Donations Needed for Holiday Soldier Drive

Santa may have come and gone at your house, but a local effort is still underway to help bring some Christmas cheer to soldiers overseas.

Bluebonnet House on Victoria Drive in College Station and Millican House on Villa Maria in Bryan are sending care packages to soldiers.

Donations are being accepted through January 7. To learn more, click below to our full interview with Allison Brewton, residence sales manager of Bluebonnet House in College Station.

Allison Brewton 122810

Non-perishable food items, as well as personal care items like razors, shaving cream and socks are high on the wish list.

They are also looking for magazines and games for soldiers to help pass the time.

So far, response has been slow but organizers are hopeful the donations will pick up now that Christmas has passed.

Ideas for Goodies Box

  • Hard candies
  • Granola bars
  • Power bars
  • Chewing gum
  • Their favorite beverage mixes
  • Mints
  • Cookie Bars
  • Cookie Bars with coconut and nuts hold together better than thin cookies that tend to crumble

Games for Soldiers

  • To pass the time, soldiers can play games. The best ones to send are the small travel sets. From chess and cribbage to dominoes or scrabble and solitaire.
  • Just having a deck of cards can make the long days off-duty go by faster.
  • Compact travel games/Board Games
  • Scrabble Game Folio
  • Magnetic chess/checkers
  • Travel Blokus
  • Thinkfun Fifteen Puzzle
  • Yahtzee Folio
  • Blank journals for them to write in

Prohibited Items

Please do NOT send the following items to a soldier in Iraq or Afghanistan. Packages are scanned and these items WILL be confiscated:

  • Alcohol and alcohol-production products and ingredients
  • Fruits, live plants and· animals
  • Pork and pork by-products
  • Pornographic and sexual· materials (including nudes and semi-nudes)
  • Obscene materials and horror comics
  • Non-authorized political materials
  • Religious materials contrary to Islam in bulk quantities
  • Firearms and ammunition
  • Cash, coins, securities or precious metals in their raw state
  • Hazardous, flammable, toxic and radioactive substance
  • Items that may melt, leak, explode or turn on


Tips

  • Use common sense and realize that packages can be subjected to high heat and bouncing around
  • Use Ziploc bags and lots of padding where applicable
  • Don’t send food and scented products together. Several weeks in transit at 120°F+ temperatures will result in deodorant-flavored cookies.
  • Don’t use packing boxes that are labeled with a prohibited substance.

For more information, call Bluebonnet House in College Station, (979) 693-9699, or Millican House in Bryan, (979) 823-4446

More News