Keeping Close to Family Long Distance

I sent my mom a few favorite books of my son's (who is 3), and a blank cassette tape. She would read the books out loud and record herself on the tape, then mail them back. My son would be able to look at the book while listening to grandma read to him! He loved it!!

Have you tried Dropshots.com You can post your pics and then have the grandparents leave comments. If you want send me a message and I'll send you a link to mine. My mom lives on the other side of the state and this is how we do it.

Aloha K.!
I grew up in the Treasure Valley and attended UH Manoa. Go Bows! :)
Video chat is a great way to stay in touch with family. We stay in touch with friends and their kids across the country this way. Consider an Apple iMac. They are a few more dollars on the front end, but have all the equipment you need built in and they are reliable and very easy to use. You don't have to become an IT Guru to use the system. It does not matter whether the person you are chatting with has a Mac or PC, it works both ways. With a Mac you can also manage your digital photos and burn CD's and DVD movies to families. There is a Mac store in town on Overland Road, MacLife. They can show you how easy it is to get set up and going.
Good luck!
K.

Aloha K.,
We recently moved to the mainland (Las vegas..the 9th island as it is refer too) from Hawaii, which island are you on? We were from Hawaii..the Big Island, where the earthquake just hit. Needless to say that we were frantic when we could not get in touch with everyone the day it happen. But Thank God everyone was ok, except for a lot of broken items.
We have tons of family and friends in Hawaii and are in constant contact via email, cell phone (same carrier means free calls), snail mail with photos once a month. I gave my closest family and my daughter's godparents, scrapbooks before I left Hawaii. Then I send scrapbook pages for them to put in the books. They all love it. I also buy inexpensive disposal cameras to send to them, with pre-paid envlopes for them to send them back after they have taken photos. ai would then get them developed, however, usually, I get photos back as they have the cameras develpoed. Nice way to get recent photos.

The ideas about having an online scrapbook is a great idea. I just lack time. Work full time and take care of my 3 year old daughter and husband, the household chores, bills, etc...
And, I love the other suggestion of having family members making a "reading tape".

Take care, Ahui hou, Alohas, A. S.

PS: I hope you go to the beach everyday, I sure miss the ocean. We went everyday after work. When I was a keiki (child) I use to surf and snorkel and collect shells washed up in the shore. Great memories.
Some Suggestions for getting to know the islands: 1st see it like a visitor. Play tourist.Go to the historical spots, and then get to know the culture, the people, the language, etc...
Best book for knowing the Big Island is "Big Island Revealed" and then for Kauai "Kauai: The Ultimate Survival Guide" The THIS Week magazine is a good visitor magazine with great maps. Comes out weekly. Hawaii Visitor Bureau is also very helpful.

I'm estranged from my family and my husband's family are all in NZ and Australia. We keep them in touch with our one-year-old primarily by taking ungodly amounts of photos with the digital camera (and some 30-second videos on it as well), then occasionally burning DVDs and mailing them off.

In the meantime I post the best pics to my livejournal account and the family can see those as well.

We're also training her to speak to family on the phone, and we encourage the family to come visit us whenever they can.

Aloha,
We have lived in Hawaii for about a year and a half now and we also left behind two grandmas. I have a 4 year old son, but he was only 2 1/2 when we moved. The more active the grandmas stay in the kids lives, the easier is will be for them. My mother sends letters every couple of weeks with pictures of her. Every couple of months or so she sends a care package with little stuff, like toys from a dollar store or stickers. She also calls frequently. We have time warner, and they give a discount to military families. I think for 30.00 a month, you get unlimited long distance to anywhere in the country. If you use them for Internet and Cable, they put the bill all in one and that makes it really easy. We dont go home often, yet Caleb knows exactly who Granny is, he knows just by hearing her voice. We also make a big deal out of sending little artwork just for her so he focuses on spending time on her instead of with her. That ways she is still with his heart, even if she isnt with him in person. On the flip side.. my husbands mother never calls, she never writes. She didnt send a gift or card on his birthday. He has no clue who she is. We have filled his room with pictures of him with both women, but he has no connection to her through any happy memories. So, it all depends on how much you, and they put into it. It can be done. If you need any help, or your 4 year old needs a friend, Caleb and I are hear for ya!!!

Hi there.. My husbands family is back in the mainland as well and mine is over on Maui. We keep them very active in our daughters life in so many ways. We send photo album emails every sunday, We make up video DVD's and send them out every month or so, weekly phone calls, and webcam visits. They keep in contact by video as well. WE have each family memeber read books on video or tell stories on video and our daughter watches them ever week. They also send lots of pictures as well and we put them up everywhere. Our daughter is so familiar with my husbands parents that when they came out a couple months ago to visit her for the first time..she knew exactly who they were. Good luck keeping in touch. It is a lot of work, but well worth the effort for your children and families. Aloha !

I have a younger sister that lives in Sweden when she lived here she was very close to my oldest son. We have yahoo messenger Friday night my son sits at our laptop and tells my sister all about his week. Messenger tells you when they are online and they set up a time so they are always there. They have a great time we dont have a web cam but he can sit and talk to her for hours if he wanted to. It is a great way to stay in touch without having to sit in front of a camera.

Hi K.,

I like Kristi C's idea of having grandma "read and record" a book for baby to listen too. What a great idea! You could also have your kids record a message for grandma- they could sing a song or record a personal message letting grandma know they love her and miss her...I'm sure grandma will treasure listening to their voice and being able to play it whenever she wants.

