Operation Cookie Overload Update: 13 mailing days left, 225 hungry Marines!

This Thanksgiving weekend, we’re grateful for the sacrifices of the men and women in our military, especially those who spent the holiday far from their families and friends. We’re also grateful for the amazing supporters of our troops who are participating in Operation Cookie Overload. Our numbers keep rising: We now have 132 people/groups from 35 states sending cookie-filled care packages to Marines in Afghanistan for Christmas!

We started Operation Cookie Overload to help make the holidays sweeter for a 19-year-old Marine who will be in Afghanistan this holiday season. We thought we could get a handful of nice folks to send a few cookie care packages to this young man to share with his buddies. We had no idea so many people would want to bake and ship packages! So we’re now on a mission to overload his entire Marine unit — all 225 of them — with cookies!

If you haven’t joined us yet, there is still time. (See our contact information below.) The deadline for mailing Priority Mail packages through the U.S. Postal Service is December 10th in order to guarantee delivery by December 25th. Please keep spreading the word about Operation Cookie Overload!

Terri from Virginia sent her Operation Cookie Overload boxes right before Thanksgiving. Her treats? Three kinds of cookies, beef jerky, and lots of candies.

So who is participating? We have Vietnam veterans and Gulf War veterans. There are grandmothers and their grandchildren, Marine moms, Army wives, a Marine sister, and roommates who just want to say “thanks.” We have Postal Service employees and firefighters, hospital workers and Girl Scout troops. There are even several cookie swap parties that will be making a few extra boxes for our Marines. We can’t think of a more thoughtful way to get in the holiday spirit. 

For those of you who are still putting your packages together, we want to pass along this terrific tip from Sharon from Indiana, who says she’s been sending cookie-filled military care packages for years: “I usually send things that have both nuts and NO nuts with my packages. I always mark each inner bag with what the item is and if it has nuts or not. I don’t figure the Marines that are in remote areas usually have allergies to nuts, but not everyone likes to eat them.” 

Heart-shaped brownies heading to Afghanistan for Operation Cookie Overload from Marguerite from California. (Click the picture, above, to read her blog posting.)

Do you have questions about Operation Cookie Overload? Get the details here:

• To participate in Operation Cookie Overload, send an email with your name and complete mailing address to christinestrength@me.com or use this secure form. Remember: We don’t post any addresses online due to privacy and security issues.
• Mailing deadlines for guaranteed Christmas delivery are fast approaching. Priority Mail packages must be sent by December 10th.
• We do have an Army soldier in Afghanistan who has requested cookie packages to take to some of the remote FOBs (forward operating base). We also have a young man deployed with the Air Force who would love a few packages. Some of the larger groups who are participating in Operation Cookie Overload have been kind enough to take two or three names. 
• This is our first post about Operation Cookie Overload: “Operation Cookie Overload: Will you help a Marine mom make her deployed son’s Christmas merry and bright?”
• These are suggestions for what to put inside: “Operation Cookie Overload Update: Our best tips and tricks for baking and sending cookie-filled care packages.”
• Details on the customs form you’ll need: “It’s Your Duty: Filling out customs forms for military care packages.”
• Finally, a thank-you from our Marine’s mom, Judy: “Operation Cookie Overload Update: Our Marine mom says ’Thank you’”

Happy Thanksgiving to all!

Giving Thanks: Meaningful ways to send holiday cheer to our troops this season

The spirit of the Christmas season has arrived early this year! We’ve received dozens and dozens of emails in the last few of weeks (Hello, Taste of Home magazine readers!) from folks from all across the country wanting to send a cookie-filled care package to some of our troops serving overseas. How sweet! Unfortunately — or, more appropriately, fortunately — our Adopt an MP soldiers that many people have asked about are all safely back home. But we’re glad that there are lots of organizations in addition to ours that support our military. To get involved, check out some of our favorites: 

1. Soldiers’ Angels. This organization currently has 227 “heroes” waiting for adoption. Adopt one of the Soldiers’ Angels military men and women with your family, school, church, or neighbors. Then check back here for all the details on ordering a free military care package kit, getting the best deals on postage, the nine most wanted care package items (and three to skip), and — of course — our famous Hershey’s Kiss cookie trick.
2. Cup O’ Joe for a Joe. For just $2 you can send a cup of Green Beans Coffee to a service member serving overseas. What’s nice is that you often get an email back from the thankful soldier within days. 
3. Treats For Troops. These volunteers ship six tons of care packages a week to our troops. And if you’re in Tampa, Florida, this week, Treats For Troops is collecting extra Halloween candy to ship overseas.
4. Operation Santa. The great folks at Citizen S.A.M. still need stocking stuffers for Operation Santa, which will be sending more than 30,000 handmade stockings sending overseas for this holiday season.  

