Thank you letters

[curtaincall]

What's the difference between getting your child to write a thank-you card and pulling teeth? The second one might be easier.

DS aged 6 has 17 thank you cards to write and has done 4. This took the best part of an hour even though he's a good writer. Wanted to do anything but. The party was a success, the presents were generous. We've told him this. Any ideas to encourage him to go a hell of a lot just a teeny bit faster?

cheat and do them on a computer, then he can write one longer one and taylor it to everyone.
I never used to do this but DS2 is SUCH a reluctant writer I gave in and at least he will do them without a big scene now and he can design his own border etc.

i think for such a young one i would print out a letter with gaps in for him to write. I'd also ask him to help you write the letter as well, so it is really from him.

eg
dear --
thank you for coming to my party. I loved the -you gave me. it is brilliant because it --
love
Sammy

etc

does that make sense

One of my friends got her son to write one long one and then photocopied it! I gave up at Christmas and he just put his name at the bottom, but even this was painful!

ooh and some friends of mine would take a pic of the party and use the bottom of that for the thank you - i'm guessing you have software that does it - all done within a few days!

do one and colour photocopy it. life is too short

For 5th birthday presents I got DS1 to write

"Thank you from DS1" and put in a photo of him holding the present.

For Christmas after 5th birthday I got DS1 to write "Thank you for the xxx, love from DS1".

For 6th birthday I think it'll be "Thank you for the xxx. It is . Love from DS1".

You don't need much at that age, surely.

hey I've done that, it's not competitive parenting

some people like doing it?

different strokes and all of that

Mutt yes he did thank them at the time though opened them after party IYSWIM. Yes it is a lot but the ones he's done are only 3 lines such as dear... thank you for ... love ...
Also, he only sees about half of them every day. Last year he wrote the same number in 2 days (those were the days when he did everything we asked of him!) Half term coming up end of the week and want his friends to receive one before end of Feb.

When he does get down to it, he does 'creative writing' which is quite sweet normally but they are unreadable unless you are Inspector Morse as he does mirror writing, Chinese style - top to bottom and highly decorative letters etc. He spends 15 minutes on each one.

Thanks for advice about computer, photocopying etc. everyone. Life's too short and I think will print out something plus a photo of the party which he can top and tail.

Hi!
I remember writing thank you letters as a child as an acutely painful experience - I was probably an average writer but my mum insisted on me starting again if I made a spelling mistake/ messy smudge/ writing got scruffy etc. I can remember genuinely wishing people would not give me presents so I would not have to write them!

So I never make my DC1 (5) write them unless she wants to (occasionally she spontaneously writes a short thank you note (in her own words and with her own spellings) and draws a picture for something she especially loves or a present received during the year rather than birthday/ Christmas)! We call people to say thank you, thank them verbally when they give the present in person, or I write an email to family we rarely see.

I would rather not receive a "forced" thank you note personally!

Just my opinion!

I do have mixed feelings about all this and have been thinking more about it over the last couple of hours. We were brought up never to begin a card 'Thank you for...' as it was just letter writing by numbers with no real sentiment behind it. I'm now asking my ds to do just that as it's the easiest, quickest thing to do.

But I do want DS to learn that people who've spent their precious time and hard earned income on a gift for him, deserve proper gratitude commensurate at least in part with the effort it has taken them. Old-fashioned gratitude in other words.

I've had some thankyou letters with a picture of all the kids at the actual party, and printed above it says "Dear, Thank you for coming to my party, I had a great time!" and below the kid writes "Thank you for my starwars lego, love Boris"

It is nice to have a pic of the party and much better than a photo of the kid holding the present.

I'm like 2and1onthe way and remember the whole letter writing thing as taking away all the joy of the present. That list of thank you letters to write would hang over me for days after Christmas or my birthday and I would end up sending formulaic thank yous which really meant nothing at all.

Nowadays I never make my own children write thank you letters. If they are physically given the gift by someone they say thank you then and there, otherwise they phone or maybe send an email. For school parties I make sure I thank the parent because frankly the child never really works out who has given them what from the mountain of presents they receive. I'm pleased to say we have never had a thank you letter from anyone at school either so we are not outside the norm.

I'm also worried that number of thank you letters might put the child off writing.