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Military motherhood awards launched

Could your favorite military mom use some recognition and $5,000 in cash?

Operation Homefront and CincHouse.com have launched an essay contest, open through March 31, for their inaugural Military Motherhood Award. You can nominate your spouse, friend or yourself, describing why your nominee deserves the Military Motherhood Award.

Eligible are active-duty, National Guard and reserve moms; the spouses of active or reserve component troops; mothers of service members, and others. Nominees might have children, stepchildren, foster children, or have other unique circumstances.

“This is a celebration of motherhood, and there aren’t any hard and fast rules about what constitutes an amazing mother,” said Meredith Leyva, founder of Operation Homefront and CinCHouse.com.

The winning mom will receive $5,000 cash and will be flown to Washington for an awards ceremony May 8.

The essay section on the nomination form accepts up to 3,000 characters — about 500 words.

Operation Homefront will select the top 20 nominations, and allow the CinCHouse community of military wives and women in uniform to vote for the top five. A panel of judges will select the overall winner.