We, too, relocated out of state about a year ago- from Nebraska to Utah- and our families are all in NE. No family in UT at all, so I can understand your position. What we've been doing to keep in touch... we take videos of our daughter constantly throughout the month, capturing all milestones and new accomplishments, etc...then at the end of each month, we download it to the computer and burn a DVD for grandparents... My husband even prints a picture of our daughter on CD label paper and puts it on the DVD to personalize it. Our families have really appreciated it, as it gives them a chance to see little Isabela in action!

As far as talking on the phone... we use Sprint and so do our families - it's FREE long distance from Sprint PCS to PCS. If you don't have Sprint, check it out, worth a try (I think it's like $5-$10 a month). I talk to my mom every day. It's also nice bc I also have family in Puerto Rico who have Sprint, so it saves me quite a bit.

Hope this helps!

Z.

Hello, I believe i have the perfet thing for you where you can use your web cam and talk live with up 8 people at a time for a low monthly fee. there are different packages but i was thining of the $9.95 per month package. My fasmliy uses it all the time. simple easy love it. my kids are not missing any of their cousins and aunts and uncles because it's like they are right here.you can talk to more than one at a time from different places. If this sounds interesting to you please e-mail me. for more info

I have family all over the country. My husbands family is in Missouri and Arizona. Mines in Florida, Georgia, California, New Jersey...anyway...have you looked at the website myfamily.com? Depending on how much space you want they charge you a really good price for your own family website. You name it and invite all of the family members you want. You can post pictures, messages, recipes and all kinds of info on there and even schedule family chats. We love it and it keeps us up to date with all of our family. You should look into it. It's worth the money.

I understand this! I live in Washington, and the rest of my entire family is in Ohio! We have a webcam and I make video's and send them out as well as take pics with it and send them out regularly. I write real main and snail mail to my family members and I also have the kids color pictures, and finger paintings and crafts and send them to the relatives. I also screapbook online, so the whole family has a link to that as well. Really though, the webcam is our way of keeping in touch. There's a microphone on it, so we can all talk back and forth and everyone can be seen. My kids love it and it makes my mom happy to be able to see her grankids that are 2500 miles away grow up.

Being that your kids are older, I'd say that getting a phone plan that works for you is a good idea as well. Do you have a cell phone? My whole family is on verizon, and because of that, we can all talk for free anytime. It works out. You will find something that works for you so that it's not as hard. Good luck!!

Hey there! My son, Bryce, who just turned 9, is really close to my brother, who moved to Los Angeles to go to school almost a year ago. Bryce lives a few hours away from the rest of our family, so to communicate, his grandma set him up an email account. He loves it! He loves being able to check his email, and looks forward to hearing from all of us! Even for your youngest, you could read the emails to him. I think your kids would really enjoy it! It seems to really make my son feel like a "grown up"! :)

oh to be in maui...i'm so jealous! we live 1000 miles away from our family and we wanted a way for our 2 year old daughter to remember them easily. with our digital camera we took pictures of her with everyone (one with grandma, one with grandpa, one with auntie, one with cousin abby, etc.) and then we made a photo album with all those photos and every night before bed we talk about each person in the photo and what they might be doing right then. what's really great is when she does talk to them on the phone, she asks about work or school or the thing they are involved in. it's really cute to see her try to stay connected to them.

Congrats on your move! I just recently found out about this company that allows you to create your own professionally bound books with your own photos and stories. This might be a great idea for you to create a book about your family that the kids can look at and read all the time. My kids LOVE to look at the books they have with pictures of themselves and our family. It is truly a treasured keepsake.

www.bookyourphotos.com

If you have any questions about them, feel free to ask. There are specials available that are not listed on the web.

Good Luck!

I understand completey. My husband and I are in Washington and my family in Indiana. We only see each other maybe once a year. I keep them up to date by always sending pictures by e-mail (at least once a week) and we talk everyday. Talk to your phone company about your long distance plan. We pay somewhere around $25 a month for unlimited long distance so we can talk as much as we want. We also send videos of the kids. Even something like my daughter coloring a picture for grandma always makes her day. Hope this helps some. Good luck

M.

How about the internet? I have a "myspace" (myspace.com) and can upload pictures AND videos for my mom and sister to see. They unfortunatley live too far away to visit also. With Snapfish.com you can share your pictures with other people. So between night and weekend minutes on the cell phone and "my space" they have alot more contact....

Good Luck!

M.

Congrats I love Hawaii!!!!
Well, I would recommend you buy your parents some books and tapes and have them Tape their readings to the kids. It is a way for them to feel close. Or if they sing they could do that as well. My daughter loved that her gramma did that for her. It made her feel special. There are so...many good books out there about grandparents.Like Billy Crystals new one!!! Christmas classics would be a real treasure....Take them to get some construction paper and have them make cards when they are missing them. Make a weekly project and they will look forward to it!!! It is hard but they are at a good age to verbalize what they are thinking....Just act on it when they say they are missing them do it regularly.
They will pick up on your anxiety..don't feel or at least don't show guilt for moving.......K?
Aloha

we'll what i would do is when your kids dont have school for the summer time you can send them to grandmas for the summer and then you can have them while there in school and do it every year that way they stay apart of there worlds and that way you can save more money a year to do this. A. l.