Sunday, January 18, 2015

A brand new year, the same ol' mission...

We started Operation Touch of Home in 2007 to show deployed soldiers that they had our support back home.  On November 8, 2014, we held our 15th care packaging event.  When we first began OTOH, we never imagined what it would grow into so many years later.  Our original vision was to hold one care packaging event as a community service project for the North Orange Grange.  Yet we were astounded by the response and support from the community.  People came from far and wide to help us at that first event.  After that, we decided to continue our efforts.  We've since sent more than 700 care packages to soldiers stationed overseas.  As the numbers of deployed soldiers has waxed and waned, we've noticed the amount of addresses we receive has decreased dramatically most recently.  This has made our attempts to provide these brave men and women with a "touch of home" much more difficult.  We can't rely on Veterans' Agents for addresses due to confidentiality restrictions.  Attempts to connect with Family Readiness Groups have unfortunately been unsuccessful.  Thus far, we've found the best way for us to obtain names and addresses of soldiers overseas is by word of mouth.  That being said, our next care packaging event will be held in May 2015.  It may seem too early, but now is the best time to start asking those you know if there are any soldiers in their lives who would welcome a "touch of home".  Missy Elumba of CineMEumba Productions created a wonderful video about our operation and the work that we do.  We're simply a small group of people trying to show deployed soldiers that they have not been forgotten.  Help us do what we can!

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