Keeping in Touch with Grandparents

[Jessica at Parenting.com]

Do you live far away from your parents or in-laws?

In the November issue of Parenting magazine, we offer some suggestions for staying connected all year long.

For example:

Put the whole family on speaker phone for a more natural conversation.
Let your kid loose with a disposable camera to document his day, develop the pictures, and have him put post it notes on each one, explaining what it is. Mail the whole batch.
Let the grandparents read a bedtime story over the phone.
Start a family website.Reply to this message to let us know how you keep in touch with family that lives far away.

[craftyashley]

My family pressured me into starting a family blog on blogspot. I thought it would be so lame! But I've really enjoyed it. I've noticed I'm taking more pictures of our everyday outings. It's been great. The grandparents that live so far away feel more like a part of our family- and it feels like I'm getting some scrapbooking done- keeping all my thoughts and stuff for when I actually get to do some real scrapbooking.

[War_Eagle]

My parents and grandparents have homes on our farm and my wife's parents have a home here, although they go to Florida from Oct to April.

Since they live here and because my parents are a part of our children's homeschooling, the kids see them just about every day.

[gostomskiart]

My family is close by but my in-laws are in another state. We talk to different family members on speaker phone a lot. It allows both sets of families to have more of an open, interactive conversation.

I'm hoping to start a family blog (like craftyashley) once I leave work for the baby's birth. I think it sounds like a fun way for family to look into what is going on with us and see photo's etc.

[brandie1127]

I love the family blog idea. Many of my relatives live in Colorado. We do the speakerphone thing. For my family that lives in Georgia ( I live in NJ) we have started using snapfish to take pictures of everything. I like the family blog idea. I'm starting that once the baby is born I think!

[Grandma Shelley]

I'm speaking as a 50 something grandma of nine and I love our family blog. We live close to one another but we still enjoy sharing photo's and cute stories with one another. I would imagine that it would be an absolute treasure for distant grandparents and the grandchildren.

I am a grandma blogger that shares my "grandma style" which is full of traditions and activities planned just for the grandkids. If you wish your family had more traditions or wished the grandparents were more involved check out my blog for some inspiration!

If you haven't tried blogging yet...you will love it. So will grandma.

Grandma Shelley
www.grandmasmoderndaytrunkoftreasures.blogspot.com

[lindseyh911]

My MIL lives about 2 hours away, the rest of the family is very close by. We have the boys color pictures to mail to "MeeMee Margaret", we snapshots periodically and whenever she calls she spend 5-10 minutes on the phone with each of the boys talking.

[marisky23]

We live far away from all of our family. We are in Oregon and family live in Illinois, Virginia, Massachusettes, Texas, and New Mexico. We use Skype to video regularly video conference with grandma & grandpa in MA. We skype with other family members less frequently but it is still good to see them and they get to see our little guy in action.
The best thing was we were alone for the delivery but we're able to video conference with all of the family at some point during the 2 days we were in the hospital. It was like we had lots of visitors. :)