7th Annual Holiday Love Project for our Troops

7th Annual Holiday Love™ Project

Each year we send holiday cards to our troops for Christmas and Hanukah. This year’s project starts October 13th and ends December 1st to ensure that all cards and letters can be shipped to meet the holiday deadlines. Mail your holiday cards for our troops to us and we’ll ship them to our military in time for the holidays!

Get everyone involved! Here are some great ideas:

Adults

• Place a drop box in your office or place of business and get everyone involved in bringing in cards.
• Put a notice in your apartment’s newsletter about our project or put up this flyer.
• Get your church, synagogue, or place or worship to add our project in their announcement letter this weekend.
• Visit local retirement homes, VFWs, Moose Clubs and get the folks involved. This is a project that will make them feel really special and give them the opportunity to hear back from our troops too!
• Buy holiday stationery and create your own personalized holiday letters.
• Make a banner using a vinyl tablecloth (red, white or blue) and sharpies to create a thank you or support banner. Have friends, co-workers, family, church members, etc. sign it with their message.
• Make a poster using poster board (red, white or blue) and colorful markers to create a thank you or support poster. Have friends, kids, classroom, co-workers, family, church members, etc. sign it with their message. It's easy to ship too, just stick it in a mailing tube to us!
• 3 x 5 or 4 x 6 cards (like the kind you can get at any office supply store) are great to write a short note on or for a motivational quote. Colored ones are very festive and great if you just want to say "I support you" or "I'm proud of you". Dress them up with holiday stickers. Include your contact info on the back too with an address label or stamp.
• Include phone cards for our service members to call home. The best cards to purchase are the AT&T phone cards as they can be used internationally as well as nationally.
• Introduce a friend to eMailOurMilitary.com and have weekly card writing sessions for fun! Get creative, go ahead, use the glitter and the glue just like you used to when YOU were a kid.
• We always need stamps. Ask your company to donate a roll of stamps to eMail Our Military; when they do, we'll give them some free publicity in our monthly newsletter as a thank you.
• Even more ideas...

Corporate Sponsors

You can get your company involved. Get your community relations team to schedule a day for employees to get together to sign holiday cards then ship them to us. Our troops will be proud to see the companies back home that support them.

Donate holiday cards for our volunteers to sign. When you do, we'll add your company name to our list of sponsors, blog about your participation and promote it across our social networks. Great publicity for your company!

Donate your products or services. When you do, we'll add your company name to our list of sponsors, blog about your participation and promote it across our social networks. Great publicity for your company!

Promote the Holiday Love™ troop support project throughout your company using your website, blog and intranet. Your clients will be pleased to know that you support our troops.

Finally, consider contributing funds to the project.

Kids and Teens

Kids can make their own holiday cards for our troops. Children have the most creative ideas and this is a fun, family project you can enjoy together.

• Try stamping or using scrap booking items to create fantastic unique cards home made by you.
• Let the kids create their own holiday cards adorned with holiday stickers.
• Get your children's classrooms/schools involved making drawings and cards. We have hundreds of schools participating each year and we want your school too! This is a great class project.
• Make a banner using a vinyl tablecloth (red, white or blue) and sharpies to create a thank you or support banner. Have friends, co-workers, family, church members, etc. sign it with their message.
• Make a poster (or a giant card) using poster board (red, white or blue) and colorful markers to create a thank you or support poster. Have friends, kids, classroom, co-workers, family, church members, etc. sign it with their message. It's easy to ship too, just stick it in a mailing tube to us!
  

What You'll Need To Know

We screen every piece of mail prior to shipping for safety and security reasons. Therefore, all cards and letters MUST BE left unsealed. Place your unsealed items into a larger shipping envelope with your return address on it. Envelopes or packages received without return addresses will be refused for safety reasons.

Please include eMailOurMilitary.com somewhere in or on your envelopes, cards, letter, notes and postcards or sign your name with "Proud eMailOurMilitary.com Member. This ensures our troops will be able to contact us should they need our support in the future.

Please DO NOT put stamps on your unsealed envelopes or postcards as we ship all correspondence to our troops in bulk. To help us with shipping costs, please include the stamps in a separate envelope aside from your letters or sponsor a shipment by becoming a Postage Patriot™.

Do not address individual cards, letters and notes to a specific branch. Address your correspondence to "Dear Hero", “Dear Service Member" or “Fellow American”. Keep in mind, they aren't all soldiers and they aren't all men. Remember, we ship in bulk.


DO's

• Do include your return address on your package to us
• Do place all your unsealed correspondence in a larger envelope or package
• Do include your contact info if you wish to receive a reply
• Do address your cards generally (like Dear Hero, Dear Service Member, Dear Fellow American)
• Do try to include "eMail Our Military" on all your correspondence (it is a huge timesaver for us)
• Do tell everyone you know and spread the word! Blog it, tweet it and keep sharing the news. The more the merrier.
  

DONT'S

• Don't seal your correspondence
• Don't put postage on your correspondence
• Don't date your correspondence
• Don't specify a branch (like Army, Navy, etc.)
• Don't address your correspondence to a particular branch (like Dear soldier)

Holiday Love's Postage Patriots ™

For every $5 payment we receive, we'll ship one of our "Holiday Love™" packages stuffed with morale boosting holiday mail to our troops. Imagine the excitement our service members will feel as they receive packages of holiday mail sponsored by you. To participate, send a check, money order, use the pay pal button on the sidebar of our site or the chipin widget below and sponsor a package today!

Please send your holiday mail and or payments to:

eMail Our Military
"Holiday Love"
8004 NW 154 Street, Suite 344
Miami Lakes, FL 33016

Your packages must be received in our office by December 1st, 2008 to make it to our troops by Christmas. If you miss the deadline, ship it anyway and we’ll mail it out. You may sponsor shipments as a Postage Patriot ™ year round.

More Goodies/Resources

There are many more Holiday Love™ goodies and resources on the sidebar of our blog. Plus, you can use the Holiday Love category to view all of the posts tagged with Holiday Love™.

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