4th and 5th letters have arrived from Finland and Arizona

As promised,here are todays 4th and 5th letters.They are both from my youngest daughter's only penpals & let me tell you they are the sweetest women ever!She really enjoys her letters from them,so she was happy that we got letters from both of them on the same day! :)

This first letter below is from Kati in Finland...she sent us a great recipe for shrover buns...we will have to try these once we get our new oven put in. :) She wrote us about Shrover on the postcard.Thanks or should I say kiitos Kati for the letter,postcard & recipe!It is greatly appreciated!

Now,onto the next letter.It comes from Tracey in Arizona.We met her through postcrossing just recently.Along with a letter,she has sent some cute notecards and stickers...as penpalers know,you can never have enough of those,right? :) Thanks so much Tracey for also joining our project!Every letter brings us much happiness!

We seem to be averaging one new sign up everyday, but we will need more than that to reach our goal.Please join in so you can see your letter on this blog,too.As always,please feel free to grab our blog button,tell your friends,tell anybody you think would be interested in seeing their letter on our blog for all the world to see.Maybe one of your goals for 2011 is to write more,well,now is the best time to start,right?So why not write to someone that you know will really appreciate a letter from you...us! :)

More letters arrived...

We've had an arrival of 2 letters today,but you will have to wait til later to see the photos...sorry.I will give you two hints for now (one for each place). The first hint is Moomins (that might really stump most people if you've never heard of them) & for the second place the clue we will leave you with is the Aztec Indians called this place "arizuma",which means silver-bearing.I think that clue was too easy for you guys,but at least you learned something new for today,right? ;) Check back tonight for photos.As always,thanks for new sign ups,we are literally getting at least 1 new member every single day...it's amazing!Thanks to you all for your kindness in making this project a success so far! We are really thinking we can reach our goal! We refuse to give up! Email us at the address in the sidebar of you haven't signed up already,thanks!

Letter #3 from England

Well,even though it's gloomy out and we are all sick in bed,we had something exciting happen! The mailman brought us another lovely letter for the letter project.I'll give you some clues below to see if you can figure out if it's your letter....

image from here

image from here

Has anybody figured out where this letter came from? Well,it's all the way from England! The lovely Rachael sent us this wonderful letter below with a postcard of her town and some photos,which we think is really cool.We love the train station photo,too. :) Rachael is a film maker and owner of Glass Completey Empty Productions.She's putting together a lovely art project about our favorite thing- penpalling! We think that is so cool especially since most people don't even write anymore...I even hear it's becoming a problem for kids and that some kids cannot even spell anymore because of all the abbreviations kids use when texting...so sad! Anyways,stop by her blog and tell her hi and that you love her idea for a documentary on letter writing.I hope it never becomes a total lost art.Thanks so much for the lovely letter Rachael and I hope you didn't mind us sharing your blog on here.... free advertising,right;) Enjoy her letter below:

Please keep the momentum going....tell everybody you know about our project to help us reach our goal.No letter is too short or too long.Maybe you know a teacher looking for a writing project for her class.We'd love to get some letters from children and their information would be anonymous since they would be mailed from school and each letter would be counted individually & posted on this blog so they could see their own letter on a blog.I think it would be so interesting to read about schools in other countries so we could compare them to the schools over here.

Rachael,I'm sure you'll be hearing back from my daughter once she's feeling better...she was so excited when you contacted her about your project!

If you're new to this blog,feel free to email me at the address on the right sidebar for more information about our project or with any concerns.Thanks and as always,please continue to help us spread the word to get more letters!

Updating...

Hello everybody! Just wanted to keep you all updated....we have been having people sign up everyday to send us a letter,so that's wonderful! We haven't gotten any more letters since the last letter we posted but we should get one soon...hopefully it will be this week! Although we did get a postcard from Michigan...with a letter to follow at another time.I will give a proper post & thanks at a later time,I promise. I will have to wait to post it another time because we are all sick now.I'm typing this from my bed.As soon as my daughters are feeling well,I will have them post their introductions.Again,I'd like to thank all the people who have signed up & for our list of followers which continues to grow.Thanks so much to everybody for helping us try to reach our goal and to those of who who are spreading the word.You don't know how much it means to us,we really appreciate it!We are so excited everyday when the mailman comes hoping it will be a letter for the letter project.We can't wait to learn about how other people live & possibly get letters in another language.It's so exciting since every letter will be like a surprise since they will each be so different and unique...even if they come from the same country.We will be back as soon as we are all better or when we get a letter...which ever comes first.Till then I hope you are all doing fine!

