Both Annie and I find ourselves in transition this year and thus aren't organizing any official Mrs. Claus Affair fundraisers or gift giving. However, I recently moved near Sacramento, CA where there are several military members serving in the area at Beale and Travis Air Force Base. If you're like me and are surrounded by service members...reach out, ask around! If you want to, you'll find someone whose spouse is deployed this holiday season. Make this a memorable Christmas for them. Not because it will be one they spend without their loved one but because a fellow American remembered and honored both of them with a little Christmas cheer.
Merry Christmas and hug your loved ones that are near!!
Rebecca
Tuesday, December 9, 2014
Monday, November 18, 2013
The Mrs. Claus Affair Rides Again!
Last year my dearest, darlingest friend Rebecca and I organized a wild project called The Mrs. Claus Affair. We realized there were a number of amazing wives and mothers who are left behind at overseas assignments here in Germany while their spouses are stuck in a far away deployment. They are so good about care packages for others, but come Christmas morning these amazing women routinely find themselves empty-handed next to the Christmas tree. Many of our soldiers and service members simply don't have easy access to shopping and shipping. They work long, grueling hours. We realized there was a great little opportunity here to help everyone out.
Enter Mrs. Claus.
We did a fabulous fundraiser, thanks to some awesome photographers--Geneva Chugg who just finished my family photos, and Sharma Shumate who is such a talented girl in every single aspect of her life--and had local people from our Ramstein area submit names of women who would be husbandless on Christmas morning.
Our goals were simple:
1. Provide something personal to place under their tree--not a gift card or cash--to be opened on Christmas morning. Something nice.
2. Keep the donations and participants anonymous.
3. Make Christmas a little better and brighter for someone who is far from home and far from family.
We had a number of deployed men submit their wives' names, including a detailed description of their likes and dislikes. Then we took our fundraiser money and spent about $75 on each one of our 20 or so women. We kind of rocked the gift packages.
It was amazing. We delivered their gifts the week before Christmas and I kid you not, it was incredible. We hugged and cried and celebrated on doorsteps with women who were literally speechless that someone had remembered them, had remembered their sacrifice, had recognized just how hard it is to be on this side of the coin. These ladies are special. They must be remembered. They must!
My friend has moved and I'm not going to be able to do the fundraiser this year. However, after talking to my girlfriend Hollee I realized that The Mrs. Claus Affair can still reach out to others, we're just going to modify our packaging.
If you know anyone--anywhere in the world--who is supporting a deployed military spouse this Christmas, nominate them! Send an email to themrsclausaffair@gmail.com
If you know anyone--anywhere in the world--who is supporting a deployed military spouse this Christmas, nominate them! Send an email to themrsclausaffair@gmail.com
Or, if you would like to be part of The Mrs. Claus Affair this year, please email themrsclausaffair@gmail.com and I will hook you up to adopt someone from the Military Community who will be alone for Christmas and YOU can be part of this magical Christmas event. This year it will be a little different, so here are the instructions.
1. Send me your contact information
2. I will assign you the name of a wife (or husband) that is going solo this Christmas, including a mailing address plus a little something about her.
3. Prepare a personal Christmas gift to send her, wrapped and ready to go under the tree. We will have a letter for you to include in your package explaining a little about The Mrs. Claus Affair. Packages will ship directly from you to your assigned military support family member.
4. MAIL PACKAGES BY THANKSGIVING, or December 7th if you're going stateside to stateside. You must send it Priority or it very likely won't make it by Christmas, no matter what the post office tells you.
So let's make this year's Christmas season something special. Adopt one of Mrs. Claus' girlfriends today!
Send emails to: themrsclausaffair@gmail.com and I will personally hook you up with someone who could use the love and support your family has to offer.
Friends! Please post this to facebook and anywhere else you can think of, let's see how many families we can help this year. There's a FB button right under this post. Go on, do it!
Much love from Me and Mrs. Claus!
Friday, September 28, 2012
Fundraiser -- Mini Photo Shoot
We are holding a Holiday Card
Mini-Photo Shoot fundraiser to earn money for our Mrs. Claus Affair.
Families receive a 25 minute mini-photo shoot with a photographer at Kusel
Castle. They'll be given a photo CD with 10-15 professionally edited
pictures--groups and individual shots--all Christmas Card ready! It's an amazing
value. $75 from each family will go toward providing something special this
Christmas for one of the wives on Mrs. Claus' list. Thanks to our photographers
who are giving so much of their time and resources for this cause we will be
able to make a real difference this year.
We're holding the shoots on two different dates Oct. 11th & Oct. 13th.
If you're interested in booking a session please email us at themrsclausaffair@gmail.com or message us on Facebook at TheMrsClausAffair page.
Wednesday, September 26, 2012
How the Mrs. Claus Affair got started
Christmas 2011.
