How to Stay in touch with extended Family

The advents of the computer, Internet, and e-mail have completely changed the faces of communication in the last twenty years. Today, many people use stamps and envelopes only for sending bills and Christmas cards.

During the same time period that computer use has become more widespread, families and friends have become more dispersed. Today, children rarely grow up near their cousins and grandparents. Jobs move people around to places they never dreamt they’d go. And in the process of moving around, it’s easy to lose touch with friends and family.

E-mail: If you have a relatively large family, consider using an e-mail list or group and sending them all a weekly letter. At first this may seem generic, like those form letters you send out at Christmastime, but you can personally respond to individuals who ask questions or have comments. My husband’s family (nine children) use e-mail groups in their letters, and it’s great to know what everyone is up to once a week. Then, when we get together, we know all the details and don’t have to spend our time “catching up.”

E-mail is also great for conversation-like correspondence. In postal-delivered letters, the information is usually outdated before it gets there, but e-mail is instant. You can correspond back and forth across the country in a matter of seconds. It’s almost like a telephone call, but e-mail is free, and long-distance telephone calls add up quickly.

Chat Rooms: There are many places on the Internet where you can host your own chat room. Designate a set time each week for a family chat. Make sure you take time zones into consideration when you announce what time you’ll be chatting. Chat rooms allow for the immediacy of in-person conversation. Younger children might need you to act as scribe for them while they chat.

Sound bites: Grandparents love to hear their grandchildren’s little voices, but sometimes those grandchildren get shy over the phone. If you have a microphone on your computer, have your children sing songs into them, tell stories, or recite something they’ve learned. They won’t feel embarrassed like they would if they had an immediate audience, and the grandparents will listen to the sound bites again and again. After you have recorded the sound bite, save it and send it out to the family via e-mail.

Photos and Drawings: Put your scanner to work scanning precious photos and drawings. Your son may come home from preschool with a wonderful drawing of himself that you’d love to send to your parents, your in-laws, your sister, and Cousin Ned, but your son wants to hang the picture in his room. Scan the picture and send it via e-mail to everyone you know, and he can still post it on his bulletin board. Likewise, you can send photos you’ve scanned or saved from your digital camera to the whole family.

Start a Family Website: If you enjoy putting websites together, consider being the webmaster of a family website. You can create a page for each family member where they can write about what’s going on in their lives. It serves as an instant family newsletter. You could even host your family chat room on your site.

There’s no excuse for “drifting apart” when an e-mail message can arrive in their inboxes in two seconds flat. With a computer at your disposal, keeping in touch with long-distance relatives can be easy and fun.