Skype the ones you love
How to conquer long-distance family relationships
We have a speaker phone in the kitchen. Most mornings while we have breakfast we dial grandma and grandpa and the kids talk to their grandparents as if they are just in the room together. For us it means we can talk about all the unimportant things that are going on in our lives, and the kids and grandparents feel like they know each other. There are plenty of cheap phone deals - all of our long distance calls are now capped at $2.50 a call.
Our kids post plenty of that fabulous art work that comes home from school and kindy back home to the grandparents, so grandma gets the joy of sharing in the clutter too!
Our folks send heaps of weird things through the mail: pictures of elephants they have cut out of the newspaper, just because they know our eldest loves elephants; photos of grandpa and the big banana, stuff the kids love (it's also grandma's way of sharing her clutter with us!)
Every summer the kids and I spend a few weeks with the grandparents, just hanging out, doing fun stuff.
Email! Email! Email! It's the best way to keep up contact with friends and family, who are at work or aren't big phone chatterers.
When someone back home has a special birthday, we make a cake for them at our end then phone them and sing happy birthday. The kids get to blow out the birthday candles, and dont miss out on cake.
And when you miss really special occasions, have a good cry, go to bed early and it will all be OK in the morning.
- Kathryn, Kalgoorlie
