Weekly News Round-Up

All the Latest in Everything Blue Star Families               

Tuesday, October 27, 2009

HEADLINES - Welcome to our newest Board Member Connie Milstein!  iParticipate is out with a new Public Service Announcement featuring Matthew McConaughey thanking military families for their service.  Check out all the Freebies and Discounts for military families below!

Remember, if you want BSF info and links to articles and events more than once a week, join us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter, and check out our Blue Star Families Blog.

If you received our Weekly News Round-Up from a friend or co-worker, please join us today.  Blue Star Families is an exciting new way for military family members from all ranks and services (and our supporters!) to Connect, Support, and Empower one another.  Just go to the JOIN US page on our site BlueStarFam.org.

There's a lot of excitement about Blue Star Families and the best way to make sure you are in the middle of it all is to join your local chapter.  Just shoot Vivian a note at members@bluestarfam.org, and she'll get you connected.

Enjoy! Heidi & the Blue Star Families Team

Welcome to BSF Director Connie Milstein!

Connie Milstein has joined the BSF Board of Directors.  She has a long-standing interest in military families and veterans, and she sees empowerment as a means to bettering people’s lives.   Additionally, she empathizes with the significance of the human dimension of international affairs and wars.  Connie is able to bring a unique perspective to the Blue Star Families’ team because of her accomplishments as a philanthropist and businesswoman.  She is Chairman and Co-Founder of The Humpty Dumpty Institute, a non-profit organization focused on building public/private partnerships, specifically strengthening ties between the United Nations and the United States government.  Medical Missions for Children, which provides healthcare to children in developing countries, was also founded by Connie Milstein.  Furthermore, Connie is a member of the board of UN Watch, a Board Member Emeritus of Refugees International, and a Board Member/Trustee of the New York-Presbyterian Hospital. Welcome Connie!

Freebies, Discounts, and Other Great Stuff

Here’s some fun for the whole family…The Veteran Tickets Foundation has teamed up with major sports teams, leagues, promoters, organizations, venues and everyday ticket holders to provide free and discounted tickets to veterans and military families.

Are you part of or know a military family serving overseas in need of coupons to help keep expenses low? Coupons to Troops collects current and expired coupons, sends them overseas to military families where the coupons can be used for up to 6 months past their expiration date.  They are also looking for more families who are stationed on an overseas base who would like to receive coupons from us.

Google is recruiting U.S. Soldiers as users of its Voice online telephone service, promising to help military families stay connected.  It allows people to make cheap international phone calls, send free SMS messages and provides transcripts of voicemail messages. Soldiers with .mil email addresses can sign up for the free service online at www.google.com/militaryinvite. Blue Star Families is a part of this exciting launch, so spread the word!

Helping us get home for the holidays, United Airlines is providing discounted flights to military families now through December 31, 2009.

The fabulous restaurant chain, McCormick and Schmicks is offering a special entrée only to active duty, reserve, retired and veterans on Sunday, November 8, 2009 at participating locations.

Speaking of chow, eat free at Applebee's Neighborhood Grill & Bar Restaurants this Veterans Day, Wednesday, November 11, 2009!  All U.S. veterans and active duty military with proof of current or former military service will eat free at all Applebee's nationwide on Veterans Day, Wednesday, Nov. 11, 2009.  Proof of service includes: U.S. Uniform Services Identification Card, U.S. Uniform Services Retired Identification Card, Current Leave and Earnings Statement, Veterans Organization Card, photograph in uniform or wearing uniform.

But wait, there’s more! Golden Corral's 9th annual Military Appreciation Monday dinner will be held on Monday, November 16, 2009, from 5 to 9 pm in all Golden Corral restaurants nationwide.  If you are a veteran, retired, currently serving, in the National Guard or Reserves, you are invited to Golden Corral's Military Appreciation Monday dinner.

PBS FRONTLINE Digital Nation Wants Your Opinion

PBS FRONTLINE Digital Nation is a multiplatform project about life in the digital age, examining the way we think, learn, live and love.  One of the topics they are covering is the military, and they want members of the military community to share their own stories about how technology impacts their lives. For example: How has technology changed your concept of privacy? Does all of this technology bring us close together, or farther apart?

