With Independence Day around the corner, many of us feel more patriotic now than any other time of the year. It’s important for us to remember the sacrifices our men and women in uniform are making overseas. Days and nights without loved ones, missed anniversaries and birthdays, being deployed is very lonely so let’s take a minute (and a few bucks!) to show our service members how much we love them!

Here is a breakdown of my favorite charities for the troops:

If you want to sponsor a service member or purchase a readymade care package, try treatsfortroops.com. This website offers a foster program where you can send packages to someone you select randomly or by branch, state, gender, or area of deployment. They also offer AMAZING care packages readymade, some even with themes like Just for Her which comes with Burt’s Bees lotions and soaps and Happy Birthday! which comes with brownies and a birthday candle!

If you want to donate goods like crafts or things you’ve purchased in bulk, try operationgratitude.com. This site also sends care packages to the troops but here you can donate money or donate your own goods. What’s great about this is that if you’re very motivated you can have donation drives or Knit-a-thons to provide handmade gifts! They even have links to patterns to make handy items like Gators which protect against the wind and sun!

If you want to help injured veterans, try woundedwarriorproject.org. This great organization provides assistance to those who have been severely injured in Iraq and Afghanistan. They build houses, provide advocacy services, coping assistance, and help support the families of these heroes. Recently they held a job fair to help ease the transition back to the civilian world.

If you want to help the families of those who’ve made the ultimate sacrifice, try taps.org. This organization helps the surviving members of a family by offering grief support, administrative support in dealing with benefits, and a children’s outreach program. We must never let them think their country has forgotten them.

Have any nonprofits for the troops that you love? Let’s discuss it in the comments!