Nonprofit collecting Christmas stockings

Published: Thursday, November 5, 2009

NASHUA – MooreMart is hosting its fourth annual Christmas Stocking Drive on Thursday-Saturday, Nov. 19-21, at Nashua High School North. The nonprofit organization hopes to beat its previous record of 3,768 Christmas stockings collected and shipped in 2008.

Last year, stockings were sent to more than 500 soldiers on MooreMart’s mailing list; 50 to the New Hampshire Veterans Home in Tilton, 50 to Buckingham Place, the veterans-in-transition shelter in Nashua; 300 to Walter Reed and Bethesda military hospitals; 250 to the critical care units in Brooke and Sam Houston; 300 to a Marine Corp rifle company in Iraq; 120 to Camp Phoenix in Afghanistan; 900 to members of the armed services from New Hampshire serving outside of the continental United States, and more than 1,200 to the MWR (in-and-out processing center) in Kuwait, so that every member of the armed services who walked off of a plane Christmas eve or day had a stocking waiting for them.

Want to contribute to MooreMart’s annual drive? Here are a few ways how.

Purchase and fill a Christmas stocking and drop the filled stocking off at Nashua High School North, 10 Chuck Druding Drive, on Thursday, Nov. 19, or Friday, Nov. 20, at the auditorium from 3-7 p.m. MooreMart is requesting 12- to 14-inch red furry or fuzzy stockings (available at CVS, Dollar Stores and the Christmas Tree Shop) filled with gifts and food items. Suggested items include granola bars, small Christmas decorations, garland or strands of mini lights, Tootsie Pops or Rolls, hard wrapped candy, packaged cookies, dried fruit or nuts, note cards and pens (new), crackers, playing cards, hot chocolate, puzzle books, candy canes, packaged holiday cookies, gum and mints, dominos or other small games, marshmallows, book marks, licorice, white tube socks, Slim Jims or M&Ms. There cannot be any toiletries, liquids or home baked goods included.

You can also “adopt” a serviceman or woman. Anyone that is interested in helping MooreMart with the postage expense associated with mailing the care packages can do so by “adopting a serviceman or woman.” Upon payment of $10, Mooremart will include the donor’s name on the care package being shipped Saturday, Nov. 21. Last year, the overall cost of the Holiday Care Package event was $30,000, and, this year, Mooremart would like to be able to provide the same level of services to servicemen and woman serving overseas.

For more information, visit www.mooremart.org.