A handwritten envelope with my name! Who could it be from?
Text, email, and social media make staying connected so simple…but is faster always the best choice? I’d like to make a case for “real mail”. Here are a couple quick stories to show the strength of a handwritten letter.
First, one of my boys is on a mission for our church. He is in a foreign country. We can email him once a week, but he has said he loves letters. Then he can hold them and read them anytime.
Second, my kids have great grandparents that love “real” mail. Last December we all wrote a few notes and made fun pop-up cards. We sent them one card a day along with a couple of our favorite pictures of time spent with them. We did this almost daily for the whole month of December. I can just imagine Grandpa’s face as he got the mail each day. It was good for my kids to think of others…and it was fun.
Without further ado, below are some fun ideas for “real mail.”
• Pop up Cards (as shown in the post Card Commotion). Here are a couple examples to get your mind going…. 1) For our missionary who loves puns, my little daughter made a pop up card about one of our last family outings before he left. I am sure it brought a smile to his face.
My youngest boy made a pop up card of one of our favorite family songs.
• Balloon Messages: Blow up a balloon, but don’t tie it. Write on it with a permanent marker and then deflate it. The receiver has to blow it up to see the message! Hint..write really small so that as it deflates, the letters are too small to read unless it is blown back up. Put the balloon inside another piece of paper and into the envelope to keep it from having a ridge for the mail sorter machine.
• Puzzled Note: Write a message and then cut the letter into a puzzle pieces. The receiver has to put the puzzle together to see the fun message.
• Mirrored Image: We love you! to !uoy ɘvol ɘW —I like to write the mirrored image myself. You just think backwards :), but you can also search “mirrored writing” and there will be an app available to do it for you. The receiver would have to use a mirror to read the message.
• Confetti Fun: Write a letter then as you fold it in thirds tape two of the sides together to create a pouch. Cut some confetti of different colors and shapes and put the confetti in the pouch. Seal it with a sticker and put it in the envelope. The receiver gets a fun surprise to celebrate a birthday or New Years!
• Printed Pictures: We get so used to pictures on our devices that sometimes we forget how fun it is to actually print a picture! Grandparents especially love a printed picture. Send them one with a handwritten note of love.
• Sticky Note Jokes or Messages: We randomly placed sticky notes on a sheet of paper and then wrote notes underneath them…one tiny note from each family member. Another rendition of this is to write a joke on the top of the sticky note and put the punch line underneath it.
More “real” mail ideas will come in a second post sometime soon. Merry Christmas!
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