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.
Here's the e-mail of the guy who's doing the Knife project. He'll be happy to give you all of the info.
rkirka@ix.netcom.com
Update:
PsyOps at Baghdad had to move their offices and that delayed their planned Hawaiian party. Just received this email with some pictures that will be posted later.
"Dear Patty,
I am sorry we have not gotten back to you before today—we had the party a week ago today and we spent about 2 days preparing for the party, having it and then recovering from it and we are also preparing for the elections tomorrow! Very busy time for us.
I must tell you that the party was even more fabulous and more successful than we expected it to be! We really transformed this little compound of ours into a little luau and everyone had a great time (even the usual nay-sayers and party-poopers!) The drinks and the blenders really made the atmosphere—all of that was really the key element. As you will see in the pictures everyone that entered was issued a Hawaiian shirt and our commander told them they were “out of uniform” if they didn’t want to wear it! So everyone had one and everyone had at least one of the lovely leis you guys sent.
We had guests from other units who want to borrow our “party kit” too. Everyone was really impressed by our (your) efforts and during our little break in the action we told everyone about what you and “The Band” did for us.
The great result of this party is that morale really improved afterward and we have another section that is determined to out do us for Christmas—it will be difficult!
Thanks again so much for all your hard work to make us so happy so far from home. We will be sending you a CD of the party pictures too.
P.S. The macadamia nut cookies made it to the party!"
Wonderful! Thank you so much for putting all this together, and for keeping it going. You're a gem.
Bump.
I've been a little out of commission lately but I really want to contribute, if it's not too late, to your Christmas efforts. I don't know what is needed or wanted, however, so any guidance is appreciated.
Yeay, I'm glad they had lot's of fun!!! Count me in for Xmas for them! :)
I have you, CAluvdubya, down for Tal Afar for Christmas.
You, CAluv, can coordinate finding out what the soldiers/marines there want and then talk with me about any extra people you think you'll need to help send the items or get donations to buy the items.
We're working through a civilian contractor (Army vet in Iraqi as a soldier last year) there now, as the Marines and Army soldiers are too fluid there to be sure their particular units will be there at Christmas.
Our veteran will play Santa Claus and pass the goodies along.
I'll let you know when and if he gets the boxes that I and SENClander just sent for Halloween. She and you may want to team up and work together to send Christmas to Tal Afar.
Congratulations, Ros! You just volunteered to chair the Christmas for PsyOps in Baghdad this year.
They are our smallest adopted unit, so hopefully you won't get overwhelmed.
I'll give you an email address and names to contact there after they recover from the elections going on now, and you can find out what they'd like. Then you can talk with me about how we all can help you see that we get as much as we can for them and get it mailed out before the end of November.
The lucky part for you is that we get the most feedback from them, so you probably won't have problems getting replies like we do for the other units who are more directly involved in fighting and building.
Cheers!
Patty
Pictures of the Hawaiian party in Baghdad are posted just above. Thanks to New Perspective for web hosting them!
We are rounding up volunteers for helping with Christmas.
So far I have volunteered CAluvdubya and SENClander for Tal Afar; Ros42 for PsyOps at Baghdad; nina0113 for Bagram, Afghanistan; hoping Abigail Adams, Ican'tbelieveit and The Right Stuff and TexasTaysor will be available to work together to do Mosul.
These are the units that will probably be there come Christmas. The other units may be home for Christmas. Don't know if we'll be adopting others in their place.
Anyone who would like to help out with Christmas, please let me know. Thanks to all of you for continued prayers, bumps, mail for the troops, donations of time and treasure for our care packages for the troops in harm's way!
And thanks especially for prayers for a successful election and continued progress toward a free and independent Iraq.
I still want to help.
Were you going to help nina0113 with Bagram? I'm just finishing up the last of the Halloween boxes and starting to pull together my notes on Christmas. I remember you volunteered and I can't remember exactly who you were going to help.
I don't remember, either, but that would be fine.
Great pictures!
I'll be more than happy to do that! Just let me know the details when the time comes! :~}
Btw, Great pictures!!
Patty, those pictures are heart warming.
Thanks for posting them.
It looks like they had a good time!
I would be happy to help out with Mosul for Christmas! However, we have a limited budget, and I need to watch my stress level, so most likely my contribution to the effort could involve:
-Communicating with contact in Mosul, perhaps?
-Buying a few items and sending them
-Offering moral support to those who are going to be more active in heading up the Mosul Christmas effort.
I need to limit how much time and energy and money I offer. But I do have enthusiasm, and it would be fun to communicate with the contacts we have in Mosul! How does that fit in to your planning, Patty?
I'll get back to you all with plans in a couple days.
Just going out in an hour or so to mail the last of the Halloween packages, and then I intend to take a 2 day break...
Thank you all for volunteering. We'll taylor your duties to a level you can cope with. :-)
Anything you do will be a big help to me.
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