Memorial Day CFH Bloghop

Today is the start of the big Cards for Heroes Bloghop! If you haven't been there yet, please visit the CFH website at http://cardsforheroes.org/bloghop to start your hop (everything starts at noon, PT)!

Sandy has done wonders with the site and there are so many fabulous volunteers working hard to create cards and make sure they get out to our heroes overseas so they can write home to their friends and family. Every time I see the pictures of the heartfelt cards people make it makes me feel so good. You can send one card or a hundred—each card it accepted with appreciation and love.

My card features a beautiful red poppy to observe Memorial Day and the sacrifices that were made for our country.

Card details: Cardstock from Papertrey Ink and Bazzil; patterned paper from me & my BIG ideas; stamps from Stampin' Up!; markers from Copic; Punch from EK-Success. In the background is my grandfather's flag; Alfred H. Bentley served in the Army in WWII and retired as a Master Sergeant.

Once you are done here please hop over to Vicki's site where you are in for a special treat. Her cards are so cute and cheerful I know she will have something wonderful cooked up for us today! Whoever gets her cards are very lucky!

(Scroll down to read more about why poppies are a symbol of this day. )



Thanks to my coworker Captain Troy H. for forwarding the text and story below.

The Poppy Story

From the battlefields of World War I, weary soldiers brought home the memory of a barren landscape transformed by wild poppies, red as the blood that had soaked the soil. By that miracle of nature, the spirit of their lost comrades lived on.

The poppy became a symbol of the sacrifice of lives in war, and represented the hope that none had died in vain. The American Legion Auxiliary Poppy has continued to bloom for the casualties of four wars, its petals of paper bound together for veterans by veterans, reminding America each year that the men and women who have served and died for their country deserve to be remembered.

Poppy Day has become a familiar tradition in almost every American community. This distribution of the bright red memorial flower to the public is one of the oldest and most widely recognized programs of the American Legion Auxiliary.

This poppy, as a memorial flower to the war dead, can be traced to a single individual, Miss Moina Michael. She was so moved by Col. McCrae's poem that she wrote a response:

. . . the blood of heroes never dies
but lends a luster to the red
of the flower that blooms above the dead
In Flanders Fields.

On impulse, she bought a bouquet of poppies–all that New York City's Wanamaker's Department Store had–and handed them to businessmen meeting at the New York YMCA where she worked. She asked them to wear the poppy as a tribute to the fallen. That was November 1918. World War I was over, but America's sons would rest forever "in Flanders Fields." Later, she would spearhead a campaign that would result in the adoption of the poppy as the national symbol of sacrifice.