So warning, it gets REALLY cute here at the end..
I am headed to the gym to get on the bike / elliptical before I head off to get SHOTS in my feet (finally!) today.
But before I did that, I wanted to shout from the rooftops that my care package only took 1 week to make it to my Husband overseas. He is living in a box people, so I was seriously thinking it was going to take at least a month to get there. Last year he has slightly( ok a lot better ) facilities at his location, and it took 2-3 weeks most of the time!
The Christmas Care Package Box:
It is a special APO military box, and it is decorated all patriotic by the post office, and Says “America Supports you” or something like that. LOVE it!
I LOVE decorating the box. I know it is a total waste of that expensive stock paper, and I should use construction paper- but i like it. It makes it look so special and I want it to be SO special when he gets his packages. (I have SO many cool ones from last year’s deployment. I should post on them sometime ;-))
He is so cute.
His requests were seriously for foot powder, a t-shirt, and some meal replacement shakes. That is it. He was struggling to get to food working 17+ hour days so the shakes are perfect.
My box seriously turned out to be SO heavy, and I know I am forgetting a lot of what I put in there but I will make a list of what I think I can remember ( Aka what I can see in my pictures đŸ˜‰ !
What is inside : *ahem* What I can remember I put inside…
- A Men’s Fitness Magazine. – We use deployment to focus on getting healthy while apart.
- Grumpy Cat book– Seriously, it is such a cute funny book. Great Stocking stuffer.
- Christmas puzzles.- Not that he has time but…
- Foot Powder
- Shampoo
- Plackers ( Apparently regular floss is lame? )
- Mixed nuts
- Smokehouse Almonds
- About 30 different protein and meal replacement shakes.
- Spark in a few different flavors ( He has sounded SO tired in the few minutes I have gotten to talk to him.
- LifeSavers Christmas book.
- Ghirardelli Chocolate – peppermint Bark
- A shaker for his shakes with different flavors of Ghirardelli squares inside.
- T-Shirt
- A Big BIG Christmas Card ( Also very loved by him. He couldn’t believe how big it was!)
- 30 Days of why I love you ( My own little Love calendar / advent take/ i miss my husband project)
So when I got samples of wedding invitations from companies ( and then got 7.00 invitations and printed them myself after seeing the prices/ stopped caring about the invitation) Â I was left with a million envelopes.
I have been using these gorgeous different paper envelopes for different things, but still had quite the stack of them. With ZERO cards.
30 Days of Love.
I decided to cut up some scrap paper, and write 30 days of love, and tied it up with a bow from when my KitchenAid Mixer arrived. ( Yeah. I am a reuse reuse reuse kinda girl!) I put a post it note on every little item I put in that box, either something very me ( quirky and funny ) or just a” hey try this, I love you!”
Things ranged from how much I love what he does for our country, me, and our future family. To just simple things like I love your blue eyes.
It was his favorite thing!
He opened all the way up until December 10th yesterday ( Well it was Tuesday for him while it was still Monday for me.. Eek! That STILL confuses me. ) He said they just made his day so much better, he loved them, and talked about his plan to open it every day before work, and stick it in his pocket through the day to keep with him.Â
I can not make this up- I will say he is the bigger romantic than me- and Oh my goodness was I melting. Melting- a new word for crying tears of love, mush, and wishing my husband was home at that moment even more.
I seriously feel like I am in a romance movie on TV and I love it. Makes me happy I can make him smile while he is over there and know how much I love him from over here.
So while planning your Holiday gifts, I encourage you to do something simple and sweet. A cookie with an I love you note, something handmade, or something that took longer than scribbling your name. It might be your most valued gift of all.
Love the care package, the 30 Days of Love is a beautiful idea!
I can’t count the number of packages I have sent to the Mister when he was deployed and can’t always remember what was in them but I do know some of his favorites were from his first UN deployment in ’94 (man we’re OLD). This was before Skype, IM … heck it was before the INTERNET so we did a lot of letter writing but the Big’s were very little (18 mos and 5 weeks) so I bought two tape recorders (man, this comment is making me feel REALLY old), blank tapes and two sets of children s books (one to send, one to keep). Mister recorder himself reading the books and shipped the tapes home so we could listen to Daddy read bedtime stories. I used my blank tapes to have Big 1 send his dad a “letter”. 19 years later we still have all of the tapes.
Aww. That is a beautiful idea. I am tearing up in the waiting room. I know some day we will have little ones, and I would love recorded books from the hubby for them at night. I don’t get to Skype him really but I am thankful for phone calls!!
Oh my goodness! I love all those cute ideas for your hubby! Too sweet and your post really has me tearing up! I love love! đŸ˜€
Aww! Desiree’! đŸ™‚ Thank you! It is just something simple. Sending him “gifts” would not work because it would be so hard to send back/ use there so I am glad he had things to leave behind for others to love too.
SO cute! I love home made boxes of favorite things! I often do this for my sister as a gift. I know they are things she will use and it adds a personal touch! Great idea!
Thanks! Some of my favorite things are from friends sending me a box of nice little things instead of a regular “gift”. He enjoyed it, and I am glad to send him a little home and Christmas in a box!
What a great idea! I often make home made boxes like this for my sister. It’s such a personal gift and filled with items you know they will use!
This was great!! Thanks for sharing Ashley! I can’t imagine my husband being so far away for so long – you are so strong and positive…you’re a special kind of person, and so is he!!!!
Thank you. Hopefully with two back to back deployments we will be done for a while! Thank you for your kinds words, means a lot!
You are a great wife, this is SO sweet!! I’m sure your hubs appreciates it đŸ™‚