Posted on 02/19/2005 12:40:42 AM PST by patriciaruth
Time for a new thread!
Our Merry Band of Patriots has seen a psy-ops unit at Bagram, Afghanistan, help educate voters in Afghanistan and come home successfully, while we supported them and special forces in the field by sending over 100 movies and many packages of snacks and toiletries and Hallowe'en candy. A Christmas tree and decorations (Daybreakcoming) and stockings (Ican'tbelieveit) and cards and over 400 candy canes were sent for their follow-on unit, and a box with movies and magazines and misc is just beginning to fill for their next care package. The movies and books we sent previously went into the Special Forces library there.
We've seen Beast Battery at Kirkuk, Iraq, through till their deployment home, sending them over 100 movies and dozens of books and a microwave and DVD/VCR player (from arjay) and many big boxes of snacks. Plus a huge wave of goodies was organized by McLynnan for Christmas in Kirkuk (2 prelit trees, ornaments, Santa suit, many stockings with stuffers, many cards, and a couple thousand candy canes to share out with all the forces there).
We've supported the 411th Engineers at Baghdad in 2004 with about 70 movies and several dozen books, a Playstation 2 and a Nintendo console with a couple dozen games (from asgardshill and ican'tbelieveit), a 4 foot Christmas tree and ornaments and boxes of snacks and many cards and 600 candy canes. In the next couple months we will be bidding them Godspeed as they return to their homebase in Hawaii.
We've sent over 50 movies, a DVD/VCR player (from arjay), and a dozen and a half books to an MI unit near Kirkuk, plus some Christmas decorations and stocking stuffers, and many cards and 156 candy canes. They have mostly left for home now and we just sent a package with more movies to their follow-on unit.
Also we have sent some packages to an Aviation unit at Balad, Iraq and to an Infantry Medics unit, and a small Christmas package each to another AVN unit and an MP unit.
Stryker Infantry company formerly at Fallujah and now at Mosul since November has been the major focus of our care packages these past months. All of Stryker at Mosul has taken fire, and our adopted company has suffered a KIA and some soldiers with severe injuries.
Early on we sent food items (mostly power bars and dried fruit and nuts) then Christmas stockings stuffed with goodies and many cards and 200 candy canes, and since Christmas have begun sending movies. They recently received a DVD/VCR player (from arjay) and with the movies just mailed today their collection will total about 75 movies and a dozen books.
And all this happened because our grassroots volunteer group began forming in the early summer of 2001 to send care packages to Camp Bondsteel in Kosovo, when the 101st Airborne and then the 10th Mountain were there.
The contents of packages just mailed will be listed in post below.
Nina0113 is sending Halloween candy to Bagram.
I'm sending a couple Halloween movies to each base (like I Know What You Did Last Summer, Red Dragon, etc.) along with some other movies, books, etc. next week. Anyone who wants to send contributions to help pay for them, let me know.
Anybody who wants to send Halloween candy to a base, step up and volunteer.
Soldiers say Christmas is important to them, not Thanksgiving, so I am still looking for volunteers to spearhead efforts for Christmas for our various units.
Nina0113 is coordinating Christmas at Bagram. Units at Kirkuk will be turning over before Christmas, so that is up in the air. Just got an APO for the new unit at Mosul, but haven't confirmed it by getting word back from them that they got the first care package. Just sent a boatload of stuff to Baghdad, and not thinking about Christmas yet.
Great pictures!! I'm am thrilled that they are home and I am so very proud of them!! WELCOME HOME C company, 1-5 Inf, Stryker Brigade Combat Team!!! Wooohooo!!! :-)
Thanks for sharing the photos!
I could send some Halloween candy to Iraq. Let me know where to send it. I could probably afford to spend maybe $30 tops for candy and postage.
THANKS for helping out.
You have FReepmail!
And a well deserved swig of cold beer!
Together at last!
Way to go, Bret!
I've heard good things about Bret from CPT Schow.
He's come a long way from the hard times at Walter Reed.
His mom is a very vocal lady, who plans to be a patient advocate for the wounded soldiers in her home state of Arizona.
Do you know which soldier had an eye injury, and what happened with his eye (also arm and leg injury that I don't know outcome of)?
I'll find out. I know the guys were talking and discussed two eye injuries. One soldier managed to keep his eye and another lost his.
There were some pretty emotional stories being told, and my head was swimming from it all.
I thought I knew, but I didn't. None of us do. We will, in time, know the whole story. How much they did and how much they risked. How they protected one another and, in doing so, protected us.
Words do not do it justice. "HERO" falls short.
Did he just leave Walter Reed? I met a guy there recently at one of our Friday night rallies who had lost both legs in Iraq, had some burn scars, and wanted to go BACK.
As I posted earlier, I have one name of a soldier who was killed, and three names of severely injured.
We want to learn as much as we can about these soldiers, so we can be available to help the surviving family or the wounded soldiers if the need arises.
Also, some members of the Merry Band may wish to pay their respects at the grave of our fallen soldier, if we can find out where he was laid to rest.
Bret left WR around Christmas last year I think.
He's been gone from Walter Reed for about a month. Doing rehab in Texas and Arizona.
A real American hero, IMHO.
We were sitting around talking, and the guys decided to go for a drive somewhere. They told him to get off his butt and come with.
Without missing a beat, he said, "OK" then looked around and joked, "Any body see where I put my shoes?"
We all stopped for a second, and then he burst out laughing at us!
Good job, Patricia. Send us some names of deployed troops and I'll put our schoolkids to work. They love to send stuff to the troops!
It might well have been him I met, then. That's about how long ago it was. The soldier we met had borrowed a motorized wheelchair to come down to the Freeper corner to thank us for being there to counter the Pinko's. Are you in contact? Tell him Hi.
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