Almost Gypsy Soul

Like our chicken fried And cold beer on a Friday night A pair of jeans that fit just right And the radio up We live in the greatest country on Earth and we salute the ones who died so we don't have to sacrifice all the things we love. A huge thank you to all past, present and future military. You guys and gals ROCK! God Bless America!

Grab the button (at the bottom of my page), link up and share what feeds your soul! This week so many things feed my soul. The fact that we live in a free country, thanks to so many who have sacrificed so much. Friends that really come through. Friends of friends that come through. Thankfulness, gratefulness, honesty, creativity, love, kiddos and Duck Dynasty! We are thankful for the many, many soldiers past, present and future that selflessly serve our great country and protect our freedoms, and that's a fact, JACK! After the initial Duck Dynasty edition of Letters to a Solider , I received a request for DD care packages for a whole unit that had been deployed. I was a little nervous about "adopting" a whole unit, even if is only for one project, so I "enlisted" a bunch of friends to help me. I knew I had good friends, but this Operation Duck Dynasty proved to me that not only do I have good great friends, but the friends of my friends are great! ...

I had a little surprise on an old Letters to a Soldier blog post a few days ago, a comment from an anonymous user. Now I've had some spammy comments so I was a little unsure as to the validity of the comment, but decided to check it out.  I tracked down the FRG of this particular unit and asked about the validity of the deployment, names given, mail stop date etc. I quickly got a reply back that yes they were a real unit, those are real names and they were just deployed not too long ago. So this is the comment that I received (with a little editing) MAY I PLEASE HAVE SOMEONE SEND MY TEAM AND I SOME DUCK DYNASTY CARE PACKAGES TO AFGHANISTAN WHERE WE ARE DEPLOYED. I included there sizes just in case. I didn't tell any of these people that they would receive a care package just in case it doesn't happen. You can also find our address on face book. Now since I am currently without an adopted soldier I decided to take on this request and I'm asking you to enlis...

I knew that my remaining soldiers mail stop date was coming up soon, so his final care package was around the Fourth of July and celebrating his return to America. I wanted to think of something that I hadn't done before and finally settled on American Classics theme. All my planning was sabotaged by my inability to find Cracker Jacks in this stinkin' town. I see them all the time now.....ggggrrrrrr. American Classics or subsitutes in some cases are: Cracker Jacks Fiddle Faddle Rootbeer Beef jerky sticks Apple pie Dubble Bubble Shell peanuts Sunflower seeds Jack Daniels BBQ sauce Wrap it up with some fun flags and streamers and wa-lah a little bit of America in the Sandbox! 'MERICA! I recently recieved a FB message from him and I must say his thankfulness and sincerity brought tears to my eyes. It is such an honor to be able to support those who sacrifice so much for our freedom. Its humbling to be reminded that small acts of kindness can go s...

What better trip to revisit to than Washington D.C. to celebrate Memorial Day. Washington D.C. is rich with history and memorials remembering the fallen ones of our country. Past, p resent and future military...... THANK YOU! Happy Memorial Day! Did you thank a veteran today?

I hope that my soldier enjoys celebrating holidays well after the day that they actually occur as his Valentines Day care package is currently sitting on my kitchen counter....still not even boxed up! [In my defense, I did get them in the mail approximately one week ago, so they won't be a whole month late!] If I do say so myself though, he will be so excited about the yummy treats that he won't even remember that the Valentines Day box didn't make it in time for Valentines Day! I attempted made these cute little valentine pretzel buttons ,  made jars of cupid kisses , changed up at little bit. Mine had both M&Ms and pretzels in little ball jars, included the ingredients for one of my favorite childhood treats, graham cracker and frosting (with valentines sprinkles) sandwich cookies, some 2-in-1 men's shampoo and AXE that I had some really great coupons for. I also picked up another soldier. A friend that I met a while back was deployed about 5 months ago....

Did you know MREs can have a shelf life of up to 60 months? That is 5 years! longer than it took me to pay off my car (well the first time.....but thats another story). Not to mention that even if soldier is lucky enough to avoid MREs a majority of the time, they will still eat in a "cafeteria" on base.....can't imagine this is that delicious either. So I put together this little MRE Survival Kit to send to my adopted soldier. And I hope that it is useful, but honestly.....who can't use Taco Bell sauce? MRE Survival Kit I may or may not schedule special trips to Taco Bell just to re-stock my Taco Bell sauce stash at my house. Looks like its time for a Taco Bell run!

Let us not wallow in the valley of despair, I say to you today, my friends. And so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream. I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal." Martin Luther King Jr. Day is today. On Friday at work we received an email from our Administrator, Juan Garcia, encouraging us to read King's I Have a Dream speech. Now usually when we get these rah-rah emails at work I just delete them, but for some reason I decided to read over his speech. Its really amazing how far we have come since King stood up in front of all those people and told us about his dream. I believe that this his speech still has elements that apply to us today.  We are facing some of the biggest difficulties that this Nation has ever seen and even t...

I was on a flight somewhere sitting in DFW on layover where there was a group of soldiers leaving for deployment. Many leaving had wives/husbands, kids, friends there to see them off. As I sat there "reading" my book, watching the various interactions, fighting back my own tears I noticed the one soldier who was sitting one row over with his head in his hands. There was no one there to see him off, to give him a hug and a come back safe. Was it his choice? maybe. But I couldn't stand the though of him being over there and not having anyone checking in on him, sending him letters, telling him how much his sacrifice was appreciated, sending him corny care packages. As I took my seat on the flight and we took off, I found out that the guy that was sitting next to me was a Blackhawk pilot, heading back to the Sandbox for the 2nd half of his 2nd deployment. He was an amazing guy. As we were landing all the passengers participated in a round of applause in tha...