I had no idea that you could include those things in letters. I didn't think we were allowed to. Does it vary by prison? Those are some very good ideas.

I called the county jail and asked about mailing a magezine, he told me that i could not mail a magezine unless it came straight from a company, but if i rip pages out that they will allow it as long as there is no porn

We have to send magazines through a company. We can't rip out things from newspapers or magazines. We have to copy them. Stupid, huh?
I don't write to him much. I see him at least twice a week and usually talk to him about3 times a day. Less if I work and he knows the nasty manager will be there.
I do send him things he would like to know about. Articles in the newspaper, pictures of things I do, things we might buy, pictures of the grandkids, etc.
We discuss when he gets out where we will go on vacation. Lately we are discussing my house problems, and he has helped me find help. He helps me decide on car issues, etc.too. I include him in everything I do here. It makes him feel still a part of this life out here.
Recently we almost got another house. It needed work, but had 3 acres and had possibilities, so that got his mind going. I sent him pictures of the house, yard, and pole barn, and he then made redecorating and renovating plans. Now I am looking at a place that has an apartment upstairs and a storefront. We are discussing starting up a take out pizza place in that town. It gives him something to strive for.

Janie,

This advice is not only for you, but for all the new mothers or wives with sons or husbands in prison.

When your loved one receives a letter from anyone on the outside, as soon as they read the letter, tell them to tear off the return address and flush it. I don't know how many times I saw one inmate steal addresses from another inmate and start trying to contact the family, so get those return addresses off the envelope and flush them.

I know you folks have enough to worry about without some crazy inmate trying to call you, or worse, trying to extort money from you. I have seen inmates contact the family of another inmate and tell them that their loved one is in grave danger and they need to send him some money. You would be surprised how many families fall for that kind of nonsense.

So rip those return addresses off and flush them.

rewdiazepam

Wisconsin i like that about how you include him in the decisions. I recently started doing the same thing with asking for his opinion on alternative energy sources for backup to solar panels. lol It got his mind clicking and i am sure it kept him occupied for a day or two anyway. I can tell you now, I am going to HATE it when he is transported to prison if i can not rip out pages of books and magazines.i have subscribed to reader digest for him and ordered a couple of individual magazines but it is very expensive to send a single magazines or comic books. 2 comic books cost me $32.

And thank you for the safty tip rewdiazapam, I had not thought about that.

I also ordered him all kinds of catalogs. Things he can look at and plan for later when out. Like how to build a deck, the costs, materials, etc. Car auto parts catalogs, which we always have cars to fix. Just things he would like. We have planned on getting married for YEARS, so I even sent him as kind of a joke wedding planning catalogs. I am sure he LOVED those.

He got so many catalogs, the mail lady there got mad, said he was getting too many. Well, she don't have to read them all first, like they do sometimes. Just give him the darn things.

Sometimes his magazines are delivered there, but he don't get them right away. They come to him with pages obviously viewed, sometimes they have pages missing of coupons or ads, so we know the mail person is looking at them first.

Including them helps both of us. He can help me figure out things, and I get help with answers I wouldn't have a clue about otherwise.

I send him copies of important papers or mail, since I tend to lose things. He keeps them in case we need them later.

We go over our bills together, he helps with my budget, so really he is actively involved in our life out here.

He watches commercials and finds things I might need to buy or know about.

He is even worried about my issues with my health and finds things like new medicines to ask about and other things. It works for us.

We are presently looking for a new home and land, so he looks in the newspapers, gives me the phone numbers for me to call.

Years ago I did a genealogy search for his father's side of the family. He didn't grow up with his dad. Long story. I found out MORE than you would think you could. Very interesting family. So I would print it off and send it to him. Sometimes if there was a question if one or more people were related to him, I would have him look and see who those people were connected to and he would help me decipher if they were his relatives or not.

We found out he was related to the captain of a ship that hit something and there was a huge oil spill on Lake Superior years ago. The Exxon-Valdez scandal. We found out the his dad's side of the family had very similar traits regarding alcoholism and vanishing for days or weeks, as he has.

We found out his great great grandpa was a Civil War Hero, and that there was a ship named after him. Also that one of his relatives actually hid Billy the Kid and his boys while the cops all over were looking for them.

Very interesting family. He was deeply enthralled in this project. He couldn't wait to get his mail everyday, and it kept me busy for hours a day while I was unemployed.

And the best part is it made him feel connected to that side of his family. People he had never had a chance to meet from this generation. I contacted one of his cousins and they still write. She is a jailer in Missouri or Kentucky, and her husband is a cop. How funny that is?

I found out that half of them were Pentecostal Christians, the other half were drunks. Go figure, he is in for DUI's. I found info back to the 1700's. Could of found more but that was enough. Pages and pages he made into a book.

