<p>I love receiving the letters. I agree w/laxmom-it is the only insight to people we don’t get to see. Love to hear from the family who has only super stars, the family that praises God in every paragraph, the family that complains about having no money but describes all the travels and expensive toys. We send out a family photo greeting card with a personal note each year. I leave out the cancers, dialysis, surgeries etc.-it just isn’t my style.<br>
One of the relatives changed from everything is perfect to “sent the kid to college, he returned at Thanksgiving and never went back”, “daughter was super star at XX, till injury and surgery”, "gramma was super voluteer till “accident”. I long for their old brag letters.</p>
<p>I like receiving them and I like sending them, though last years Christmas letter was a spring email, oh well, the essence was that we were very busy. I always give a paragraph for each family member with general news rather than accomplishments. I figured, among other things, that all our extended friends and family would be interested in knowing which colleges the kids were considering/attending etc. I think it all depends on your intention. If the idea is to brag it comes through in a letter, phone call or visit, just as a general updating does. The letter, like everything else, seems to fit the sender.</p>
<p>I thought I was the only one who felt that way about the form letters until I happenned to mention it on the soccer sidelines yesterday. Everyone started hooting and quoting from different ones they’d received over the years. (yes, we should’ve been watching the game, but, oh well)… I send out 150 cards, 75 of which are corporate obligations. The other 75 I write personal notes on which are tailored to the interest of the recipient. The great aunt I never see doesn’t give a fig about our son’s schooling, but she does want to know how my aging mother’s doing these days. The friend who’s son is severely dyslexic and in a special school doesn’t need to know about the honor roll, but an old college friend would get a kick out of it . (considering how she watched me slog through final exams)…I guess I just feel, like Weenie posted earlier, that if I haven’t been in touch with someone ALL year, they aren’t close enough to know the various details and logistics of my family’s life. I guess this comes from my mother who used to throw them in the garbage without reading them. (“I’m not going to read a mass mailing!”) One step down from that would be my soccer sideline pal who said that her mother used to write “deceased” on the envelopes from people she knew sent the form letters!</p>
<p>“…” the leaves are slowly changing their vestments, like shy virgins, shedding their plain greens for vibrant hues" or “Jeff and I are marvelling at the softly arriving Spring, and are filled with joyous anticipation at the happy times ahead , digging in the warming earth”, and horrors, one of an Irish vacation, which detailed the planning stages of the trip, attached pictures of them on every single bridge." --Choc</p>
<p>Hahahhahaha! Yes, thank you, Choc.</p>
<p>Cleveland, I forgot about the ones that rhyme. So funny! :D</p>
<p>I don’t get very many. One, written by a rather dull man, is…rather dull. “He did! She did!”–including the achievements of his wife. </p>
<p>The other is a treat–written with love and humour worthy of Dave Barry. I beg for the draft version by email. My heart would be broken if he decided not to write that one.</p>
<p>I should get more letters because I have sent out a weekly humourous letter via email for the past four years. </p>
<p>The rate has dropped in recent months. In a moment of charity, I agreed I would no longer use S2’s life experiences as comic fodder. </p>
<p>48 year old life isn’t quite as amusing, darn it.</p>
<p>After doing holiday updates, with a photo of the family, for so many years, I was tempted to discontinue doing them (especially since H thought folks might get bored to tears). But then, several friends of my family, some elderly, told me that they looked forward to seeing the kids grow up and hearing about what they had been doing. A couple of them have even saved our photos over the years so they could see how the kids changed as they aged. I guess we’ll keep doing them. (We do keep it to one page, including the photo.)</p>
<p>Individual notes are of course ideal but the time involved makes it impossible for me, note the spring mailing of the “Christmas” letter. It’s the best we can do.</p>
<p>One I get, from someone I live near, tells about the weather (among other things), organized by month!</p>
<p>The other highlight was a family who finally included their daughter’s girlfriend (significant other - whatever you call it) in the family photo. It was clear they had broken their 5 years of denial. Ha!</p>
<p>I’d like to know how its possible to have 8 extracurricular activities as regaled annually in one card we receive. ??</p>
<p>Last year we got a card from someone my husband worked with at his old company. He wrote about this relative dying and his acid reflux disease…We shouldn’t have laughed but it was absurd! (the dead relative wasn’t a parent or sibling. In fact, we couldn’t figure out exactly WHO it was!)</p>
<p>We have a family tradition. At my sister’s house on Christmas Eve, we pass around THE LETTER that her boss (female) sends out. We all laugh until we are in tears at the outrageous bragging and hilarious prose (especially since my sister shares the REAL scoop). The Boss manages to outdo herself every year. We even bring out past year’s letters if we have any newcomers to our group.
