By Rusty Nixon Correspondent
PLYMOUTH — “No matter what you feel about the war, you still want to support our troops over there.”
Jan Houin of Plymouth probably echoes the sentiments of many with her words, and it’s also her explanation of how she came to be involved with Operation Quiet Comfort. The nationwide group, based in Michigan, provides support for those who have been injured in combat in Afghanistan and Iraq.
“I don’t know whether the war is wrong or right; I don’t think that really matters,” she said. “We still have people over there being wounded and we need to support them.”
That’s just what the organization does. Quiet Comfort has contacts in all the medical units overseas and constantly tries to provide items of need for the troops they serve.

Currently the group is hoping to send an apple pie to every service man overseas.
“A company (Montana Tom’s) makes an apple pie in a jar where you just have to open it and eat it,” said Houin. “That project is going on until Friday (Nov. 16), but we have all sorts of other things we’re involved with.”
One project is quilting. The group takes strips of denim with inspirational messages, sews them together in quilts for wounded soldiers.
“I take squares of denim everywhere and ask people to write a message on them and we sew 96 patches into a blanket for them,” she said.
Unfortunately it’s hard to keep up with the need.
“The last numbers I saw we had 500-700 wounded each month,” said Houin. “We hear about those who die, but we don’t hear as much about the wounded.”
When Houin became involved with the group about a year ago, it was a family matter.
“My son-in-law (Travis Smith) was in Iraq, and just before he got sent home they were going to increase his base to 167 percent of capacity,” said Houin. “My daughter (Lori Smith) told me they had a real need for blankets and other things like that because of having to open up barracks that had been slated for destruction and this was a project (Quiet Comfort) was involved with.”
Travis is now stationed in Alaska. Houin, whose son Kurt spent more than six years in the Navy, has remained involved with the organization. Occasionally, she makes trips to LaSalle, Mich. to help the volunteers pack boxes for shipment.
“We recently went up to pack things to send for the holidays,” she said. “We had more than 300 boxes — some of them have to wait because postage is so expensive — it’s $15 to $20 to ship each box.”
She added, “In World War II, they tell me the whole country was involved; today it seems like if you don’t have somebody there you’re not involved. I feel very good about this organization and very strongly about what they do.”
The non-profit organization is nationwide as part of Yahoo groups. To get involved, you can visit Web site at  www.operationquietcomfort.com or locally contact Houin at  This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it or phone 574-936-1424.