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Bringing “Sunshine” To Others~
David Archuleta with @CarsonHeAth credit Carson
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Feliz Cumpleaños to David’s Abuelito!
Wishing you a lovely day from all of us! Hope that you will be able to celebrate with David really soon!
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Armed Forces Tour Appreciation
Our lead photo today was tweeted by Carson Heath who expressed his thanks and gratitude for David and company~
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Dan Clark’s Summary of Week One
Post by Dan Clark.
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As I began to watch this video montage of “Week One” put together by Dan, and heard David’s “Angels” playing through in the background, the tears started to well in my eyes. I recalled David’s recent words about “feeling puny” because that is just how I was feeling. Here I was safe and secure with all of the modern comforts available to me watching a video of the ongoing experience of this brave entertainment group and brave group of servicemen and women while they are in harms way!! I couldn’t be more humbled by and more proud of their willingness to serve. “Angels” couldn’t have been more appropriate because these men and women are all angels on earth following God’s call .
We are definitely blessed by their actions ~ Thank you so much , to Dan for creating this vid. You can also click on the pic below to watch the vid “bigger.”
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Jason Hewlett’s (Tuesday) Blog update :Kuwait to Afghanistan
Well, I’m sad to say it, but it looks like I’m not supposed to update much while we are in this most unsettling time in the Country of Afghanistan.
However, for the incredible flight over from Kuwait we were in a c-17 like the kind pictured here:
Armed Forces tour to Afghanistan JH-and-David-Archuleta
Dan Clark and David Archuleta had the experience of a lifetime and got to go up in the cockpit and stay up there the entire flight! Dean Kaelin and I hung out in the body of the plane with the soldiers in complete silence, a feeling of quiet and contemplation on the face of each uniformed hero, guns over their shoulders the whole flight, never to be removed. It was sobering. With the recent deaths of Troops in this part of the world, this was not a time where even a word was uttered between these comrades. I cried 5 times just thinking about what they must be thinking. In fact, it made me sick to my stomach.
Armed-Forces-Tour-to-Afghanistan-inside-the-c-17-seating-sides-3-credit-Jason-Hewlitt.jpg (Not the same plane & ppl tho)
As the roar of the engines was so loud I put on my headphones and listened to the song I knew would help me really feel the moment and internalize it, Billy Joel’s “Goodnight Saigon”. And I just cried as I looked across the plane at these young men and women. Brave, strong, true. Marching into harm’s way to protect our Country, protect the Afghanistan people from the terrible threats of the Taliban and al Queda, and restoring a sense of safety to these people.
My view on the trip. The soldiers on their way to war.
As the lights on the plane shut off, the darkness set in. First a green light for a few hours and then the red light once we crossed into the country. It was an eery red, I tried to capture it in the photo but not sure that worked to tell the true story.
Seated next to Dean Kaelin, this was the most contemplative and sobering flight of my life.
We aren’t allowed to know where we are going, or say where we’ve been while we are here. I wish I could but this is big time undisclosed location time. In fact, we flew a different route and landed in a different place than they originally said we would, and the whole tour has changed. We are safe, comfortable, and being well fed and taken care of, but this is legit, scary, and humbling.
Thank you all for your comments on previous blogs, support of our tour, and the love shown.
God bless our troops, God bless you, God bless America. Signing off.
Military Tribute Tour
***PLEASE CLICK HERE to head over and leave a comment for Jason and the team if you haven’t already done so.
This was a very “real” and sobering blog. Times are serious folks and we might not be able to hear much right now. It sounds as tho from Jason’s blog that our information, pics, and blog posts may be less frequent due to their locations..that’s ok. We’ve received more so far from them than I ever could have imagined. Their safety and discretion is and should always be top priority. I’m sure they’ll give us what they can when the time is right
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Additional Pics From Afghanistan
Thanks to DavidArchuletaVenezuela for the “finds” on these additional photos out of Afghanistan. Would love to give proper credit to the owners of these photos; if you have that information, please let us know and we will further credit.
Armed-forces-Tour-Afghanistan-shared-by-DAVenezuela-original-credit-unknown-
http://fansofdavid.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/Armed-forces-tour-Afghanistan-shared-by-DAVenezuela-3-original-credit-unknown.jpg
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@Brettja6 Shares a pic
Afghanistan David and @Brettja6 credit Brettja6
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David “Shares” NSA Bahrain Album!
David shared the NSA Bahrain album on his fb page! (Thx ML for the heads up!) Be sure to show your support by ” clicking” to like it.
