Writing To Your Children

Happy Valentine’s Day! I hope you have a wonderful, love-filled day on this 14th day of February.

Today I decided to write about…writing.

You have probably heard it a million times as a mama, but sometimes it gets away from you. Especially if you have more than one child, it’s hard to always “write it down.” all the funny anecdotes, all the milestones. I have heard it before, how a mama almost finished the baby book for the first child, then maybe got halfway through for the second, and the third was lucky to even get a book, let alone anything in it.

I am one of those mamas.

But this year, I have decided to rid myself of that mama guilt, and use a method of recording memories that works for me. 
Instead of worrying too much about a baby book for each milestone, I have been writing letters to my children at special times of each year. The times that are most important to my family are birthdays, Christmas, Easter, Thanksgiving and Valentine’s Day. But find the holidays that work best for your family.

Just around each holiday, I take minute or two or ten to write down a letter to each of my children. I go out and buy a holiday card appropriate for the age, and then write my letter within the card. I write to them as a child, or sometimes as the adult they will be, and mention the funny and heartfelt things that happened since the last card I wrote to them. I try to write milestones but I don’t stress too much about them, since it’s the love that I want to express more than anything.

If you have never written a letter to your child, or you don’t like writing letters, consider adding a photograph and building from there. This is not going to be a novel, but a sentiment of how you are feeling in that moment about your relationship to your child and what they are doing lately.

Valentine’s Day is important to me because I consider my three children to be my second, third and fourth Valentine’s. The first is, of course, their father, my husband, Papa MOE.

So maybe when they hit high school or college (!) I’ll have some more time on my hands and I can muster up all the milestones I wrote down here and there, along with the memories in my mind and create a perfect childhood book. But for now, this is perfect for me, and for them.

Both images provided by The Graphics Fairy

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2 comments

Tanya Toledano February 15, 2012 at 3:32 pm

Julia-I LOVE this. What a fabulous idea.. I started writing a journal to my kids when I was pregnant..there are about 3 entries…I LOVE this idea!!! Thank you.

Reply
Julia M. C-G February 17, 2012 at 8:45 pm

Thanks Tanya,

I realized after the twins those baby books were just not going to fill up! It’s a cute thing to do and I’m sure the kids will like these letters later on 🙂

Reply

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