Tag: care package

Introducing Think Jerky, Our New Brand Partner

Find Their Products in an Upcoming Military Care Package

We love the idea of incorporating healthier, high-protein snacks in our armed forces care packages because they’ll help nourish hungry heroes as they work hard on base or during deployment. So you can imagine how excited and proud we are to be partnering with American company Think Jerky!

Why Think Jerky is Special

Did you know that most jerky products you find at your local store are high in sugars? That’s what sets Think Jerky apart; it’s both healthy and delicious, and doesn’t include the “bad” parts of other store-bought jerkies.

Think Jerky uses only restaurant-quality, sustainable, 100% grass-fed beef or free-range turkey in their jerky, and never adds any hormones, antibiotics, or genetically modified ingredients. Every turkey or beef jerky product, including the jerky sticks, is gluten free, too, making them a wonderful option for military members sticking to a special diet, like paleo.

One of our favorite parts of Think Jerky products is that we can read and understand every ingredient on the ingredient list. In fact, the Classic Beef Jerky has just eight ingredients, all of which you could find in your own kitchen! Your hero will know exactly what they’re putting into their body, and you can take pride in knowing that you’re sending the very best military care package from My Hero Crate for your loved one in the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps, National Guard, or Coast Guard.

Our Army Care Packages Include Think Jerky (And They’re For Every Other Military Branch, Too)

Would your beloved service member want to try a Think Jerky product in their next military care package from you? Order them our Sweet & Salty Care Package, which will include Think Jerky beef jerky effective immediately! We think your hero will love the tasty steak flavor with chef-curated spices in flavors like Classic, Sesame Teriyaki, and Sweet Chipotle.

We’ll also be including them periodically in our military care package subscription service, so if you’re sending your hero a monthly service member care package, then they’ll get Think Jerky products to try (and love), too!

Send your hero a care package with Think Jerky today.

Self Care Ideas for Military Spouses

Reduce Stress and Refresh Your Mind, Body, and Spirit with These Ideas

It can be hard to focus on yourself when your life gets crazy. Perhaps your spouse is deployed, and you’re shouldering the responsibility of working, taking care of the home, raising children, and dealing with all the household issues as they arise.

But even though you’re busy, it’s important that you stop and take some time to practice self care. It will help keep your spirits up, keep you feeling positive, and give you a burst of energy you definitely need as you face down the next big thing you have to handle. 

Try these ideas for self care, and take time out for yourself.

-“Borrow” your child’s coloring books and color a few pages. You’d be surprised how relaxing it is!

-Choose healthier snack options, and encourage your family to make better food choices, too. You can help your service member make good snack choices by sending our April self-care themed subscription box from My Hero Crate.

-Take an extra-long shower and use your favorite and best soaps and scrubs. You deserve it.

-If the weather is nice, take a walk. Bring along a friend or your kids to burn off a little extra energy.

-Visit a state park and go hiking.

-Have a dance party in your living room. Pick out only your favorite songs and get moving.

-Take a yoga class or meditation class on base, or watch an instructional video on YouTube to learn how.

-Go to bed early or on time every night. You’ll be surprised at how much more well-rested you’ll feel.

-Watch your favorite movie or TV show, alone, with no interruptions.

-Utilize on-base hourly child care and spend an afternoon of “you time” doing whatever you want.

-Read a book for fun.

-Get a salon haircut and blow dry.

-Go shopping and pick out something for yourself.

-Volunteer for a cause you support.

-Drink water throughout the day instead of tea or soda. Invest in a nice water bottle that you can carry around with you.

-Try aromatherapy, using your favorite lotions scented with essential oils, like the one in our April military subscription box.

-Pay yourself a compliment every time you have a negative thought about yourself.

-Hug a stuffed animal.

-Take your lunch break outside.

-Clean your bedroom.

-Ban smartphones for an afternoon. Put yours in a drawer and ignore it!

-Spend quality time with your pet.

-Watch a favorite cartoon from your childhood. You can probably find some episodes for free on your favorite streaming service!

-Write your military hero a letter and drop it in the mail.

-Take time off from cooking and order a pizza for dinner one night this week.

-Refresh a room in your home with small upgrades, like a new bath mat in the bathroom, a new set of curtains in the bedroom, and a scented candle for the living room.

-Do some arts and crafts! Try your hand at junk journaling, scrapbooking, painting, knitting, embroidery, and more.

Spread Self Care to Your Loved on in the Armed Forces

Just as self care is important to you, while you’re at home, it’s also important for your military member, wherever they are in the world.

That’s why My Hero Crate is pleased to announce that our April military gift box is full of items that make self care accessible and easy. Your hero will feel their stress melt away, even for a moment, as they enjoy the gift you sent them! And shipping is always free to APO, DPO, and FPO addresses.

Send a monthly care package to your military hero.

The Human Connection: How an Army Vet Provides Support to Today’s Service Members (and How You Can, Too)

Start with an Military Care Package from My Hero Crate

Ellyse Corbeil is an expert at helping people.

During her seven-year stint in the Navy, during which she was deployed three times on the U.S.S. Ronald Reagan and at Guantanamo Bay, she served as a religious program specialist. She was tasked with helping Navy sailors and officers navigate through big emotions and obstacles related to life — work-related or not.

“I helped people on a human level,” Ellyse explained. “If you were struggling with your career, we could coach you or help you find a better fit.”