PS-We keep watching our page views climb higher and higher but aren't getting nearly as many sign ups,so we do hope you will consider taking 5 minutes from your day to write us a letter.Thanks!

Our email is in the sidebar to your right if you would like to join,thanks!

About Semeeah...

Below is the introduction of my youngest daughter:

Hi!!My name is Semeeah,I'm 12 year old.I live in southwest VA.I have 2 sisters.My favorite movies are Ramona & Beezus,Chestnut,Despicable Me.My favorite shows are The Facts Of Life,Little House On The Prairie.My favorite postcards are Moomins,Limoon,other countries postcards.My 2 favorite countries are Finland and Germany.I love to get postcards from Germany and Finland.Look at my blogs here: http://myblythedollsarepretty.blogspot.com and http://mygoodmemories98.blogspot.com

Letter #2 from Belgium

Hi! Sorry we never got to the introductions as promised...we've had some sickness in the family,so introductions will come in a few days.Now on to better things....we've had our second letter arrive today!This is so exciting!Where is it from?Is the letter from you?Check out the picture below to see if it's your letter...

Here's a clue:

This lovely package came all the way from Belgium,from the sweet Rebecca.She included a teen magazine and some postcards.Thanks Rebecca for the package and we loved your letter with the cute doodles. :)

Once again,I apologize for the picture quality...I don't get too much light into our house so we have to work with what we have.

We are continuing to get emails from people who want to join,please don't be shy about joining or think you have nothing to say.You can write about anything.My girls are so excited about checking the mail and wondering where the next letter will come from.I need to get a map so we can pinpoint where all the letters come from.Please don't think that since we got a letter from Belgium,that we wouldn't want another letter from the same country.I'm sure you will have different things to write about.You are even free to write in your native language,so there is no excuse for you not to participate.

We now have 2,009 letters to go.Please help us reach this goal.Every envelope counts,so feel free to have each of your children write a letter,your relatives,your neighbors....anybody who wants to write can write to us.We'd love to hear about schools in other countries or maybe you are a fellow homeschooler overseas,we'd love to hear from you.Tell us what creative educational ideas your family or classroom uses.We would also love to get some art from participants or maybe share a story you have been writing....we'd love to give you feedback and help spread the word about your art or writing.

We figured we need to get about 167 letters a month to reach our goal and we are far from that figure this month, but we believe we can make it up in the months to come once more people learn about our project.I have even sent an email to the president (why not?) and a local newspaper.My daughter has also heard from some great people with some great ideas which we will not discuss until it happens.Feel free to post this project on any blog,magazine,newspaper,etc. We need to get the word out and I will do whatever I can to help my daughters achieve this goal.

I know many people would have preferred postcards but we really wanted to get to know the people who wrote to us and a postcard isn't as personal as a letter.To us a letter is like looking into the soul of a person...once people start putting pen to paper,things that you didn't think you'd write about just start flowing out onto the paper and when we read the letter,we feel like we are right there with you. I even enjoy writing letters to my own daughters and hope they will keep them to look through once I'm gone and maybe have a few laughs.I want my kids to have something tangible that came from my heart once I'm gone and I don't think emails would hold the same emotions as a letter.

We keep watching the page views go higher and higher and we want to thank our followers but the page views is nowhere near the number of sign ups,so please think about spending just a few minutes to write us a quick letter.If writing is too hard for you,you can just mail us a postcard of your city or country inside an envelope or just mail us a brochure of your favorite place to visit.

Email us at reneealam(at)verizon.com to sign up,thanks!