Rebecca and I sat with our families around the dining room table gazing at what remained of a perfectly fabulous holiday feast. Everything about Christmas had been memorable, from the rocky nativity skit starring our children to the frantic last minute gift wrapping after tuck-ins. The entire holiday was almost perfect.
Almost.
We had invited one of our girlfriends to join us for Christmas dinner since she was not only newly wed, her husband was newly deployed and both their famliies were an ocean away.
"So what did your hubby get you this year?" I asked in my best I'm-nosier-than-you-are tone.
"Oh, well, nothing," she replied.
Wait, what? "What do you mean, nothing?"
"Actually I did get a package from him in the mail this week but it was something he'd bought himself and had shipped home. He said he got me something but I'll have to wait until February when he gets back. He didn't want to ship it..."
What could we say to that?
This story has been repeated hundreds of times all over the world by wives of service men deployed for the holidays. Deployments are hard enough on a man. Throw in Christmas and shopping (something most men hate) with hundreds or thousands of miles separating them from malls and families and what is the final Christmas result?
A nice phone call.
Not a purse or a Kitchen Aid, no massage or two months worth of housekeeping. Men who are fighting for our freedom don't always have the time to make sure Santa remembers the Sherpa lined boots or the Brighton charm bracelet.
That's where we come in.
The Mrs. Claus Affair is dedicated to taking care of the wives of deployed service men during the holidays. We're not out to cure breast cancer (although that would be kind of awesome) or build houses for the blind.
But we do want to make sure that we teach our children the importance of serving others, especially mothers and wives who are hoofing it alone. Women that kill themselves off sending care packages and support for our deployed men and women often find themselves alone and giftless on Christmas morning.
Our goal is to raise enough money through donations and fundraisers to make sure some of the women in our local are have something special under the tree on Christmas morning. We don't need to save everyone, but we'd like to make a difference this Christmas for somebody.
Through nominations we're hoping to gather a list of women to bring together and celebrate with this Christmas. Not through bulk gift giving, but with a personal touch and plenty of thought. We're interested in quality not quantity.
And if you don't live in our area and want to participate, join our movement by locating a wife in your community and get her a gift to open on Christmas morning. Sign it, "The Mrs. Claus Affair," and send us a letter telling about your experience. Anyone can be involved.
If you would like to donate or participate in one of our local fundraisers, or if you have someone to nominate, please contact us at themrsclausaffair@gmail.com. More information will follow.
Tcheus!
Annie & Rebecca
Rebecca and I sat with our families around the dining room table gazing at what remained of a perfectly fabulous holiday feast. Everything about Christmas had been memorable, from the rocky nativity skit starring our children to the frantic last minute gift wrapping after tuck-ins. The entire holiday was almost perfect.
Almost.
We had invited one of our girlfriends to join us for Christmas dinner since she was not only newly wed, her husband was newly deployed and both their famliies were an ocean away.
"So what did your hubby get you this year?" I asked in my best I'm-nosier-than-you-are tone.
"Oh, well, nothing," she replied.
Wait, what? "What do you mean, nothing?"
"Actually I did get a package from him in the mail this week but it was something he'd bought himself and had shipped home. He said he got me something but I'll have to wait until February when he gets back. He didn't want to ship it..."
What could we say to that?
This story has been repeated hundreds of times all over the world by wives of service men deployed for the holidays. Deployments are hard enough on a man. Throw in Christmas and shopping (something most men hate) with hundreds or thousands of miles separating them from malls and families and what is the final Christmas result?
A nice phone call.
Not a purse or a Kitchen Aid, no massage or two months worth of housekeeping. Men who are fighting for our freedom don't always have the time to make sure Santa remembers the Sherpa lined boots or the Brighton charm bracelet.
That's where we come in.
The Mrs. Claus Affair is dedicated to taking care of the wives of deployed service men during the holidays. We're not out to cure breast cancer (although that would be kind of awesome) or build houses for the blind.
But we do want to make sure that we teach our children the importance of serving others, especially mothers and wives who are hoofing it alone. Women that kill themselves off sending care packages and support for our deployed men and women often find themselves alone and giftless on Christmas morning.
Our goal is to raise enough money through donations and fundraisers to make sure some of the women in our local are have something special under the tree on Christmas morning. We don't need to save everyone, but we'd like to make a difference this Christmas for somebody.
Through nominations we're hoping to gather a list of women to bring together and celebrate with this Christmas. Not through bulk gift giving, but with a personal touch and plenty of thought. We're interested in quality not quantity.
And if you don't live in our area and want to participate, join our movement by locating a wife in your community and get her a gift to open on Christmas morning. Sign it, "The Mrs. Claus Affair," and send us a letter telling about your experience. Anyone can be involved.
If you would like to donate or participate in one of our local fundraisers, or if you have someone to nominate, please contact us at themrsclausaffair@gmail.com. More information will follow.
Tcheus!
Annie & Rebecca
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