For most, this time of year evokes a feeling of family. You tend to want to reach out to those you have not seen in a while and catch up. Perhaps they live close by and you just can't seem to get together often enough throughout the year. Perhaps they live far away and the only way you would get to see them is to travel by plane, train or automobile for many hours. Perhaps you cannot afford to do that.
A great way to stay in touch with your family and keep them up to date with what is going on in your life is to send out a newsletter. Have you always wanted to write a newsletter to send out to all of your relatives during the holiday season? Are you having trouble figuring out how to write it and where to start?
The first thing you need to do is create a list of everyone you want to send the letter to, including their full name and address is using traditional mail or email addresses if you are choosing to send it by email. (I tend to be old-fashioned, I guess, and still believe that traditional mail is more personal.)
Next, you want to make a list of the topics or items of interest you would like to mention in your newsletter. This may include vacations you've taken this past year, notes about various family members about what they have accomplished this year or what they are doing these days, thoughts of the season and so on. At first, don't worry about putting them into story form, or even sentence form. Just jot down all of your ideas using bullet points on a piece of paper.
Once you have all the ideas written down, choose one topic at a time and write a few sentences about that subject. This can be handwritten or done in a Word document on your computer. (This is preferable because it is easier to edit what you write.)
After you have finished writing about each of the subjects, you can prioritize the subjects and put your paragraphs in order accordingly.
Finally, return to the top of the newsletter document and write an introduction, putting your various topics underneath. Then, finally, add a closing at the bottom.
That's all it takes!
It's nice to mail out your newsletter to each person but, the alternative is to send it via email with some graphics or family photos thrown in for good measure. Encourage other relatives to do the same. It would be fun to receive newsletters from them too!
If you start preparing your newsletter now, you can have it done and sent out in time for the holidays. You can send it out anytime in December. It would not be too soon.
So get started and share your stories with your relatives (and even friends) to keep everyone abreast of what is happening in your life.
Wishing those of the Jewish faith a Happy Chanukah!
Wishing everyone an organized week!
