ShareThisBy KIRSTEN BROWN
Tuesday, November 21, 2006
When Lt. j.g. Gregory Trach, 34, received an e-mail from Germaine Broussard two years ago asking permission to send cookies to his ship, he thought little of it.
"Thank you for your support of the U.S. military," he responded, then dismissed the request as a thoughtful but meaningless gesture.
A few weeks later, however, the U.S.S. Shreveport was bombarded with 12 boxes packed with more than 1,800 chocolate chip, peanut butter, oatmeal and sugar cookies.
Shocked, Trach sent Broussard a second e-mail: "We thought you were kidding!"
That was Trach's first brush with "the Cookie Lady."
Broussard, 39, has baked and shipped more than 51,000 cookies to members of U.S. Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines and Coast Guard. Most of them she has never met. The McLean, Va., resident calls her mostly one-woman program "Troop Treats."
It felt like Christmas to Lt. Col. Skip Goodwillie, 45, each time he and his unit opened a box from Broussard. Goodwillie, who is in the Army Reserves, was stationed northeast of Baghdad at Kir Kush military base when he started getting cookies.
"It was just wonderful to have mail call and hear, 'Hey Skip, the Cookie Lady sent us another box,'" Goodwillie said. "It was wonderful for our morale."
The Cookie Lady does get donations, but she pays for most of it out of her own pocket. After her job as a Smith Barney business development associate, Broussard comes home to start mixing batter about 7 p.m. She pulls the last cookies from the oven between 1 and 3 a.m.
"Some people can be a little hesitant about why am I doing this," Broussard said. "I had wanted to do something, but with the Red Cross, you donate money, and they send the box. But our family has always used home-baked cookies, bread, whatever, to be able to say thank you."
Her generosity doesn't stop with cookies. She sends necessities such as travel-sized shampoo, soap, toothpaste, and mouth wash and other treats, including DVDs, Cocoa Rice Krispies and cheesecake mix.
"It's a small piece of home," she said.
Probably the most eccentric and beloved of the Cookie Lady's efforts are her "embedded" teddy bears.
Broussard's six "Battle Buddies" bears are dressed in camouflage and she could fill an album with pictures of beaming soldiers posing with their brown battle buddy.
Goodwillie said the bears "developed their own personality" over time.
"They represented the rest of the country and everybody over there who was thinking about us," he said. "It became a mascot for the team."
Broussard will soon launch her second holiday project, "Operation Santa's Little Helpers," which enlists children to write cheery cards to the troops.
These notes are tucked in red or blue stockings along with presents such as Slinky toys, Silly Putty, playing cards and, of course, candy. Last year, she shipped 1,200 pocket-sized stockings.
Although she's accustomed to whipping up 300 cookies a weeknight and more than 1,000 on weekends, Broussard earned only a "B" in her junior high home economics class.
"I don't use a standard one-cup measuring method," she said. "It's just a little of this, little of that. The home ec teacher went crazy. I'd love to go back to that teacher and say, hmm! Wonder who's right now?"
Visit www.trooptreats.com to donate or get involved in one of Broussard's card-writing programs.