They can use their minds in there to get through it. And it really solidifies our relationship too.

We intend to go to a family reunion the next time they have one. We also stay connected to one of his nephews who also is in prison. No one else does.It's a son of a brother he was never raised with.

I also did more research and found out his father had a daughter that he never knew about. I got pretty good doing research on the computer.

He gives me ideas what to buy people for Christmas, if I can't think of anything.

Really there is a wealth of things they can still do with us and for us. Just gotta use your brain as to what they can help us with.

I took apart a book full of floor plans and sent the pages (a few at a time) and some graph paper. I figured that would surely keep him busy a while. I am always talking to him about renewable energy and living off grid like i am working on , so i send information about all of the different sources and inventions for off grid families. by the time that he is up for parole (in 3 years) he should have every detail worked out lol. I am missing my baby so much. i cant stand it.

I have an app on my phone that is called the final count down. it is a countdown to the day he will be up for parole. DOES THAT SOUND CRAZY??? lol
It shows how many years*monthes*weeks*days*weekdays*hours*minutes*seconds*and milliseconds until it is time for him to come home. I like it because i can look at it now and then and i have a visual of how much time we have behind us

I had an app like that too Janie. I was lucky to have him serve a short custodial with a longer community order. It helps. Even seeing 10 minutes pass really helps. Once you get halfway it gets a bit easier, time seems to move faster.

I used to send a letter weekly. I'd say how things were going, what's been happening on tv shows he had missed, our children would send him drawings. It was never anything exciting but he looked forward to them!

Hi everyone, I'm new here. I like the ideas here and what you all do for the family and friends you have in the system. I'm a former federal prisoner with the experience still very fresh in my mind.

I love that you send material to prisoners. The greatest part of any day in the prison is "mail call." Having your name called when they are passing out mail. Some men get tons of mail, while others get no mail at all for years.

What you send, honestly, doesn't matter if he/she doesn't like it or isn't interested in it. You may think they love this one item you send, and they may just take it and give it away. Some prisoners even barter items but most get thrown away.

I'd like to recommend that you earnestly listen for what he/she likes and what they would like to receive. Besides stamp stamps are not getting any cheaper. Sending what they like will increase the likelihood of them talking about it to you. That's how you tell what they like the most. You won't have to bring it up.

Good luck.

Oh he gives me plenty of ideas what I should send him too. I did get him a few magazines, that he enjoys, about cars. He is hoping to restore an old car someday.

I am having a problem with the jail. The comic books that i ordered for him were delivered to the jail friday but the have not given them to him yet. also missing commissary that i paid $40 for. This is not a large jail where it would be easy to lose these things. I went up to the jail today and told the cop at the front desk what was going on with the commissary and he put me off telling me that he will have more information for me by 3pm. and of course there was nothing. he said that he would call me by 430pm.....he never called back. I had to contact tiger commissary 3 times before someone finally told me that i would have to have the jail to call them to confirm that the order never arrived so that they can resend. any suggestions on dealing with this type of situation?

Thank you for the advise on what to send john. i am sure that some of the stuff that i send in there does get trashed. i dont think that he has the heart to tell me that he doesnt like it all. however, he did finally tell me that he would be okay without the coloring book pages haaaahaha. I probably made him look like a wimp by sending in disney coloring books for him. lol

HAHA that's funny, coloring books. BUT... did you see a commercial for adult color books. They say it is a form of relaxation that works. Think about it, when you sit and color with a young child, it is relaxing. Just maybe don't send kids color books. HAHA

And what Rew said about our addresses is true. It did happen to us. His roommate got my address, he was extorting from him and me. Ended up he threatened to do things to all of us if I didn't send him money, and also that my guy didn't get a bunch of guys there stuff out of his canteen. So I had to put money on that too. They told him they knew my address, and my parents address, as I had moved there for awhile too. This roommate had read his letters, knew even my kids names. They had people drive past my house. I saw them. They knew what kind of car I drove and told my fiance that.

It got so bad, I ended up causing a big stink with all the higher ups at the prison and threatened to go to the media because the guards were allowing it to happen. They " over look" some things SOME of the guys do. I used kinda crazy tactics also, but it stopped it. It got the guy taken out of that room and put in solitary until my guy could be moved, not only to another prison but one I told them I wanted him to be moved to or I would stir more things up.

It just had happened luckily that our local news had did an expos'e on things that go on in prisons that the guards let happen. They sure didn't want this dredged up.

But before it ended it was a nightmare of huge proportions. We found out later that 6 other guys were having the same problems. We had had to pretend we broke up, not write much, I couldn 't visit for awhile. Not until I did what I had to do and got him moved.