Hello and welcome Michelle!!I was married to a marine and know what it is like to have them gone and deployed. We are happy to have you join us here. Look forward to getting to know you through this forum.

Take care and God Bless our Troops!!

Candy

 Hello and welcome aboard!! I am so happy to see some more of you newbies jump right in to this great forum!!!We can all work together and at least bring a smile to some of these deployed especially with the holidays coming up!!I

Take care,

Candy

thanks so much everyone. It means a lot to me... im pretty new to the whole military thing.. at least dating one... this is my boyfriends 3rd deployment, its my first 

I would like to welcome the new members to anysoldier.com forum.

This is such a great place to meet.

To introduce myself to the new members, my name is Christine.

I been on here for a month or so now.

I am 29 years old and live in Indiana.

My brother is in the air force but right now is here in the states married to his wonderful wife.

He was in doha Qatar over the summer though working at an air base there. He was working the gas pumps etc.

Talk soon.

Christine

 Wwelcome christine!!We are so happy to have you join us here at AS!!!As you can see we are like one big happy family and we are all addicted and military junkies!!! LOL

At least that is what all my friends all call me!!Look forward to getting to know you Christine!!Glad to hear your brother is back in the states and serving our country!!

God Bless all our troops!!!

Candy

 thanku....i am enjoyg reading all the news from all over and see the value of connection from one member to another

Hi< I'm Joannie and am 58 and divorced.  I was married for 33 years to a career Marine.  I spend many years with my friends in the Corps and it had to be the best years of my life.  We got tight and leaned on each other, especially since most of us were nowhere near family.  I thought about that when I saw this site and it had me go back to remembering what it was like to be so far away from home. 

I send you my prayers for a safe return and my thanks for what you are doing.  You have my respect and my thanks and my heart goes out to all of you and your families.  The furthest out we ever got stationed was Gitmo and I even came home with a little Gitmo special.  I would love to hear from any of you on this site.

Thank you again for serving your country.

Hi Joannie and everyone else I've missed.  Welcome to the Forums! 

Joannie I'm glad you had your support group in the Corps.  I hope you find some comfort here with us.  

You mentioned Gitmo.   My son in law recently returned from a 7 month IA there.   He missed the birth of his first born and his son's first 5 months.  Blessedly he made it home in time to watch his son learn how to crawl, and they have settled back in to being a family.

 Take care, have a good day. 

Thank you Deni,

I was in Gitmo a long time ago.  From 1976 to 1978 we were stationed there and our daughter was born in April 1977- we had nothing better to do down there.  My kids didn;t go into the service even though my daughter was supposed to go into the Air Force.  I was so upset when she decided not to sign at the last minute.  Now she looks back and is really unhappy about that decision. 

I have to get back to work and I have a luch date with a girlfriend so I will be a little busy today.  I hope your family is well and that your child int he service is safe.

Thank you for responding.

joannie 

Hi, I am new to this site and have requested a few addresses to help out as much as I can. I am a 24 year old single mother. I am currently in college in Louisiana. I have a beautiful 10 month old daughter. I would like to help as much as I can with soldiers overseas as much as possible. Even if it is just becoming penpals, or sending what they need or want. I cant help much but I do what I can. I am very appreciative of these soldiers, I am a former Army spouse so I know what its like to know these guys need things over there. Anyway, feel free to email me if you are looking for a penpal or need things for you and/or your soldiers. I am looking forward to helping out as much as I can. Nice to meet everyone.

Welcome T.S. - you're going to love this web site and it's great that you are willing to spend some of your precious time to help the troops. Today I saw that Fernando J Velez, rep. medics in Iraq (40M, 13F) there until 5/28/09 posted an update. He sounds like his group really appreciates letters from supporters - that they really help them when they've had a bad day. Just thought I'd mention him to you. Also, if you have a Dollar store nearby, there are packs of Christmas cards - 20 cards for $1- you could send a few packs of these right now in a flat rate envelope to troops you've chosen and they could use them to send back to their freinds and family. Cards are hard to come by there. Just an inexpensive idea to go with your very important letters of support.

Jean in Tampa

Hi Jean

I'm going to pick up some of the cards tomorrow- if they have them.  I might just go and send some I have since I must have about 10 boxes myself.  My address on aol is alicelmk- please email me the info to send them to.

Joannie in Phoenix 

Hello, My name is Jypsy and i was told about this site by some friends. I live in england and we have a similar idea going on over here which i help out with.  I have actually been corresponding with a amercian solider and we are now a couple and we are hoping to meet when he returns home from Iraq in November!!!!  I am very nervous lol  Anyway, I have picked a few names and am getting ready to send some parcels, my only problem is that i am unsure of what to send. being here our version and the american versions may not be the same any help would be appreciated

Jypsy 

Welcome Jypsy

Cruise the FAQ area of the website 1st.  It should provide answers to questions that are pretty common in nature.

What kinds of things are simliar and what is different in the England version of Any Soldier?

babs

Welcome to everyone! 

I haven't been able to post on the forum from home even though I can go into the chat rooms.

If you haven't checked out the chat rooms, please be sure to do so.  Lots of folks have been chatting this past weekend.

It was great to chat with Sgt Nick on Friday night and Sgt Mike on Saturday morning, but it was also fantastic to connect with some folks who've been on AS for 3-4 years as well as a half-dozen brand new newbies...

Got lots of ideas of what to send for the holidays.  Helped the newbies figure out how to sort the troops listing... Have to admit I never sorted by alphabet before yesterday! LOL.  I do like sorting by  # of females on site,  by the service branch, by the state and so on.  I REALLY like sorting by # of times address requested... I look for those who've been on the site for more than one month but have less than requests for their addy... they need support! LOL.

 So, if you haven't visited a chat room, do so!  It is super.  Let all your contacts to come visit you there if they can.  Tell them to let their families know they can connect there also, especially if they need some of us to support their troop person!

 Take care,

Anna