Operation Sweet Treat spreads holiday cheer

  • Published
  • By Airman 1st Class Alexis Siekert
  • 51st Fighter Wing Public Affairs
OSAN AIR BASE, Republic of Korea --  Unaccompanied service members at Osan Air Base can have a taste of the holidays through Operation Sweet Treat.

The Osan Officer's Spouses' Club and base volunteers are working together through Operation Sweet Treat to bake cookies, brownies, and different types of sweet treats to be delivered around base.

"What we're trying to do is get all of these cookies from our community to hand out to our service members across Osan to spread a little Christmas cheer and to say thank you for everything that they do," said Casey Gallegos, OSC event chair. "A lot of these service members are away from their families and it can be kind of a hard time for some people. So having just one simple little cookie can remind them of home, and can change an attitude and make life a little better. It's just as easy as that."

However, Operation Sweet Treat does not stop at Osan. Greeting cards are also being delivered to Airmen stationed around the peninsula, she said.

Thousands of hand-made holiday cards created by schools, girl scouts, and children both on Osan and from the U.S. have been collected for distribution.

"We've got our schools and youth center participating at Osan, but we've also had members reach out to the states to have school districts and churches make Christmas cards," Gallegos said.

The club's goal for the drive is 8,000 holiday cards and 15,000 sweet treats," explained Gallegos. To help them reach their goal, the commissary donated enough supplies to bake more than 12,000 cookies. The supplies were distributed in baking kits designed to make 120 cookies each.

"The commissary has been donating to Airmen cookie drives for 15 years now, so we were very thankful for the help," she said. "The kits helped a lot but we hope others donate as well."

Anyone can drop off treats Dec. 10 from 7:30 to noon at the officer's club. Volunteers will then gather and package them for distribution by the first sergeants to work areas.
In previous years, this drive was known as the Cookie Crunch, explained Kate Kraxberger, OSC president. A large group of volunteers would get together at the Mustang Club to bake all the cookies at once, but with so many made; a lot were frozen before being distributed. This year, to accompany the name change, the treats will be fresh.

"We just hope this shows the service members how much they are appreciated here," she said. "This is our family, so you want to take care of them."

For more information or to get involved with Operation Sweet Treat, contact the Osan Officer's Spouses' Club.