Simple and creative ways to help your military kids say goodbye to their friends before your next big move!
creative ways for military kids to farewell their friends
Military moves are brutally hard! Throw kids into the mix, with their beautiful vulnerable hearts and carefree ideals of the world in which we live and brutal, just became even harder!
If I was asked to cast my mind to the most heart wrenching moments of my army wife life or my family's military journey thus far; every single one of them would revolve around my children. My heart breaks at the memories of them grieving at having to farewell their daddy each and every time he walks out the door for weeks or months on end. Even worse though, is the grief they experience at having to farewell their closest childhood friends, knowing they may never see them again.
Five years into our Australian Military family journey; we've made more cross-country moves than we ever imagined possible in such a short time frame. As our children have grown and more than one has begun formal schooling; we've gotten creative with the ways in which we help our little ones say goodbye to their world; the kids who've supported them through thick and thin. The ones they hope everyday to meet again, but perhaps never will. Here are our favourite farewell ideas…
I hope even one of these farewell rituals will be an encouragement to you and your military kid. Don't forget to drop me a comment below if you give one a go, or have one for me to try!
Host a whole class or friendship group farewell party
Simplicity is perfection with this one! I see you military mama; you're a thousand moving boxes deep and wading through paperwork as your next military move hurtles at you. You DO NOT want to add party planning to your agenda. I promise you, your child doesn't expect a three ring circus and custom party favours; they just want a chance to say goodbye to their people. We've shouted school friends to ice cream at a local parlour as a farewell before and it went down beautifully! An icy pole at the park and a game of soccer would suffice for little ones. Our military kids so badly want their experience and their feelings validated too. I very nearly pushed off having a farewell for my then seven year old as we left our last posting. I was extremely burned out after our second 12 month turnaround and I couldn't bear the thought of an extra admin job (chasing down all the relevant parents to contact). I'm so grateful we prioritised it though! As it would turn out, my daughter's classroom teacher was MORE than happy to help facilitate any farewell custom our hearts desired (taking a lot of the stress off of me) and my daughter still raves about her “ice cream farewell” 12 months later ;)
2. Send a signature bear to class
These things first made an appearance over 30 years ago and were popular when I was a kid, but I couldn't go past them when I was looking for a cute way for my little ones (Kindergarten and grade 2) to collect their classmate's signatures.
As you can imagine, I couldn't find the cute one I owned as a child - but Amazon has a gorgeous range of calico signature bears and while I was skeptical as to whether bears at this price point would stand the test of time; they have held up beautifully and are so cherished by my girls. I didn't trust the quality of the pens which were supplied with them (and wanted the girls to have the choice of fun colours anyway) so I bought a bumper pack of coloured sharpies off of Amazon and they worked brilliantly.
Of course I pre-emptively warned their teachers that I was sending in sharpies so they could have kids use them outside and protect against unnecessary marks on walls, desks and classroom aids. But the kids and staff alike had a brilliant time leaving their mark on the teddy. Word travelled around the school that these bears were being signed and they ended up collecting signatures far beyond their own little homeroom classes, which my military kids were stoked about!
3. Build-a-scrapbook date
This idea is soooooo much fun! (and i'll tell you why in three words: thermal. print. camera.)
These cameras work on the same technology as your standard supermarket checkout receipt printer. Put thermal print paper in and through heat activation, the image you capture is instantly engraved on the paper. Your military kid and their friends can snap and print to their heart's content and then they can compile all the photos they've taken into a scrapbook that they all sign/decorate/write well wishes in together (bonus points if you buy spare scrapbooks, so each kid in the friendship group can make their own!).
Of course trusty polaroid cameras are a great tool for teens to build a scrapbook with, but if you want to avoid the expense/slash have young children … thermal print cameras are so incredibly affordable on Amazon and give your littles so much creative licence to capture those last moments with their friends in the way they want to. I can't recommend them enough!
4. Give out custom “Military kid” business cards
This is such a cute and fun idea. I read about it years ago and couldn't resist whipping some up. Click HERE for your free, downloadable Military kid business cards (don't forget to set your printer paper orientation to “landscape" before printing). I've taken the liberty of designing some for you to hopefully save you just that little extra time to *breathe* during what is universally recognised as one of the most stressful human experiences: moving house!
You can customise these cards with all the details you feel comfortable giving out to your children's peers at school (messenger kids username, email, phone number or parent's phone number for younger kids) and a brief message explaining why moving is a part of life for your child and just how much it would mean to them if classmates stayed in touch!
I highly recommend personalising these at home and then laminating (for that extra touch of professionalism and protection against unwanted spills). You can always enlist the help of your child's teacher to pass these cards to the students or classroom parents at an appropriate time and then even if you and your kids don't get a chance to collect all those numbers and emails that you'd hoped to before moving day rolls around; your kids peers will always have a way to get ahold of them.
business card design ©️ Jessica - misadventures of a military mama
Business card design ©️ Jessica - Misadventures of a military mama
5. Help them gift a piece of their heart
Kids LOVE giving. Spend a minute with a toddler and they'll have gifted you five “flowers” from the garden, two home made cards and a macaroni necklace. Creating and giving is such an integral way that children show their love. So why not lean into this and encourage your kids to make a gift from the heart for each of their closest friends.
The options for hand made gifts are endless (comic book, playlist, jewellery, photo album, poem or song, knitted or crocheted items etc), no matter the age, gender or ability of your child. The cherished memories of planning and creating this gift and then the joy their friends express on receiving it; will last far beyond the harder moments of your military move and will help your child to hold onto just a little more autonomy during a seriously turbulent time.
6. Set up a pen-pal exchange
Last but not least; organise privately with just a few of your child's closest friends to swap home address and send letters back and forth via good old snail mail.
Rarely have I seen more joy on one of my children's faces, than when they've received a letter in the mail. It's one of life's simple pleasures and takes so little organising.
I highly recommend this one … and you can take it a step further and connect your military kid to someone else's military kid so they can brighten each other's days with physical letters. Nothing makes a house feel like a home more quickly than a mailbox full of joy ;)
I hope you've enjoyed reading these … please do try one or two and leave your best suggestions for farewell ideas below.
Also … if you didn't already grab it, don't forget to download your free military kids business cards by clicking HERE; simply adjust your printer paper size to "letter" in settings and hit print! You can double side these or just print on two pages and glue the two halves together. Laminate them after you write on them for that little extra touch!
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Love to all you military mamas,
Jessica xo
