It's not just about Uncle Sam anymore

First of all, I'm pretty sure my father would go into heart failure if he knew I had posted this picture on the world wide web...so let's not tell him, shall we? Secondly, I apologize for the crease across his face - I'm pretty sure this photo has had a hard life. However, this is to inspire the good folks in bloggerworld to participate in Military Mission's upcoming program, Steps to Honor (Memorial Day - Sept. 12).

Steps to Honor is the brainchild of Beth Pennington, founder of Military Missions. She credits her participation in the Run for the Fallen for giving her the inspiration to create Steps to Honor. It's not a contest, there are no prizes. It's all in the name of awareness and recognition of our country's heroes. And participating in it is easier than making ramen noodles: you walk, run, ellipticize for X amount of miles, then if you would like to publicly honor someone who is a soldier, firefighter or police officer, you can log onto the Steps to Honor blog and write about them. It doesn't have to be eloquent, it doesn't even have to be long - just write what it is about them that inspired you to exercise. I always think about those soldiers who are literally sweltering in the desert heat right now who STILL get up in the morning and do PT. If they can do PT in the desert, then surely to goodness I can do a few miles in the Bluegrass. That's all there is to it. The individual can be currently serving, retired, or one of our fallen. All that is asked is that you do it.

To add to your already packed social calendar, if you are interested in participating in Steps to Honor with an entourage, we will be walking the Bluegrass 10K on July 4th in downtown Lexington. Beth has Steps to Honor t-shirts for sale (and I have to say, I wore mine to the Arboretum this morning and got lots of approving looks - I know the difference, I get disapproving looks when my girlfriends and I take up the whole walking path - and got a wave from a retired veteran) and we encourage walkers participating in the 10K to wear 'em if you got 'em. I'm personally going to find the hottest picture of my husband in uniform and tape it to my back for the race just to give the girl behind me something to work for. If you think 6 miles is about 5.5 miles too long, then you're invited to join us on Saturday mornings as we work up to 6 miles. We have 6 Saturdays to train..that's a mile per Saturday and I know we can do that!! If you're interested in joining us - shoot me a comment and we'll make sure you get all the info.

And my shameless plug for Military Missions: this woman is doing great things and she always needs help doing more great things...whether through donations of money or time or word of mouth. The link to the organization's webstore is
http://www.militarymissionsonline.com/apps/webstore/">Military Missions Webstore and the link to the site is http://www.militarymissionsonline.com/">Military Missions
This is my first attempt at using BFF's link strategy so if it looks all funky, then..uh, sorry about that. But, you get the point. We look forward to getting as many Steps to Honor participants across the US as possible and I look forward to seeing some Lexingtonians on the trails!