Correspondence Connections: April

My "Correspondence Connections" post was inspired by Michelle from Blogging from the Boonies--I highly recommend that you check out her blog! She has lots of great ideas for letter topics and fun things to include in your letters.

This month I started a letter series on my travels to other countries. From age 15 through my honeymoon, I was blessed to visit many countries--Cuba, Bolivia, Argentina, the Dominican Republic, Canada, Mexico, Honduras, Belize and the Grand Cayman Islands! I thought that I would write a letter sharing about each trip and including a few photos from each trip! I also thought that I would share a little about each of the countries that I went to. Once I'm done sharing about the countries I've visited, I'm thinking about writing to each child about his or her country.

This letter, I shared about my trip to Cuba with my mom when I was 15. We helped to host a worship conference for Christian leaders throughout Cuba. It was a fun trip and very eye-opening. I also shared a song that I learned while there: "Extiende Tu Mano" by Juan Luis Guerra (I translated it into English for the non-Spanish speakers). It's a beautiful song and you can listen to it here!

Here's a sample of the copy that I sent to the girls:


And here's a sample of what I sent to the boys:



I also wrote letters to my 11 to 13-year-olds about my 12th birthday. When I was 12, I received a "Challenge" where my parents gave me various tasks to complete before my 13th birthday. It was a lot of fun and very educational! Some of the tasks were:

- read 9 books of the Bible
- help 3 neighbors
- prepare my testimony
- learn to swim freestyle, breaststroke and backstroke
- go biking with my mom
- go hiking with my dad
- learn how to start a fire
- write a story in Spanish
- write a newspaper article
- learn CPR
- teach my siblings how to clean the house
- learn how to share the gospel

I shared how it was a wonderful experience to learn so many new things and how excited I was to celebrate my 13th birthday because I had been able to accomplish some of these challenges!

I also dug out some photos of me working on my challenge to share with them. This inspiration came from Jill, who blogs at Compassion Family and who shared that she wrote letters to her kids themed "When I Was Your Age" (you can read Jill's post here). I hope to continue this trend with other age-groups, but this was my starter letter!

Here's what I send to the girls:


And here's what I sent to the boys:


I love the letter writing templates on Compassion's website! And hopefully this will give you some inspiration in your letter writing!