Do You Mail Holiday Letters?

I always send out letters with my cards. Every year I think I won't do a letter again, because it is so much work, but then all my friends and family beg me to write one because they say they enjoy them so much. If you'd like to see the last 2 or 3 letters I wrote for Christmas cards, send me a private message and I can email them to you.

I send a letter in with my cards as most of my friends and family live in the UK and we only get to see them every couple of years. It's a handy way for them and us to keep in touch. I never thought of it as a brag sheet, just a way to keep everyone in the loop. However, with the advent of Facebook it has become harder to find original stuff to say....!
I usually look at the years photos and use that as a basis for what to write

This may sound harsh and is not meant to offend, but...
I personally feel that they're incredibly annoying.
I don't need a summary of your life over the last year. If we're good enough friends, I already know. And if we're not, I don't care.

The worst ones are where the mom writes in the "voice" of her little one. I had a friend that did that with her new baby last year ("I really like watching Mickey Mouse Clubhouse while I drink my milk!") That one made me want to puke.

Sorry, just my thoughts.

Right or wrong, most folks feel these letters are nothing but brag sheets. Choose the recipients carefully, in other words, make sure they would want to know about how great your kids are and how great your year has been...

I have found the older generations like them better than the younger generations. Of course, there will always be the relatives/freinds that love it, thus my comment, choose your recipients carefully.

I usually get a Christmas letter from one person who I haven't had contact with in more than 10 years. The letter always brags about how advanced her kids are, how her husband just completed his PhD and got promoted to some executive level, their annual Disney trip and their exciting "real' vaction to Europe or Hawaii, blah blah blah. There's nothing the next year about how his employer closed the company down or that her kid's in therapy becaues her mom pushes her to over achieve... so obviously - thats not my favorite letter to open.

I've recieved ones occasionaly that are heart felt - and I've actually kept them - one from my aunt the year my uncle had a stroke and she used it as a way to bring all the people she loved up to speed with my uncle's condition and how prayers had been answered so many times in the prior year, I got one from another friend the year they adopted their baby and it was full of emotion and joy describing the trip to get her, their stay in the hotel, how thrilled they were to bring her home, etc. One year I wrote a ltter when we had done a lot of demolition and manual labor on our home - which had been my moms and before that my aunt & uncles. So the letter told of the memories of the house the layers of wallpaper we uncovered in the closets and my many sibling & cousins enjoyed memories while reading it.

So - depending on what you're sharing the letters can be great to read or not. Remember that not everyone wants to be regaled with the details of your 4 yr olds' preschool graduation skit - but we do want to hear about the milestones - "Sally began kindergarten this year without a look back at me while I stood on the sidewalk with tears in my eyes"...

Have fun and be humble and your friends and family will love it.

We've done letters for a long time. Some years ago I got into a habit (obsession?) of making a little Christmas carol to send, so that and the news on the bottom of it is our card/letter combination. But you can do a letter by itself, or slip it into a pretty card. There are no hard-and-fast rules for any of this except to put enough postage on the envelope.

I try to accentuate the positive. Yes, there's a certain amount of bragging done (in other people's letters, not mine! [ho ho]), but that's all right in moderation - just don't get carried away as if your whole purpose was to boast. However, this year my FIL passed away, and that was in the letter because it was a significant event. The year a tree decided to retire from the backyard landscape and landed on our roof, that was a significant event. The year I had cancer, I used the Christmas letter as a soapbox for getting mammograms. You want to keep it real.

If you write your letter as if it were a letter, it's easy to do on your computer and you can even get fancy stationery to put it on - look at your nearest office supply store after Christmas, if you want to plan ahead for next year. Or you can be simpler, add a bit of clip art to your page, and buy standard envelopes. Hand-writing letters is much more personal, but my hand would fall off, so I try to put enough warmth in the letter itself to make up for the impersonal production method.

If you give it a try, don't stress out about it too much. This is the sort of thing people look at, smile (hopefully), and toss into the trash. You just want to let your friends and family know that you're alive, you've been active, and you love them.

I havent done it but I think I'll start next year only because of a letter my mom just got from one of her SIL's.
She wrote it out in poem form and its so funny, informative and cute!
I'm guessing she wrote milestones down on the calendar and then used the calendar to create her poem. It was mostly about all the positives but she was able to incorporate a couple of negative things (Jon Jon fell while fishing and broke his little femur, but now the cast is off and has changed his bad demeanor) but since it all rhymed and flowed it just made you smile big at the end.
She printed it off of her computer with a cute Christmas border that most of us have a program for.... and then added a small personal note at the end in her own handwriting to personalize the letter. I think its way better than the Christmas cards are personally.
It's fun to put your year into poem format. My husband and I were doing it the other night and cracking ourselves up. So, I'm totally sending the poem letter next year.

Growing up my mom would write out a letter to send in our Christmas cards. Her letter included an intro paragraph and then at least six paragraphs (one for each person in the family) telling a bit aobut what he/she did over the year.

I have taken after her and have an intro paragraph and then have short (maybe 4-5 sentences long) paragraphs for each person in my family. I always start with the oldest, which happens to be my husband, and go down from there. I find it nice to end with the youngest. Since we just had a baby this year; it was pretty easy to come up with a nice ending.

I try to keep a positive spin to ours as I know everyone has ups and downs. For example, our oldest is in the 8th grade and I basically said that she's doing ok and school and finding that the work is trying to prepare her for college etc. and then told about her 4-H project that took her to the State Fair.

