Today it was a privilege to be at the Wreaths Across America 2018 Wilmington NC ceremony.  I’ve got eight photos from the Saturday, December 15, 2018 event today which I’m including at the end of my post.

Here are some stats for Wreaths Across America 2018 nationwide today: there were over 1.8 million veteran graves, with over a million volunteers at 1,500 WAA participating locations across the nation.

There were numerous volunteer groups at the Wreaths Across America 2018 Wilmington NC ceremony today. I have not seen a formal listing of who all was there; however, I’m including this tweet from Representative Holly Grange on Twitter this afternoon about the Wreaths Across America 2018 Wilmington NC event. It looks like a great starting point of seeing who was there. This is a link to her Tweet, and below is the text of the message along with an image of it (the tweet takes one to a Facebook posting).

“Today was Wreaths Across America where wreaths are laid at at the graves of the fallen in our National Cemeteries. In spite of the rain, Wilmington had a great turnout including the Brunswick County Sheriff’s Department Color Guard, Veterans, Representatives from Veterans organizations, Gold Star Mothers, Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts, Civil Air Patrol Cadets, Laney High School Air Force ROTC cadets, the Daughters of the American Revolution, and of course local elected officials. Thank you to Commissioner Julia Boseman, Vice Chair of the New Hanover County Board of Commissioners, for your kind words about my Father, Brigadier General Retired Charles Getz who will be interred at Fort Mitchell National Cemetery Across the river from Fort Benning Georgia on January 2nd.”

Here are Helen’s photos from the Wreaths Across America 2018 Wilmington NC today

Over the course of almost four years, there have been several blog posts here on Wreaths Across America by me.

Today was my first WAA one to volunteer in person.  I’m showing my photos in sequence of the day.

The first photo is upon arriving and seeing just some of the wreaths beforehand.

Next, it was fun running into my neighbors and getting them to pause for a photo!

Then while I was walking around taking some photos I spied what I call a real camera! It was nice getting to meet Ken Blevins, Photographer with the Wilmington Star-News prior to the ceremony.

The next four photos during the Wreaths Across America 2018 Wilmington NC ceremony

It really is something to experience seeing Wreaths Across America Day unfold in person. You’ll want to plan now to add it to your Holiday plans next year!

Towards the end of the ceremony, before concluding with taps, there was a person beautifully playing the bagpipes, concluding with “Amazing Grace”; this was all while a light mist of rain was silently falling.

After the ceremony, while waiting in the line for wreaths, it was nice to talk with the Keynote speaker from today, Lt. Cmdr. Kowalczk. We were walking around trying to place wreaths; it was amazing seeing row after row of entire areas already completed.

In conclusion, my sincere thanks to Bruce Patterson, WAA local volunteer who invited me to come out and volunteer today, to experience it first hand. It was just a few weeks ago he was sharing how quickly the placing of 5200 wreaths happens in Wilmington, and today seeing it firsthand and all done by 1 pm still has me in awe!

Furthermore, thank you to volunteer Ellen Fuller, for originally introducing me to Wreaths Across America.  Having her donating a wreath in Dad’s memory in 2015 is a special memory, it was my first Christmas without him.

You’ll want to make plans to attend and participate as a volunteer in one next year.  I’ll be including today’s event in my Christmas letter going out to friends and family. It really is something to ‘write home’ about and share.  

Anchors Aweigh,  

Helen  
P.S. Today is daily blog post #1389!

Addendum 12-16-2018 10:19 AM Eastern

Wreaths Across America – REMEMBER, HONOR, AND TEACH

Representative Holly Grange Twitter, Facebook image, excerpt

Ken Blevins, Wilmington Star-News, @StarNewsOnline

AnchoredScraps blog posts listing above