Here's our first letter...it's from Canada

Drum roll please! Our very first letter has arrived from Lena in Canada.Hooray for our first letter!Sorry about the bad picture...it was very gloomy today & we don't have good lighting in our house,either,so I do apologize for the picture quality.Thanks for the letter Lena!I know there are more letters on the way....will yours be on here next?Stay tuned,and as always,please help us spread the word.Only 2,010 letters to go...I know we can do it! We are so excited about receiving the next letter!

First Letter Arrived...2,010 to go.

Our first letter arrived today...actually it was addressed to my daughter but meant for this project,please remember if you are penpals with us please don't address the envelope to us personally,please address it to 2011 Letters project so we can keep them separated,thanks!

Who is the letter from you ask,well,you will have to wait a little longer as my camera battery died on us so it's charging,but we promise to be back with a picture letting you know which country it came from.This is so exciting!We hope this starts a chain reaction and that we start getting letters everyday...that would be so cool! (Is cool still a popular word to say or is it lame?...been out of school too long, but I like to think I'm still cool) :)

Tomorrow one of my daughters will be introducing herself.Maybe you would like to be her penpal after sending a letter...my daughters are all looking for penpals.We love mail.Our mailman is our bff...without him we have nothing to cheer up these gloomy days we have been having!So c'mon and get writing....your letter could be the next one to be pictured on here for all the world to see!You know all the cool people are writing to us,so be a part of this awesome project!Hmm,maybe I can get the president and his family to join in...I'm going to email them right now and I'll let you know how it goes.

We're so excited! (and we're not gonna hide it)

The project is starting off so great with people signing up every day to join.My daughters are so excited about collecting the letters from the mailbox and reaching our goal.The first letter should be in the postal system now but where it's from is a mystery.We will keep you all posted as soon as the first letter arrives.This is what we want to see below...send us your letters! :)

During the week we will also talk more about each other and what we hope to learn through this project.We want to hear from people of all backgrounds...writers,artists,homeschoolers,bloggers,authors,lawyers,etc.....we want to hear from all professions.Tell us what you love about your job...maybe it will influence us to pick a new career goal.Share your views of the world with us...tell us the good,tell us the bad.....help us see things in ways we never thought of before.Help us see things in a new perspective.I want my children to have open minds and not see things in only one way,so share your thoughts and ideas with us.

Maybe you would like to add some goodies...we would love to get bus tickets,subway tickets,brochures,etc. from your country.Anything you would love to share,we would be beyond thrilled to get.It makes learning more fun when you have tangible items to remind you about certain places.We hope to even make some new penpals through this.Please feel free to leave off your address off the envelope if you want it to remain private,we'll understand.

Again,please help us spread the word...let's make 2,011 letters happen! We want to see a letter from every state and every continent...that shouldn't be too hard.We want to hear from you!Thanks again for the great response and thanks to our followers for following...we love ya!

Email us at reneealam@verizon.net to participate

Keep the emails coming! :)

This project is off to a wonderful start thanks to the kindness of so many strangers we have yet to meet.We are so excited to learn about each and every one of you!No letter is too short or too long...we will love them all just as equally! We are so excited about receiving our very first letter and where it will be from!

Are you still thinking about joining but haven't yet?Need some ideas of what to write about?Here are just some of the things you can write about...again,feel free to write in a language other than English so my kids can work on getting it translated.That's called fun learning! ;)

Here's some things you can write about-(please feel free to write about something not on the list):

-Your homeland (prime minister,president,population,traditions,language,food,etc.)

-Your dreams for the year or your life

-Your favorite book...we'd love some recommendations...especially for children's books in other languages

-Tell us about the weather you are having (we're actually getting snow right now & it's beautiful!)

-Tell us about your hobbies....one of our favorite hobbies is penpalling!

-Tell us about your family...what do they do that makes you so happy?

-Maybe you could give us some words of wisdom...."if I could do it all over again,I would....."

-Famous quotes from your country

-Write the alphabet in your native language

-Share a family recipe (we promise not to tell if it's a secret) :)

-Tell us about the things that are important to you

-Share your goals for 2011 or have you given up on goals?

-Do you live on a farm,in the city...where do you live?

Again,these are just a few ideas of what you could write about to help you get started.Feel free to choose your own topics that are family appropriate.Help us spread the word about this great project....I've always told my kids to dream big and some people think our goal is too big,but help us prove them wrong and show my kids that any goal can be accomplished if you just try hard enough.Wishing you all a great weekend!