I've never gotten a "newsletter" of four pages etc. Every one that I've gotten has all fit onto one page with at least a 10 point font.

I hope that helps!

I have never sent one. The letters that I have received are basically a recap of the family's year: new jobs, retirement, births, deaths, or any milestones for the kids or family, even big birthdays or anniversaries. I love to read them! But I agree with another poster that a short handwritten note is nice as well. Although, I haven't done that myself the last two years either! :) Too busy!

We mailed a letter out (in newsletter form) this year for the first time. I was a little nervous about it, for the fact that everyone's mentioned: I didn't want it to seem like a brag fest. But we had an extremely busy year, and my family is spread all over the country and we don't talk very often, so I thought it would be the best way to catch everyone up. And indeed, quite a few people let us know that they really enjoyed it. I did include some less-than-happy points. I think it's important to include any major event from the year in the letter, happy or sad.

We get several letter like that. I don't get why people find it so important to make a newsletter about any little thing that happend but be my guest. Some are actually really funny and that is always good. Not sure if they are suppose to be funny but it makes me laugh.

I am in the group that feels like they are more of a brag sheet and annoying than anything else.

I have a picture of my daughter only for those relatives I rarely see and for all others, I just sign a nice card and send.

My husband does one, I usually don't include it with my cards, but this year the card he made, included a paragraph-sized letter in it. It was pretty basic, mentioned a couple activities we do generally, my husband's travels and a couple trips we took.

We get letters from a bunch of people, usually in addition to a card, a couple people do a photo collage with captions rather than a letter. That's pretty cool. Other people go on and on about everything. Generally they are in letter form. There tend to be sad things mentioned, when someone had breast cancer that was in there and a couple people lost their dogs this year. I guess I wouldn't be overly out there about financial problems, job loss, death, etc. You can mention those things in a positive or depressing way. I think the letters should have a positive spin and they can without just mentioning only great things.

I find them interesting to read. I get where they could have the potential to be brag sheets, but really if it is someone on my card list, I'd hope they'd care what we were up to and not find it obnoxious. My Dad is one of those who thinks they are stupid, but so, don't read them if you don't want to know. We are all so busy and live far from people we do care about, so getting a detailed update like that annually is a treat, I think.

I will send a christmas letter when my christmas card. This year, instead of christmas cards, I sent a letter on two pages and the second page was just pictures of all of us. One year, my sister was killed suddenly and my husband's grandfather died just three weeks later right before the holidays. I sent pictures of all of our families along with information about our loved ones. This was very healing to our families. Everyone appreciated it.

I have some mixed feelings about this...

First: I send out a letter myself, however I try to keep it as humble as possible. I don't want it looked at as a brag sheet more as info that I don't have the ability to share with everyone I send a card to, but maybe are interested in the info included. Am I babbling?? The first year we sent one out (3 christmas's ago) we wanted to make everyone laugh...so we included a picture of an animated christmas tree that was larger than half a sheet of paper, and "bragged" about some funny things that had happened to us that year. (our dogs getting skunked, etc). The year after that we sent out a similar letter, with a similar picture taking up about half of the sheet, and the vast majority of the letter was about our son (who was born that year), with a brief sentence about our dogs, one for my husband, and one about me. This year we left the picture out, and mentioned the major milestones in our son's life, along with fun activities the family did. Again we include only one sentence for my husband, and one for me. It's not our intention for this letter to be a "brag sheet" only to share things that we might not be able to share every day but are important to us anyway.

Second: I get some of the type of Christmas letters where people are using them as a soapbox for their lifestyles, or as a brag sheet. There's at least one that we get every year that my husband and I laugh about cause it's all about one person and all the great things that happen to that one person and leaves out all the info about everything involving only their spouse. It's so lopsided it's impossible to miss, and amusing to read.

Third: I look forward to reading the Christmas letters more than I do in reading the Christmas cards. It seems VERY few people take the time to make a Christmas card personal and the letters are a way to feel personal even if they aren't. I do get annoyed with the soapbox's and the ones filled with a person's need to feel important.

I feel offended at the people that say they see them as only brag sheets...people take a lot of time putting their lives down on paper and sometimes it can feel a little odd to share personal parts of your life...see what it looks like on paper and feel the need to fill it with more interesting things. Understand that's their insecurity and not the need to compete with another. I personally try to be humble when writing mine...but maybe just the act of writing a letter like that prevents me from being humble...hmmm...interesting thought!

To addresses your other questions...I like the idea of making a poem and keeping it lighthearted even if you need to address sad or difficult information. The holidays are a time of merriment and cheer, I would imagine most people would want to avoid a christmas letter filled with low moments. You can make it whatever format you'd like...I personally like the news letter format..it's very cute!

I've never done one but I think its much more personable and more thought has been put into that than just signing and sendig a card. I appreciate the letters, or picture cards, and especially cards with a short hand written note (even if it's one sentence)...to me, that means they were thinking of you and not just signing another card cuz they have to.

Depending on who the person was that I was sending a letter to and how sad the information was I would call, but if it were something that could be told over letter than I would probably put it somewhere in the middle of the letter so as to ease in and out of it with better updates..I found the same question on another site I frequent..so here are some more ideas for you:

http://www.theskinnyscoop.com/question/q/2553?utm_campaig...