A MILITARY MOMS SUPPORT GROUP FRETS AND FEARS OUR TROOPS ARE FORGOTTEN

Linda Edgington has been a little more fortunate in that, for the most part, she does hear from her son, Vince Edgington, 21, who's in the 101st Airborne, stationed in Mosul in Northern Iraq.

He is living in a bombed-out hotel, she said. "There is still water in the pool so they've been able to cool down," she said, noting it's been 140 degrees there, or "too hot for socks and underwear." And they have to wear full-body armor, which adds another 20 degrees, Edgington noted.

"Because they have a pool, in the last box I sent him, I put in some water toys," she said. Her son, however, has requested bug spray, because the mosquitoes are really bad, he tells his mom. So are the sand fleas.

Pintane said her daughter described the extremely hot, windy weather as being like "a blow dryer in your face."...

There also appears to be a "false idea" that donations are no longer needed, which is definitely not the case, Shahbaghlian and the others said. Care packages are still needed. In fact, she said, many soldiers don't get packages from their own families, so the only things they do receive come from the donations through the Red Cross and independent businesses.

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