225,000 Cards for Soldiers Collected by Local Group

Norwood, MA - All it took was choosing one random card among the thousands in the basement of a Norwood church to explain why Norwood and Foxborough natives Emily Spencer and Lauren Eliopoulos collect hundreds of thousands of holiday cards for current and former members of the armed services.

There wasn’t anything the particularly stood out about the card from a six-year-old, except the message in the card was clearly from a child who knew what it was like to have a family member serving overseas.

“These are the nice ones, the ones that recognized how hard is is to be away from your family,” Spencer said.

The card was just one of about 225,000 collected for the annual card drive. For the two women, the weeks-long effort has become a regular tradition for their nonprofits, the Mansfield-based Hero Helpers, and Heartily. Half the cards will go to service members overseas while the other half will be delivered to the Fisher House, a VA medical facility in West Roxbury.

For both women, the effort is one inspired by family. Eliopoulos’ brother, George, is an active member of the U.S. Marines, has served in Afghanistan and is stationed in North Carolina. Spencer’s husband, Scott Spencer, is also an active service member, currently serving in the Middle East.

The experience of having active service members is what brought Eliopoulos and Spencer together, having met in a Facebook group for military families.

“It was a life experience that was new to both of us then my husband left. It was certainly a new feeling. Then being connected to Lauren was so helpful and we found support with each other,” Spencer said.

Like Eliopoulos, Spencer was collecting cards for the holiday season. The two working together meant a drastic increase from the 17,000 and 11,000 collected individually two years ago. More cards also meant a change of location for storage. For the past two years, the boxes of cards stacked around the Eliopoulos home, rather than gifts for the family was a clear sign of the impending arrival of Christmas. That was with “only” 161,000 cards. This year, however, Spencer called on Saint Timothy’s Church of Norwood to help with the storage.

While Spencer’s husband has yet to see the results of this year’s drive, the usually straight-laced and serious brother of Eliopoulos was caught with a bit of emotion upon seeing the display.

“He was looking at the cards and crying. He’s overwhelmed,” Eliopoulos said.

With mailing the cards come substantial shipping costs. Luckily, a grant from the Dunkin’ Donuts/Baskin Robbins Foundation is expected to cover the costs, with additional donations and contributions coming from Harvard Pilgrim Healthcare and the Theresa Foundation of New York.

Card collection began in September and has included cards for Halloween and Thanksgiving, in addition to the regular holiday deliveries. Spencer said she hopes to turn the season request into something that can be done year-round.

Those interested in delivering a card though Hero Helpers can mail it to Mission Holiday Cards PO Box 612 Norwood, MA 02062. The deadline for overseas cards is Dec. 11 while domestic deliveries will go out by Christmas Eve.