Email us at reneealam@verizon.net to join.Thanks!

Great response so far!

Wow,thank you to the many people who have already joined in on our project! We appreciate your support in this.It will be so great to see my daughters reading the letters about others from all over the world.I think they will learn so much more from this project than any textbook could ever teach them. I always felt that sometimes it's better to get know about others who are actually from another place by talking to them (or writing to them) than from someone who went on vacation and wrote down only what he/she thought was interesting.We are curious to learn about everything.

image from perfect bound studio

This project has no age limitations....if you want to send us handprint from a baby,that's fine with us :) ...we'd love to get letters especially from older folks who could tell us about their childhoods so we can imagine what life must have been like since things are always changing.

We want to know anything you are willing to share with us...tell us a favorite recipe,tell us your hobby,tell us about your family,tell us what makes you happy or sad.Don't limit yourself,but please keep it appropriate for my kids to read,too.This is a family project,after all.If you would like to add pictures or brochures,ticket stubs,or anything with your native language on it,we'd be thrilled.

image from here

These letters will be held in a special case that is yet to be bought...I just went shopping but didn't find that special box for them.I want these letters to be passed down to my grandchildren and so on. I am so excited about how my children will view the world after this.I know there are so many nice people in the world that we will never get to meet but at least we will have the letters to look back on.I think there's nothing better than the compassion of humanity & so many people have been so kind to us as we begin this project so thanks to all of you who have already joined in.We are awaiting our first letter & will post about it as soon as it arrives.What country will it be from.....hmm,we'll have to wait to find out. ;) Wanna take a guess?

We are even thinking of having PRIZES! Yes, you heard that right,prizes! We are thinking about offering prizes for the letter sent from the farthest distance from us & for the most decorative envelope/letter (we may even ask for your help in judging the for the finals) since we do love pretty letters and maybe we'll pick a random letter...when we get your letter we'll number it in the order received and at the end of the year we will put all the numbers into a bowl and pick a winner!So what are you waiting for,get your pen and paper out and start writing and maybe you can be our winner!Come on writers and help us reach our goal of 2,011 letters!

Please help us out and post about us on your facebook and twitter pages (we don't do either) but would love help spreading the word.Tell your friends and family members...everybody is welcome to participate.Hmm,wonder if we can get any astronauts to join in from outer space?We'd also love to hear from book authors from around the world.If you are reading this then we want to hear from you!Don't be shy,don't think we won't like your letter because every letter will be held precious to us.No excuses allowed,just do it!

Email us at reneealam@verizon.net to participate.Thanks!

Our New Project

Hello everybody!

Happy new year to you all!

First off,let me introduce you to us,we are a homeschooling family of 5-mom,dad & three girls ages 12,14 & 16.This is our 2nd round of homeschooling.We had a break of 5 years that my girls were in public school and now they are back home.We love learning about the world and we love letters.

Now the wheels turn....

A few weeks ago my daughters and I were talking about what we would like to do this new year (school wise). Since we homeschool we are always open to new ideas.We then had this excellent idea to try to collect 2011 letters this year from around the world.We would really like to get to know people from all over the world.We want to know your dreams for this year,we want to know about you...anything (acceptable for kids to read,of course).We can't travel the world but we would like to get to know about other people/cultures through letters.We want to know everything.Tell us your traditions,share a recipe with us,share a picture of your city/farm/village,where ever you live,we want to know about it.You are special to us and your beautiful letter will be preserved in a special box for us to look back through as the year passes and maybe future generations will be reading these letters. :)

This blog will be dedicated only to the letters we receive through this project.We will scan all letters (or just envelopes),pictures,etc that we receive and post them here for all the world to see.My daughters and I are really hoping that this will be a success.I think it's a great way for my children to learn about others through the best art ever...a written letter which has seemed to slowly fade away from mankind these days with all the technology humans have.We are a letter loving family so please send us your letters.

Please pass the word to your family and friends about our project.Anybody,anywhere can write us a letter.Help us meet our goal of 2011 letters!

Email us at reneealam@verizon.net