Here’s a little mini-challenge for you today (or sometime in the next week).
I have recently added a new site to our fabulous compendium of letter writing links. The site is called Send Something. The site is similar to Postcrossing, conceptually, in that you can go get a random address and mail something to a stranger. However, that’s where the similarity ends. While Postcrossing is for postcards, Send Something can be for just about anything. Users fill out their profiles indicating their hobbies and other interesting things about themselves. What you send is completely up to you. Have fun!
(Thanks, PostMuse, for sending me this.)
Also, I’ve added a new link to the main sidebar that says “Shopping”. I’m collecting interesting places you can shop for stationery and other letter-related goodies. Enjoy.
[photo credit: Marty (S)]
Tags: fun, Link, send something
There has been a lot of buzz about the open letter from Barack Obama to his daughters. If you’ve not done so, you can read it over at Parade. It’s a great letter.
I write letters to my kids. Never as well-written as this one, but engaging, tender and hopeful. I’m not sure when they will get them, but I actually put them in the mail so they get postmarked. When the arrive back at the house I put them in a place to save them for the boys for later. I have no idea when they will get them. Hopefully I’ll know when the time is right.
I also like to write letters to the daughter of a friend of mine. Her girl is only three, but I do my best to write her on her birthday and hope my friend saves them. A little blast from the past for when she is older. I have no idea if anyone cares about stuff like that, but I like to do it.
Tell me: do you write to your kids or keep a journal that will live on long after you’re gone? Tell me all about what you do.
Tags: barack obama, parenthood, president, writing to kids
I ran across a delightful story about a woman who ran across a letter from the past and how it inspired who to try something new. In this short post she describes how delightful it can be to get “messy” when you write a letter and why that has value.
Tags: inspiration, messy letters
Have you ever heard of a round robin letter? I have never done one, but I have heard of them.
It’s a letter where you have a group of people and you basically write letters in a circle — Person 1 sends her letter to Person 2. That person writes a letter and then sends his letter AND Person 1’s letter to Person 3 who writes a letter and sends ALL the letters on to Person 4. The pattern continues until all the letters make it back to Person 1. She then removes her original letter and replaces it with a new one, then sends the whole batch on to Person 2 again. Ad infinitum.
A few years ago someone published something called a Circle Journal which was basically the same idea except you wrote in the book and sent it around. I always thought that one was a little awkward because who is the lucky one who gets to keep the book when you’re done?
The bummer with the round robin letter is that you don’t get to keep any of the other letters. On the other hand, you do end up with a selection of your own letters which is like having a diary of sorts, I suppose.
Recently I read this news article about a woman who participated in a 64-year-long round robin letter. Can you imagine??
In our links collection, I have a link to a site called Robin Flies Again. That one will take you to a 50-year-long round robin and there you can actually see some of the letters.
Go check both of these stories out. Maybe it will inspire you to start your own!
Tags: great idea, history, long letter, round robin
Here is an inspiring story about a young gentleman, a kind and honorable boyscout, who decided he wanted to make a difference for soldiers serving in Iraq.
If this doesn’t inspire you to write a letter, I don’t know what will!
http://www.suburbanchicagonews.com/newssun/news/1376065,5_1_WA14_GILETTERS_S1.article#
Tags: writing soldiers
I recently found an article about 3,000 letters and other writings of Hemingway that has been in a museum in Cuba.
The release of the Hemingway archive is part of a joint project between the Cuban National Cultural Heritage Council and the US Social Science Research Council.
As Cuba celebrated the 50th anniversary of the revolution yesterday, the Hemingway project marked a warming of relations between two countries that have been at loggerheads ever since. An expectation is growing that Raúl Castro, the Cuban President, may hold talks with Barack Obama, the US President-elect.
Great news, for a great new year!
Tags: cuba, ernest, hemingway, history, letter collection, Link, nobel laureate
I think this might be a first. The composer Brett Dean has created a violin concerto called The Lost Art of Letter Writing. He, like all of us, lament that letter writing is less-and-less a part of our daily lives. This concerto utilizes real letters which are read and integrated into the beginning of each movement.
You can read more about it at the Boosey & Hawkes web site At the bottom is a link that says “audio/visual”. You can click that to go to a page that has a sample of the concerto.
Photo credit: Kaitlin M.
Tags: brett dean, fresh link, letter writing, letters, lost art of letter writing, Music, violin concerto
I ran across a great post by Miss Jessica on how to be a good pen pal. She has some great tips!
I’d like to hear about your pen pals. Do you have any? Got any great pen pal stories? Please share!
If you DON’T have pen pals, why not? Have you seen the great magazine called The Letter Exchange? It’s a fantastic way to get high quality pen pals and they have a free forwarding service if you want security and anonymity until you feel comfortable with your new pen pal. Go check them out.
Photo credit: Andreas Nilsson
Tags: how-to, letter exchange, LEX, pen pals
Fred over at Spitball Army has a lovely letter project going on.
He has a collection of letters he has transcribed from a couple called Bev and Ande who correspond during the early days of the war. Fred does an awesome job of transcribing for ease of reading, but also includes scans of the letters and pictures. He adds links to relevent historical information so you get a real full-bodied experience.
This is a great example of why letters are an important part of our social and cultural past. It gives one a real experience of the moments, not just a restated third-party telling of the tale.
Bev and Ande’s story is addictive. Go give it a try!
Tags: bev and ande, history, old letters, spitball army
I ran across this web site recently: Printable Paper
This is a great web site if you’re looking for something new and interesting to write on. It has 450 different types of lined papers that you can print for free. They have the traditional lined paper and graph paper. They have weird log paper that I have NO idea what it’s used for… maybe mathematics or geometry? Polar graph papers (write in circles)! Hexagons! Octagons! Isometric! Music papers, dot papers! Penmanship paper! (We use this for our son who is learning to write.)
One of my favorites is the “story paper” which is the penmanship paper with blank spots. Your kids can draw in the blank space and write on the lines at the bottom. My son has a journal like this and he draws and I write in his words for him at the bottom.
Another neat one is the Cornell Note Paper which has lines in one section and then a blank column and blank bar at the bottom which would be really fun for doodling.
So, go check it out and treat yourself to some fun and free printable papers!
Tags: letter writing, letters, paper
