Anyone else–after Thanksgiving away from family–feeling a little sad?
My kids have cousins and grandparents they won’t have seen for a year. Though I obviously hate this pain on a number of levels–I love that my kids (including three teenagers!) were visibly bummed when Thanksgiving was canceled with their grandparents, and cousins half their age.
With the, um, “pivot” to virtual and flood of Zoom calls, it’s a great time to get back to the basics. Invite your #COVIDbored kids to send notes in the mail–like these free printable postcards for kids from Florida Panhandle, who kindly created five free printable cards to send love from distance.
(We need all the sunshine and beach dreamin’ we can get here in Colorado. I think the high is about 20 degrees today.)
What I love about postcards for kids? Even my two ADHD kids have the attention span to write them. They’re quick and pack a lot of punch with the recipients. Especially bored ones, for whom getting the mail may be the big highlight of the day.
Here’s a crazy factoid for your kid trivia lovers. Harvard Health reports,
Dr. Martin E. P. Seligman, a psychologist at the University of Pennsylvania, tested the impact of various positive psychology interventions on 411 people…
When their week’s assignment was to write and personally deliver a letter of gratitude to someone who had never been properly thanked for his or her kindness, participants immediately exhibited a huge increase in happiness scores. This impact was greater than that from any other intervention, with benefits lasting for a month. (emphasis added)
Older kids can ratchet their postcards up a notch on the back by writing jokes, making puzzles (word finds!), or sketching a picture. (We just checked out Learn to Draw Star Wars from the library.)
Feel free to share these free printable postcards for kids and download them to print more than once! Let kids choose the theme they’re feelin’ add the personal note relatives will be tickled pink to receive.
Janel Breitenstein graduated summa cum laude from John Brown University and began her career with NavPress, where she worked on The Message Bible. She then moved to FamilyLife Publishing. In January of 2012, Janel and her husband packed up their family of six and moved to Uganda to serve with Engineering Ministries International (eMi), an organization focusing on poverty relief and development, providing structural design and construction management for Christian organizations in the third world. After five and a half years there in East Africa, she and her family have recently returned to the U.S., where they continue to work on behalf of the poor. She writes and loves on her family from Colorado. Her fresh, authentic, intimate style connects with readers around the globe. You can find her—“The Awkward Mom”—having uncomfortable, important conversations at JanelBreitenstein.com.
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