Closer to home, if you know that the child of a friend of a friend of a friend is deployed, call up the family and offer to send a cheerful holiday package. If there’s one thing a deployed soldier never gets tired of, it’s packages and letters — and cookies — from home.

Christmas Thanks and Chex Mix

My brother returned safely this fall from Iraq. (Welcome home, Matt!) That means that for the first time in years, my mom — who has sent her sons, daughter-in-law, and son-in-law on eight tours to Iraq and Afghanistan — has no family deployed to a war zone and, at least for now, no one scheduled to deploy in 2011. So how does she celebrate? By sending my husband, Kyle, a box to Boston filled with homemade Chex Mix, which is one of her favorite things to put in military care packages. And she wrote this cute poem, below, that she taped to the top of the Christmas tin. I love it! It’s a great reminder to tell our loved ones we’re glad they’re home, whether it’s been a week or — in Kyle’s case — two years.    

Holiday Gift Idea for Deployed Warriors: Send blank (yes, blank) cards

The new Company Commander of the 108th MP Company emailed me from Iraq with a terrific idea for anyone who has loved ones deployed overseas this holiday season: Send them boxes of blank Christmas cards so they can mail holiday greetings from Iraq, Afghanistan, or wherever Hallmark stores are in short supply. I bought two boxes of cards for each of my Adopt an MP soldiers, including this “believe” card. Be sure to mail the blank cards soon: They need time to make the journey overseas — and back — by Christmas. 

The Reindeer Believe holiday cards from paper-source.com channel the spirit of the season.

Ho, Ho, Ho! Military mail deadlines loom for Christmas presents to Iraq and Afghanistan

It’s beginning to look at lot like Christmas! My mother-in-law Bette emailed a picture of the sweet red-white-and-blue stocking she knitted for her Adopt an MP soldier, Sarah. (Here’s just a small peek, in case Sarah is reading this posting. Merry Christmas, Sarah!) 

Because Bette’s military package will be delivered by the U.S. Postal Service instead of by flying reindeer, it is headed to the post office very soon. There are two to three weeks left to send packages and letters for guaranteed delivery by December 25th. Mark these military mail deadlines on your calendar: 

To all you fellow procrastinators, I’ve found that even when letters and presents are sent a few days after these dates, they still make it overseas in time. But why risk it? Get in the Christmas spirit — and the post office lines — early this year. For more information on 2010 holiday military mail, read “Shipping Out the Holidays to Military Heroes” from the U.S. Post Office.  

**I love the U.S. Postal Service, but I suspect Parcel Post is still delivered by mules. I avoid it and prefer to spend a few cents more for Priority Mail.

Happy Veterans Day

Six-year-old Joel, whose dad is in the Navy, says “Happy Veterans Day” best. Good thoughts go out today to all who are “protecting Earth,” especially the 108th MP Company in Iraq.

Hop to it! Deliver real Easter eggs to your overseas sweetie

A dozen eggs from the commissary at Hanscom Air Force Base in Massachusetts? $1.52. Egg decorating kit? $2.63. Sending cheerful, handmade Easter eggs to a soldier in Iraq or Afghanistan? Priceless. The key to this gift is one simple trick: Empty the eggs by blowing out the yolks and whites. You will be left with hollow Easter eggs that — hip hop hooray! — won’t spoil during their trip overseas. Here’s how to do it: 

O say can you see the small holes on top of these hollow Easter eggs? Barely.

1. Wash raw eggs. The shells may carry harmful bacteria, so clean them for safety’s sake.
2. Use a pin or needle to poke holes in both ends of each egg. Make the hole on the egg’s bottom slightly larger than the one on top so that it is easier for the egg’s insides to exit. Leave the eggs in the carton while you’re poking them, below; that way there is less chance of accidentally smashing the eggs while you’re holding them.

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