Red Cross (National Capital Region) Holiday Mail for Heroes

We all know monsters really couldn't fit in most of our closets. Stuff accumulates in them, leaving little room for our clothes, much less a supernatural entity. Mine are no exception.

Last year I vowed to clean one out and do something constructive with the contents. When I found boxes of unsent Christmas cards, I looked for a charity that could put them to good use.

I found the Red Cross National Capital Region's Holiday Mail for Heroes campaign.  It gives people like me the opportunity to provide blank holiday cards with a stamp on each envelope to give to members of the Armed Services that are wounded, ill or injured staying at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center and Fort Belvoir Community Hospital or Veterans being served by the VA. Each service member will receive one bundle of three cards to send to their loved ones on special holidays. i.e. Mother’s Day, Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanza.

I quickly sorted my cards into groups of three, tied each trio together with a ribbon and mailed them. 

The Red Cross in the National Capital Region is doing it again this year. The details can be read here:

Holiday Mail for Heroes

This year GHPALS joined the fun after one of our members discovered Hallmark's website offered Buy-One-Get-One-Free offer for boxed Christmas cards. Shipping was free if you picked them up at a Hallmark store. Several designs were 40 cards for $14.99 so the PALS chipped in and bought 16 boxes of cards. Members went through their own closets and contributed even more cards. We bought the 2015 Christmas bird stamps online–our local postal clerk suggested it because we needed so many stamps. (If you haven't shopped on the USPS website, you really should try it. There are many interesting stamps there.)

We printed tags to tuck in each packet, wishing the recipient a greeting of their own.

Between the cards we bought and the cards we brought from home, we had 179 packets to send. Thank heavens for the USPS flat rate boxes.

A few of the cards we packed.

As we were prepping the packets, we watched the Supernatural Christmas episode. We're all love the series and the new season had just started. Like many fans, most of us had contributed money to the various charitable campaigns Supernatural fandom supports. We Superfans are an awesome group of very giving people 

Our discussions gave one of our members an idea. What if every Supernatural fan sent in one packet of cards? The Red Cross would get enough for every patient at every VA hospital in the US. Wouldn't that be cool?

So here's our challenge to all you fans of Supernatural and any/every other show. Tie ribbon around 3 blank holiday cards, Mother's Day, Christmas, Kwanza, Hannukah, Chinese New Year, New Year's or just Happy Holidays, and send it to:

American Red Cross in the National Capital Region
8550 Arlington Blvd

Fairfax, VA 22031