Natick Mom Delivers Care Packages to 1,200 Marines
By Amy Mevorach
Amy Adams is a Natick mother with three children, one of whom is a Marine deployed in Afghanistan. As a way to offer assistance to her son and the deployed service members around him, Adams began sending care packages. In April, Adams started the G.I.F.T.E.D. project to collect, organize, and ship care packages to roughly 1,200 Marines, some as individuals and some for groups to share.
“This is a minuscule amount,” Adams said, “when you consider the hundreds of thousands serving at the moment.”
G.I.F.T.E.D. stands for Given Items For The Enlisted and Deployed, and the project has steadily grown to serving all branches with deployed members. “Sending these care packages has helped distract me and feel like there is something we can control. We can help our Service Members know that we do think of them while they are away and that they are appreciated.”
Adams ships packages for all major holidays and as often as requests come in.
“This is where our community steps up and helps,” she said. “I request mostly easy open canned foods, ramen noodles, instant foods, coffee and individual snacks, but I have a detailed list with needs. Depending on where the boxes are going, I may need more baby wipes for hygiene purposes since showering may not always be possible.”
Adams has shipped packages to soldiers in the Middle East, Japan, Korea, and other countries.
The success of each shipping mission relies on what is donated at the moment. “We ask that the community help us support this great cause and perhaps share what we do with others. It’s usually me and my girls packing away unless we are lucky enough to have packing parties.”
Adams is connected to a large network of military families through several online MoMs groups (Mothers of Marines) and military family groups including Operation Sunshine, “whose only goal is to ship care packages to bring cheer and ‘Sunshine’ to a Service Member who is down.”
Family members of enlisted service members who have heard of Adams’s project contact her to request a care packages. “Some families asking for their loved ones are unable to ship due to financial restraints. Not that I am in a far better position, but as a great pastor [Pastor Deryck Frye of Connect Community Church in Ashland] once said ‘We are just here to serve as conduits.’ So we are here to do good and help lift others however we can. People donate items or funds. I have names and the access to connect the two together.”
Several local churches and businesses have helped with packing parties and provided space for donation collection and bake sales. For Veterans’ Day, the Natick VFW sent two decorated veterans to Lilja Elementary in Natick and the Loker School in Wayland to speak with students, who donated items, made Thanksgiving cards, and assisted in assembling the holiday care packages at school. “This in addition to the Natick moms who have dropped items off at my door to help have allowed us to ship to the 1,200 Service members we have reached.”
Adams plans to make G.I.F.T.E.D. a 501c3, pending funds for paperwork. “This is truly a soul lifting mission,” she said, “and I hope to get enough people involved to feel that joy.”