A pair who cares - girls collect boxes of useful items, letters for deploying troops Published May 18, 2011 By 95th Air Base Wing Public Affairs EDWARDS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. -- Best friends Brittany Sheridan, 12 and Shayla Smith, 8, spent a total of 16 hours, May 7 and May 8, outside of a Lancaster, Calif. K-Mart, collecting sundry items for deploying troops. The two girls knew that they wanted to take on a charitable project and took it upon themselves to do what they could to help support service members. Sitting outside of the K-Mart Brittany and Shayla explained to customers their intention to send troops various sundry and food items and collected over 5,000 donations. Donations were also accepted in the form of thank-you letters. "I think the troops will be excited that people care about them," said Brittany. The collected items were handed off to the Edwards AFB Civilian Military Support Group where they'll be assembled into take-away bags for deploying Edwards personnel. "We'll facilitate the distribution of all these goods and make sure the right people get them," said Danny Bazzell, Civ-Mil vice president. The girls plan on doing this every three months.