuffed animals and cloth dolls to hospitals as they aren’t as easily disinfected. And kids in hospitals often need to be exposed to as few germs as possible.

Bonus idea: Check with your local doctor’s office to see if they want your gently used toys to keep little ones occupied while in waiting rooms or doctor’s rooms. Again, try and steer clear of cloth and stuffed toys that are more difficult to clean and disinfect.

If you also have books to donate, here is a list of places where you can donate used books. We also have this list of places to donate used eyeglasses.

Places Where You Cannot Donate Used Toys

Despite some publications that say differently, there are a few places that no longer accept used toy donations. They may have in the past, but we found specific website pages that said that isn’t the case any longer.

Ronald McDonald House

According to this webpage, Ronald McDonald House no longer accepts used toys. Also, they do not accept new stuffed animals any longer either. No plushies, Beanie Babies, etc.

Toys For Tots

There were a few articles that said U.S. Marines Toys For Tots program accepts used toys as well. According to this webpage, that hasn’t been the case since 1980. The Toys For Tots website said that distributing used toys to some children was giving them the wrong message that they weren’t worthy of new toys, while kids who received new toys were more deserving.

This is understandable. Suffice to say you’ll have to find a different venue than Toys For Tots to donate your used toys.

Summary

If you’re wanting to know where to donate used toys, you can see you’ve got several options. If none of the options on this list work for you, check with local daycares, religious organizations, or even with families and friends that have younger children.

If your toys are in good shape, surely you can find someone who wants to take them off your hands.

The three main places to make sports bets are online, in a casino, and your friendly local bookie.

Many factors regulate my decision on which ones to use and when to use them. I can use all three, and that’s fine as well. No one says I have to pick one.

This post looks at the different venues and how to interpret their lines. It’s good to know the three transaction methods of cash, credit card, and cryptocurrency for my deposits and payments.

Online sportsbooks can give considerable bonuses, and a local bookie may give me a line of credit.

My primary reason for choosing a location is trust.

That should be yours be as well.

Your Local Bookie

Let me first say that betting with a local bookie is illegal at the state and federal levels. Among the advantages of local bookies is that it’s a cash-based business, so I don’t have to have the government involved in my finances.

Another advantage is that I generally know the person and other bettors that participate, so I have a good idea of their character.

These specialty bets may include lines for local events, and Vegas is not going to have my local games posted on the line.

I will say that I need to be careful on smaller local sports as insiders may be privy to information not available to me or the general public. This can be an advantage if I’m the inside who’s privy, though.

Some of the more sophisticated private bookies have their own website and betting platforms where people sign in under aliases. These are geared along the same lines as the major venues and are primarily geared toward betting on the NFL.

Traditional Casino Sports Betting

I previously wrote a blog on how to place sports bets and need to give a quick refresher for this section.

It’s crucial in these cases to know the game numbers associated with the team you are placing the bet. I need to know the line and its meaning. A 120 line means I pay $120 to win $100, and when at the window, I need to state the game number with to win 100. This means I hand over $120 and get a ticket for the bet.

As soon as I get the ticket, I need to check it so that it represents the bet I want to make and then walk out of the sportsbook room to take a picture of it. Phones are restricted in the sports room, but this was put in place to prevent folks from betting by proxy.

Back in the day, a professional sports bettor would communicate to numerous people across different rooms to make bets on his behalf. This was to disguise their strategy and cost sportsbooks considerable money.

Then the line would change for the rest of the non-professionals, making it harder for the average bettor to win. Complaints led to the feds stepping in and setting specific some rules — the cell phone rule being one of them.

Just don’t be that guy at the counter using his phone, or you might have a man in a suit asking you to step outside. This happened to me the first time in a sports room, but lucky for me, my ignorance was easily recognizable.

Football and Baseball

The football sportsbook will have two line items for the game with the home team listed second, a total score for over/under betting, and a spread with the favorite either being the only one with the spread or having the negative spread. The dominant betting structure for football is 11:10, meaning $110 to win 100.

Tell the clerk game number xxx under to win 100 and hand them the $110, take your ticket, check it, take a picture as soon as you can, and then look for the next wager. Find a place that has all of the lines listed to see if the book you are using has the best lines. The originator line will generally shift moments before the other books catch up.

Baseball has a similar but different structure of picking the winner or loser of a game and picking the over/under for the total projected score. One main difference is that all games and teams have their own betting lines with the favorite listed first, followed by the underdog line. The pitchers are also important, and unless specified, when a pitcher does not start, the bet is void, and you will be refunded.

Betting at Online Sports Books

There are over 100 online sportsbooks out there, and picking the one that suits you is based on your personal preference. Many online books give bonuses like $50 when signing up and making a deposit for betting.

It’s nice to get these. My bank never gave me money to make a deposit.

They take multiple currencies, but you should note that the IRS and their banking regulations require you to have an ID when putting cash back into a bank account. I can bet anywhere at any time using multiple devices to research and place the bets

Bitcoin is a currency used as well in many of the online sports rooms, and you will need an account set up with a bitcoin wallet before linking them to the room. Many of these markets will charge a fee. So, if this is not for you, just use your credit card.

Online Tracking for Sports Rooms

For most of us, limits are there to protect us from losing more than we can afford. However, if you are a professional sports gambler, these limits can be placed to protect the room from your skills. Most of the online rooms in the US track a player’s winnings and can use this to limit bet sizes to restrict their losses.

Many of the offshore sites do not limit players in this manner, so the migration of the professional gambler to the foreign sites may increase as more books are set up in each state. As regulations level out, the US regulations begin to see a little better structure for online sports rooms.

Winning in My Book

What does it take to win?

If I am laying 110, I will need to win 52.4% to break even.

And if I can get that up to 55%, I can make some real money.

If you think winning 55% is easy, I hate to be the bearer of bad news.

Places To Near Me

It’s not.

The lines are made using a vast amount of data and are almost always accurately handicapped.

There’s also a thing called recency bias. If I watch a game one week and decide that the team is awful because they play poorly and base next week’s bet on that, that’s recency biased.

Best Places To Visit Near Me

It’s not an effective way to bet, and I tend to bet poorly because of this memory. Football is probably the most common time I see it because the games are weekly.

The key to winning in sports is information and me having it before the next guy. If I see a lazy line — meaning a line that is consistently slow in changing – that’s a line that I will try to use when odds change. I can place my bet on the slow line and get the better odds.

What information is essential?

Up to the minute injury information is vital in all sports, and this combined with weather are the two needed for line selections. Additional information may include the general atmosphere of the area like the Saints after Harvey playing their guts out for the city. Unfortunately, I need to keep up with police blotters searching for key player names being arrested.

Basically, any event that changes a player’s or coach’s mental and physical states are key developments that give me an edge. I want to get to the 55% winning percentage, and that takes a lot of work. If I don’t want to do that much work, I can always look at some of the parlay bets relative to the lines and pick one or two for the week.

Conclusion

Picking a sports room can be as easy as talking to a guy at the bar for my local bookie, walking into the nearest casino, or researching online sites based on reviews.

The three key factors are trust, currency, and up to date information. With these key elements, I can use my sports room to full capacity while striving to maintain a 55% winning percentage.

I need to avoid recency bias and pay attention to other information such as weather conditions and injuries. Even the atmosphere in the city can be a factor or a police blotter showing a baseball pitcher in a tight scrape. Remember, handicappers do extensive research, and I need to do my part for the few games I select to wager.

Places To Bet On Sports Near Me

Stay Safe and Enjoy the Day!