I first heard about Coupons to Troops while lazily scrolling through my Facebook news feed as I have so many other times before. Cool, so-and-so got her hair cut. Great, this dude is at work. Blah, blah. Same old, same old. However a picture of a ton of coupons caught my eye that was posted by a fellow milspouse friend with the caption, “Thanks, Coupons to Troops!” Now, I’ve never been a real coupon-er at all but boy, do I love me a sale. So naturally I immediately went to my Google toolbar where I typed: Coupons to Troops. The result was phenomenal.
So often, even before being a military spouse, I would hear the phrase “Support the Troops!” Coming from a small town in Pennsylvania, you couldn’t go three cars without seeing some form of yellow ribbon or American flag. The pride that US citizens have for their military is both overwhelming and admirable; as well as bullet proof. And even though the catch phrases and bumper stickers are nice, it is always refreshing and eye opening to see people putting action behind their kind words.
Coupons to Troops does just that – random strangers silently support the troops and their families overseas by ‘adopting’ a family and sending them coupons that they may use on their base. After a year of being a military spouse I just found out less than a month ago that we can use coupons that have expired up to 6 months on base being military in Italy. How fantastic is that! So essentially, not only are people who ‘adopt’ military families and send them their coupons fabulous for supporting the troops, but also because they’re not throwing away coupons that are expired – because we can use them!
Personally, my favorite part about Coupons to Troops is not the coupons themselves by any means. Sure, I feel really cool (and old, let’s be honest) with all my cut out coupons and envelopes – and I may be planning a coupon party with girlfriends – but the real magic is in the emails to one another. I’m not sure if everyone who participates is as lucky as I’ve been with generous coupon-givers, but I’ve learned so much about random strangers all over the world – all who support the military in their own way – that sometimes, it takes my breath away.
One woman I’ve been chatting to has a husband who retired from the military. We’ve been discussing how different the world is from when she was a military spouse to today. She also made me see the light at the end of what can sometimes be a very long and strenuous military tunnel. As she wrote about her fantastic husband, I grew more and more proud of my own vet and realized, yet again, how blessed we are to be living this life. It is connections like this that make the world go round. And Coupons to Troops is just one more amazing military support network that you should absolutely check out.
Sign up to ‘adopt’ a military family stationed overseas here
