Holiday Gift Ideas for a Soldier

Depending upon your relation to the soldier, there are several different ways you can go with the Christmas giving. If you have a specific soldier in mind, then the best way to get ideas for gifts, is to ask them for special requests. Do bear in mind that these soldiers are in countries which have extremes in climate. The summers
are extremely hot and dry and the winters can be cold and very wet with nonstop mud, the kind that smears everywhere and is hard to cleanup because it comes from very sandy soil.

It also depends upon which war theater they're stationed in. Many of the soldiers in Iraq have more access to some sort of BX. A good lot of the soldiers in Afghanistan tend to be in more primitive conditions, often with out access to a BX.

If you want to support a soldier you don't know, then there are two ways you can go:

1-Give through an organization which is already setup to send care packages, two of which are either the USO or Move America Forward. They send predetermined packages to the troops, starting at around $24 on up. The USO also offers an option of prepaid phone cards.
http://www.moveamericaforward.org.
http://www.uso.org/

2-Or do as we do and go to Any Soldier and choose your own group of soldiers in any of the services and in any of the war zones. These are soldiers who need encouragement from us because they're not receiving any from family of friends.
http://www.anysoldier.com/

We choose a group and follow them throughout the entire time they're deployed. But you can just send packages one time if you choose. The groups of soldiers listed will have a contact soldier, often the Supply Sargent who'll list the number of soldiers both male and female and what their needs/requests are. Sometimes you'll get a
description of the conditions they're in.

We choose groups that are mixed with male and female since the males have never communicated. Some of the females will, which helps us to know that our specific group is still in place and is receiving our packages. That's important. As long as we hear from at least one of our soldiers in a two to three month window we know that we can continue to send supplies to them.

Below I'm listing the items from the actual lists that I've gotten from our soldiers:

Nutragrain Bars, Sugar Free cookies, deodorant, shampoo, body wash, baby wipes, any other personal hygiene item, laundry soap, beef jerky, chips, hair accessories, coffee, oreos, crackers, canned cheese spread, cup o noodles, and coffee makers.

Other suggestions would be moisturizer, lip balm/chapstick, soap, slim jims and other kinds of munchies. We've also sent M&M's, Tootsie Rolls, Tootsie Roll Pops, Trail mix, granola, and rice krispy bars, tea/coffee/sports drink stick mixes, slim jims, Ritz bits, dried fruit, fruit snacks, microwave popcorn/cakes and oreos.

Actually, allow your imagination to go wild and just go through your local stores and look for things that might please a soldier. Just remember that these items are going into a hot and hostile environment and also may be in a holding station for a while, in other words be careful of the kinds of chocolate or other delicate items you might want to send. Even if the item may appear to be a great idea at this end, it may not arrive that way. Also don't send any home baked items, for two reasons; 1-They'll be discarded due to suspicion of dangerous substances and 2-I can tell you from personal experience, commercially packaged items survive travel
a lot better than homemade which could arrive as a pile of stale or rotten crumbs. Been-there-done-that.

When we send the packages, we ask the soldiers to give us any specific requests that they may have and try to fill them if we can. One soldier liked marshmallows and did scrap booking, so that's what she got along with the other items. Last Christmas, we got a good deal on butter cookies in really nice tins and a good deal on hot cocoa. That was their Christmas package along with a stocking full of small gifts such as small munchies and gifts like note pads, small calendars and other such items.

These may not seem like much to you. But think if you were somewhere where you can't just go down to the local store to get your favorite snack or little item that you may want to pick up for 12 to 15 months. Then those items don't seem so small. They represent home and the freedom and caring of home. Also bear in mind that many items are either unavailable or in short supply even when they do have a BX.

We also try to make the seasonal packages fun, like putting in decorations or celebration type items or reusable decorative containers.

Remember, these soldiers are working extremely long hours, getting up very early and going to bed very late in a very hostile environment. Some of them are in tents with no BX, no refrigeration or microwaves.

The Any Soldier website also gives more gift suggestions, such as clothing and other items. They also give very important information on how to ship the items. This website was developed by a former soldier who understands the situation in the field.

We also have found that the best way to ship our packages is in the Post Office Flat Rate boxes. If it fits it ships no matter what the weight is, as long as that item can be stuffed into that box and safely taped in, it will ship. We were also taught by our Post Office personnel, who are exsoldiers, how to pack several packages in one box and
save on postage. After all what good does it do to make a killing on the gifts if the postage eats it all up. We can do that since all of the packages are going to the same distributor with the same address.

Sources:

http://www.moveamericaforward.org.

http://www.uso.org/

http://www.anysoldier.com/