On the other hand, I constantly receive positive feedback on my own letters. I am quite honest and believe in sharing the good and the bad. I skip all the stuff about what close friends my two kids are (they can’t stand each other) and how meaningful my work is (I have worked,in succession, for two of the most dysfunctional companies in America). It is a time where I can communicate our family’s news to my friends, and I want to do it in an honest and humorous manner.</p>
<p>My daft old dad used to send me weekly notes about the weather. The he xeroxed the letter, adding another sibling name to to the greeting as each of us (six) left the nest. </p>
<p>"Dear <strong><em>, _</em></strong>, _<strong><em>, _</em></strong>, ____ and _____, </p>
<p>It’s a beautiful day in the country…"</p>
<p>After a decade of the weather reports, we began to tease him mercilessly, recommending he recycle the letters. Who would know the difference?</p>
<p>Same thing with his diary. A simple recounting of the weather. There is no ‘bad’ weather in my father’s mind.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, he moans if he doesn’t get detailed letters from all of us.</p>
<p>Personally I like getting the letters unless they are way over the top … I’d say 90% of the ones I get are very good. I get a couple from people from college who for the life of me I can not remember knowing … must be my old age setting in!</p>
<p>I THINK “Love Letters” is the title of the A.R. Gurney play. Does this thread make anyone think of it? It’s a two person play–more a reading–of letters exchanged by a man and woman beginning when they are very, very young. They marry other people but continue to correspond and to have feelings about one another. In one part of the play, the male character writes a letter detailing what his wife has written on the annual Christmas card bragging letter and fills in point by point what’s really going on. That part of the play is very funny.</p>
<p>AR Gurney is my favorite playrwright, and I remember seeing the play on Broadway. Wish I could remember that part!</p>
<p>H took a class with Gurney when he was at MIT. Said he really enjoyed it.</p>
<p>FIL writes his Christmas letter from the pov of their cat. We still get the annual news in excrutiating detail, but it’s like the cat was napping under the SUV once too often and is missing some of his kitty marbles. It’s all about what my in-laws did during the year, but in weird, pseudo-cat language…</p>
<p>Old Gray Man and Lovely Lady got a big, blue machine that makes a lot of noise. It has a horn in it that scares me and makes me want to run inside… :)</p>
<p>We love getting those “brag” letters. It has become a tradition that when one comes in we sit around the dinner table reading them with funny voices and laugh our heads off. I often wonder if many are for real. I mean, come on … kids with 5 extra curriclular activities each, a star in every one and straight A’s while building homes for the poor in Costa Rica, without one screw-up, one broken limb, one mosquito borne illness?</p>
<p>I’m among those who are “guilty” of writing the holiday letters. We started them when our D was 2 (she’s now a senior). The first one began with… If you are one of those people who hates holiday letters, toss now, if not, then read on. I have a large extended family and this is one of the only times we update people. We include the good, the bad, and the ugly from the year. There is some celebration of exciting events or accomplishments but it is also sprinkled with the sometimes humorous reality of life with kids. We always try to put humor in the mix and try hard to avoid too much bragging – we include what has made us happy and what has made us sad during the year. We have many requests to keep the letters coming. Of course, this may be a reflection of the fun that folks are making of us (see examples above…)!</p>
<p>I realized a few years ago that these letters really catalog our lives and I began saving copies for each child. When they leave for their first “real” jobs and living quarters, I plan to have the letters bound for each child as a memory book. Heaven knows I wouldn’t otherwise be able to recall the month and year the beloved cat died or how depressed we were in November 2000 and 2004 and shaken by the attacks in 2001. </p>
<p>I love getting the letters from friends and relatives and almost all are restrained (in terms of bragging) and a couple are hilarious (intentionally).</p>
<p>musicmomic – Yes, I started when my D (now a Junior, who is my 3rd child) was born, and it became too much for me to write personal letters to everyone. I also saved them every year in a “Christmas Book” along with a photograph, to chronicle our years. I can’t tell you how often we referred to that book during the college application process. “Mom, what year did I start piano lessons?” It’s also great to have around for labeling our collection of random, boxed photographs that never got into albums. I know exactly what year we went out west, or which relative got married when, or when the tornado came through, or which foster child was with us when…</p>
<p>I read them again now and then, when I’m feeling nostalgic and missing my boys. I only wrote about the big things: How else would I remember that my especially talented second child learned to whistle and to hop on one foot in the same year! 
</p>
<p>A friend of mine saves all the Christmas letters she gets, along with photos, and keeps them in a binder in page protectors. She says she enjoys following up on various “stories” and such, and watching the children grow. I wish I’d done that. </p>
<p>I really value the connection these letters bring. I feel closer to folks when I’m given insight into their lives.</p>