A Piece of Work, Care Packages, Gifts, Traditions, Where the Heart Is

BBQ in a Box

For those of you who don’t know, my husband is an Air Force Veteran. Since this is a recent development, most of our relationship has been that as an active duty military couple. Of Eliott’s 9 years in, we were dating, engaged or married for 5 years, and friends the prior 4. Thus, I got really good at care packages. And I mean REAL good folks..

I thought I’d put my talent to good use and share some of my boxes with you all. Don’t get me wrong, I thoroughly enjoy having my husband home all the time, but why let the gift go to waste, right? As Memorial Day is coming up this weekend, I thought it would be appropriate if the first box I shared with you was my “BBQ in a Box.”

On my husband’s deployment to Africa, they would barbecue about once a month. The chow hall was nice enough to provide the meat and a few of the guys, including my husband, would fire up the grill (or whatever open flame it was they used). After this seemed to be an established trend, I decided to send my husband some extra equipment since there seemed to be a shortage of certain items.

Thus the “BBQ in a Box” was born.

All us military folks know that a good care package needs decoration. So we’ll get into that first. I’m sure that I could have been more extreme with my decor, but I chose to go with simple black construction paper background and stick on letters “Barbecue Master.” For that little extra something I added some red and orange glitter, for the embers if you will.

The contents of the box were as follows:

Clorox Disinfecting Wipes (sometimes they were without hot water to wash with)

Wet Ones

-BBQ Spatula

-BBQ Tongs

-BBQ Basting Brush

-BBQ Meat Fork

-Favorite BBQ seasonings

McCormick Grill Mates Brown Sugar Bourbon

McCormick Grill Mates Smokehouse Maple

McCormick Grill Mates Sweet and Smoky Rub

-Grill Mit

-Grill Apron

Technically, BBQ sauces are not an item you should mail, as they are considered liquids and those are not allowed with USPS. I did send my husband some shave cream one time, not thinking about it being in an aerosol can and technically a liquid. That particular package was confiscated.

*Make sure you check the rules and regulations of your postal service and of the country your military personnel is deployed in before mailing your package.*