It’s Important—

Residents Promotes Baby Contest To Raise Money For Troops

By Kendra Bobowick

Who: Resident Lois Barber.

What: Promoting support and awareness for Homes For Our Troops, a national nonprofit organization that is strongly committed to helping those servicemen and women who have returned home with serious disabilities and injuries since September 11, 2001. Visit HomesForOurTroops.org for more information.

How: Ms Barber has organized a Beautiful Baby Contest, and its proceeds will go to the nonprofit program to support servicemen and women.

A news article prompted Ms Barber to think, “I want to help by being a fundraiser in Newtown,” she said.

After reading about the efforts of Homes for our Troops, which benefits returning servicemen and women, she said, “What a great charity. Every penny raised goes into homes…” Some stories about injured troops returning home from overseas are “so tragic,” she said. Their everyday life can be easier if they have “adjusted homes,” Ms Barber said. Wives, mothers, or any caretaker would also see the benefits. Modifications might help lift a person from the bathtub, for example.

She read an article about the Homes For Our Troops last year and saved the clipping. “For the longest time I kept thinking, ‘What can I do?’” she said. “I decided to raise money and send it to them.”

Her Beautiful Baby Contest fees will go to the troops. Thinking of the men and women injured while serving this country, she said, “I feel like they’re all my sons [and daughters] I am so grateful to them and to their families,” she said. “They are fighting to keep us here and free.”

Although she does not have a family member or particular soldier in mind, Ms Barber wants to show her appreciation for those in battle. She notes, “It’s a volunteer Army; they chose to defend us and we owe them.”

Add to her contribution by entering or voting for a “beautiful baby.” Although it is a contest, selecting the winning beautiful baby is meant for fun. “Get grandparents, neighbors, and friends to vote for your baby,” she said.

Flyers are in Newtown supermarkets, houses of worship, and some nursery schools, and describe how to enter your baby and how to place a vote. The flyer explains that the contest is open to newborns through 3-year-olds who live or have a friend or relative living or working in Newtown. The winner will receive a prize basket. Look for a voting booth at a place to be determined in coming days where participants can place votes at $1 per vote and slip their entry into a slot designated for each baby.

To enter the contest, send a check for $20 to Baby Contest, 33 Zoar Road, Sandy Hook, CT 06482, made payable to Homes For Uur Troops with entry fee on the memo line. Send a nonreturnable 4-by-4-inch photo with a name and contact phone number listed. For contest rules, send an email to babycontest2010@gmail.com.