She also recalled a time she and her team helped a very young sailor find connections – his peers where he was stationed, dealing with the same things —  to help him feel better and see he wasn’t alone.

“We didn’t always want to give a solution,” she said. “We wanted them to figure it out, with our nudging and guidance.”

Advice for Everyone Enduring Military Life

The most important piece of advice for anyone traversing difficulties while deployed, changing duty stations, or dealing with any other issue, Ellyse said, is to find healthy connections.

These connections include family and friends back home who you should re-establish regular contact with and new people around you, who you share things in common with. 

Healthy connections help you see how others have dealt with similar issues, give you a sounding board for advice, and relieve the pangs of homesickness or loneliness. 

How to Help Your Hero Away from Home

You don’t have to be a skilled counselor or mental health expert to make your military hero feel better about being away from home or missing their family.

“Do the best of your ability to provide support,” Ellyse advises. “And do what you can to not stress out service members while they’re deployed.”

Her top recommendation for spreading good cheer to deployed service members? Sending care packages and mail.

“They make people happy,” she said. “When they receive their packages, they share their treats. A care package is never wasted.”

Ellyse recalls the happiness that comes from receiving an armed forces care package in the mail, which is why she still sends them regularly —  and lots of them —  to her friends who are still enlisted.

“I love the My Hero Crate concept, because it makes sending a care package so easy,” she said. “Especially if you aren’t sure what your loved one wants, or if they aren’t the kind of person to openly ask for items.”

Send a monthly military care package to your service member through the subscription program from My Hero Crate, so your loved one feels connected to home.

Using Military Resources

The Navy isn’t the only branch of the military with a religious program specialist. In fact, the same role exists in the Marine Corps, and in the Air Force and Army, it’s called chaplain assistant, although Ellyse acknowledges being religious had nothing at all to do with her role.

If your service member needs to talk to someone, Ellyse said it was easy to reach out. They could call, email, or show up in the office at any time.

Fleet and Family Support Programs are another option for service members and their immediate family members living on base. Counseling and helping with family issues is their specialty, along with helping people transition to their new duty station and to life in the Navy in general.

Feel At Home in Your Rental with These Decorating Tips

Make Your Current Duty Station Home Feel Cozy!

Moving from duty station to duty station gets old quickly, and settling into another temporary home is no longer novel or interesting. And it’s hard to make something feel like home when you don’t have much control over the finishes inside your new home. Such is the nature of renting or living in base housing.

Thankfully, there are creative ways you can make your new living space feel more like home, and you don’t have to spend a ton of money to do it!

Your favorite service member care package experts have a few tips for customizing your rental home. Check them out – and show us if you brought one to life in your space, by tagging us on social media @myherocrate. 

Apply Removable Wallpaper

It’s possible your landlord or military housing restrictions won’t let you paint the walls of your home. It’s really unfortunate, because sometimes a pop of color on a wall can be the difference between a cold, uninviting space to one that feels like you belong.

Instead of paint, consider applying removable wallpaper to an accent wall in your bedroom or living room. Unlike years past, there are so many awesome and beautiful designs to choose from! Removable wallpaper is usually a simple peel-and-stick product that doesn’t require any additional adhesive. 

The Low-Down on Washi Tape

Washi tape is a removable paper tape that comes on small rolls. It’s usually brightly colored or patterned, and it comes in just as many options – if not more – as that removable wallpaper we talked about earlier.

You can use strips of washi tape to create patterns on your walls, or to add stripes to plain, builder-grade kitchen cabinets. And because washi tape peels right off, there isn’t an issue with your customization!

Get Stainless Steel Appliances

No, you don’t have to purchase thousands of dollars in kitchen appliances for a rental home! But you can purchase an inexpensive roll of stainless steel contact paper and apply it to your dishwasher and other appliances to transform your kitchen.

Contact paper is designed to be durable, and it’s easily cleaned. You’ll be shocked at how big of a change you can get in your most-used room of your house with just a $5 product.

Go Green

Live plants add warmth and coziness to a room, and they can be an inexpensive way to decorate your apartment or house without doing any alterations at all.

Visit the local plant nursery and talk to an expert about the kinds of plants that might thrive in your living space. Then, purchase a few decorative pots to plant your new greenery in, and distribute them around your home.

If you have to move and can’t take them with you, give them to a friend living near the duty station, so they can enjoy some living decor, too.

Shower Head Swap

If you hate your rental home’s bathroom, you might be able to change how you feel about it simply by swapping out the shower head! This easy fix can cost as little as $12 and will make your showers feel more luxurious. Just be sure to swap back to the original one before you move out.

Use Room Dividers to Your Advantage

You obviously can’t build a floor-to-ceiling temporary wall in a rental home, so what do you do if you need to carve out a bit of space for a specific purpose? A room divider holds your answer.

Divide a bedroom in two to give privacy to siblings sharing a bedroom, or separate a section of the living room to create a small home office. Not enough closet space? Use a divider to conceal a rolling clothes rack or other unattractive clothing storage solution in a corner of the bedroom.

Fill Your Pantry

Keep your pantry stocked with snack favorites that make your new place feel more like home. It’s easy when you order a military care package from My Hero Crate.

When your beloved service member returns home from work for the day, they can settle in with a quick snack before dinner, and when your kids want an after-school treat, you’ll have one on hand without having to look for everyone’s favorites at your new grocery store. Order your military care package

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