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Armed Forces Ent. IG Repost of David’s Collage
Nice recognition of David’s collage post on IG! Armed forces ENT has reposted it! Had over to comment!
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Operation Write Home ~ From Anne Marie
Anne Marie sent us some great info last evening about a project for our servicemen and women that’s she came across. Read about it below and watch the accompanying video. Sounds like a great way to help our servicemen & women stay in touch with loved ones!
Hey guys!
I just wanted to share with you an organization that I’m participating in to support our troops overseas. It’s called Operation Write Home. I love paper crafting and making cards for my family,friends and co-workers but have always wanted to use my card making to give back in some way.
After reading Jason Hewlett’s latest blog from Kuwait, encouraging all of us to show our support to our troops in any way we can, I came across this wonderful organization. Basically, you send hand made cards to our soldiers for THEM to send back to their families. Holiday cards are sent at certain times during the year and general cards can be sent at any time. The major categories they need cards for are: Love (most requested), Missing You (most requested), Thank You, Birthday and Hello cards. They also welcome “Any Hero Mail” to be sent. These are cards and letters (or with kids they can be drawing or coloring pages) with messages of gratitude and encouragement inside. This is wonderful for schools, boys and girl scout groups and church groups to get involved in! (Downloads for coloring pages are available at their website.) I loved reading the feedback from the soldiers who have received the cards. Here are just a few:
We just got the box of cards and they are already half gone! It seems that everyone was waiting for the cards and they pounced. C.S., Djibouti, Africa
I just received your wonderful box of cards today and cannot properly express the wonderful morale boost you provide for us troops here. When the boxes of cards arrive, all the office’s Soldiers can’t wait to pilfer them – and happily many Soldiers are writing home with great frequency! C.L., Afghanistan
Thanks again for all the cards – the Soldiers really appreciate them! It may not seem like it, but little notes like the ones from your packages can really take someone’s day from “okay” to “great” in short order Maj T.M.D, US Army, Kuwait
I am providing the link to their website which explains in greater detail how to go about sending your cards. I’m also providing a short video showing some soldiers receiving their boxes of cards to send home!
www.operationwritehome.org
So for all of you crafty David fans out there, here is yet another way to show our love and gratitude to our troops! HUGS!
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A special project from Holly! “Thanks to the Troops”. Repost/Link
Hello everyone:
Today I read Jason Hewlett’s blog from Kuwait (http://jasonhewlett.com/us-troops-tour-kuwait/). By the end I felt I had to do something and I can’t think of any better helpers than David’s fans. I know that each of us can do things individually (I provided some links below) but together, we can accomplish so much! I am happy to co-ordinate care packages to send to US troops and Canadian Peacekeepers, on behalf of Friends of David Archuleta Worldwide. Some of the instructions to send packages off to our troops are specific and I’m offering to sort through the instructions and packaging requirements and mail gifts, letters and music to our troops, but I need your help!
Who’s in???
I have found an organization, Operation Gratitude, (www.operationgratitude.com), who does this for US troops and several people have told me that this is a worthwhile organization. How can you help? CLICK HERE FOR MORE or the PROJECT TITLE in our black banner at the top of the post!
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Little Red CD (and bonus tracks) Celebration Continues : Today ~ “Works For Me”
Works for me ~cap~ Sundance
Today we’re celebrating a track on the David Archuleta red debut cd that only appeared on the Wal-Mart edition. In my humble opinion, this song SHOULD have been a track on the (main) cd sold everywhere! This song, co-written by David, Toby Lightman, and Daniel Bedingfield. It is so perfectly “David.” Every time I hear the line “can’t decide between the left side or the right” I remember him on the AI stage unable and unwilling to choose between sides and instead sat contentedly in the middle.
Today we have a playlist of 3 top previously FOD voted on Works For Me live performances! The vid from Reno certainly sent fans into a giddy frenzy and that received our top vote spot. Sit back and enjoy the 3 WFM vid performances uploaded by Tina & Sin Sin, DJsail, and 88Aladdin
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Ending with a Costa Rica Treasure!
This beauty from David’s recent visit to Costa Rica was shared with us on fb. Photo credit Cristina Araya! Eep! And I see the word “video” in her post!
credit Cristina Araya
Looks like our “Zoom and Crop ” fans already did a little work of their own on the pic!
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That’s about all from me today~ I will update on twitter and may add a few more things to the post if we hear any more from David, Dan, Dean, and Jason. Keep them in your thoughts and prayers as they continue Week 2 of this incredible journey performing for our troops in the Middle East!