They are looking for you to share your stories on video, no longer than one minute in length.  Whether you love or abhor technology, use Facebook or Skype to keep in touch with your spouse or child, they want to hear from you. Videos can be submitted here, and will appear on the Digital Nation website and may be incorporated into the broadcast set to air in February of 2010.  If you have any questions or thoughts, please email Ramona Pringle at YourDigitalNation@gmail.com.

Operation Appreciation and iParticipate ~ Thanking Military Families!

Blue Star Families is proud to be one of four organizations to partner with the Entertainment Industry Foundation (EIF) in the effort to support military families.  Check out iParticipate's latest Public Service Announcement featuring Matthew McConaughey, who was recently working on care packages for troops stationed overseas.  To find out how you can get involved and promote a new culture of service, see the iParticipate.org site.  There, BSF's Operation Appreciation is featured as an opportunity to help mend the disconnect 94% of military families feel with the rest of our nation.* 

Through Operation Appreciation, members of the civilian community who would like to support our military families can send cards expressing heartfelt thanks, solidarity, or just good old-fashioned encouragement. The writer can choose to write a card to the parent, spouse, or child of a military member, or to a veteran of the armed services.  All of the recipients will be Blue Star Families members whose loved one is serving in combat operations. 

This program is perfect for school age classrooms (K-12) looking for a project, community organizations, youth groups, church groups, and individual citizens who want to support our military members and their families -- but may not know how.

IF YOU ARE INTERESTED IN RECEIVING these thank you notes, be sure to update your profile on our new website.  (Detailed instructions for updating your profile are at the end of the newsletter)

For more information on Operation Appreciation, please check out our website.  If you have any questions, please send an email to mailto:programs@bluestarfam.org.

* Results from Blue Star Families Military Life Issues Survey.  More information available here.

Standing By, a New Book by BSF Member Alison Buckholtz

Standing By is Alison’s candid and moving account of her family's experiences during her husband's seven-month deployment on an aircraft carrier in the Persian Gulf. With insight and humor she describes living near a military base in Washington State, far from home and in the midst of great upheaval, while trying to keep life as normal as possible for the couple's two small children. But she is not alone in her struggle. In Standing By, Alison portrays her friendships with other military wives and the ways in which this supportive community of women helps one another to endureundefinedand often thriveundefinedduring difficult times.

BSF Facebook Cause; “America's Giving Challenge” - Let's win $50,000!

BSF is now a Cause on Facebook!  Our Cause, Blue Star Families, just entered in America's Giving Challenge, which gives us a chance to win $50,000! Please donate today on our Facebook Cause page.  To win, between now and November 7th we have to get the most donations to our cause (every person can donate once per day and have it count as a unique donation).  We can also win daily awards of $1,000 and $500 if we can get the most people to donate in any 24-hour period.  The great thing about this Challenge is that it doesn't matter how much you give, but instead how much you do to encourage friends and family to get involved in our cause.  We all need to come together and start promoting the cause if we want to win. Thank you Stephanie Himel-Nelson for leading the charge on this great opportunity

Frustrated by Having to Register to VOTE Every Time You Move?  Tell Us All About It! 

Blue Star Families wants to identify the special challenges that military members and their families face when struggling to vote and fully participate in our government.  Help us by completing the BSF Voter Registration survey.  We are interested in knowing:

• How often you have had to register to vote?
• What kinds of problems have you had voting – either in person or via absentee?
• Why aren’t you registered to vote?

We want to share our military family stories with key policy makers and we need your assistance.  It will take fewer than 10 minutes for you to complete the online survey TODAY!

Change the World. Volunteer.

BSF Can Use Your Help. Join Our Volunteer Team.

Military families understand service.  We support our service members, our country and our neighbors.  Now, BSF can use your help.  Whether you are a military family member, a veteran or a civilian who would like to give something back to the military community, we'd love to add you to our volunteer team.  Read more about how you can help on the BSF blog or send an email to Claire at cwoodward@bluestarfam.org for more information.

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