Traveling Family Journal

Long-distance family.  sigh. My kids grandparents and aunts live far, far away.  And as much as we hate living 15 hours away from one side of our family, we have tried many different things to keep us close together at heart. One of the more successful ideas we loved was creating our Traveling Family Journal. Our Traveling Family Journal goes back and forth from our “Grandma Illinois” to us with notes, pictures, and drawings to share.  It is a fun and unique way to keep up with one another, the old-fashioned way….through hand-written word. We picked out a beautiful and durable scrapbook, since it would be passing through several hands. And you want to make sure it is small enough to mail in a cost-effective way too. When we started our Traveling Family Journal, my kiddos were not quite writing yet, so they helped me decorate their pages and dictated to me what they wanted to say. Grandma wrote back, commenting on their letters and telling them what was going on in Illinois. We included pictures and mementos they wanted to share with Grandma as well. As my children got older, they began to write their own letters – it is precious now to see their adorable hand-writing and misspelled words. Now, as their writing skills have improved, it is a great exercise to have them sit down and write about what’s going on in their lives.A Traveling Family Journal can be created for cousins or best friends as well. Another fun idea is to pass the journal around to all the different family members but make sure you give them a time limit to pass it along (so it doesn’t get forgotten!). The best part of our Traveling Family Journal is not just keeping in touch with Grandma, but creating a treasured keepsake!

The Quirky Mommas have a few other ideas for staying close to loved ones far away:

• Post Office Play
• Writing Activities for Kids
• Write a Coded Love Letter