We’ve got a lot of great partners who help us serve military families. We’re part of a network of nonprofits that work together to make sure our families have food, shelter and necessities.
Operation Gratitude is one of the many like-minded groups we work with in our mission. They send care packages — more than 500,000 to date — to deployed troops. They’re in the running to win $50,000 from the Pepsi Refresh Project, a fantastic funding program for great ideas from Pepsi Co.
I encourage you to vote for Operation Gratitude. Every time a nonprofit that serves military families gets a much-needed boost in funds and publicity, our clients benefit.
I also hope you’ll vote for your favorite nominee in our Military Motherhood Award. This morning we posted our 20 semifinalists; you can vote only once, and voting will be open through April 7. These ladies really set an inspiring example for the rest of us on how to serve and adapt. We’ll be setting up Facebook pages for each of these ladies; please suggest your favorites to your friends and encourage them to vote, too.
Update! Our friends at Operation Gratitude are a Pepsi Refresh Everything finalist for one of ten grants of $50,000.
http://www.refresheverything.com/OperationGratitude
Just rec’d by our partners at Operation Gratitude! Much deserved and we are thrilled for them:
$51,000!!
We just received official notification from Pepsi that we did indeed accumulate enough votes to earn the $50,000 Pepsi grant, PLUS…the additional $1000 from our Secret Admirer for finishing in 4th place!
Many thanks to every one who cast a vote in the Pepsi Refresh Contest, and to everyone who told anyone else about it. This grant will pay the postage for 5,100 care packages!
Every vote you cast truly made a difference–your time and effort were well spent, and will be greatly appreciated by the 5,100 troops (and their comrades) in harm’s way who will receive the care packages during our upcoming Patriotic Drive.
We plan to ship a total of 50,000 Care Packages in April through June. The $51,000 Pepsi Grant will be spent in just one morning of one Assembly Day. So…we will still be pushing hard to raise additional funds, through online contests and otherwise to ensure that all 50,000 care packages can be mailed this Spring.
I hope we can continue to count on your support and hard work. We could not do this without you!
Thank you again!