It can be difficult to be far away from good friends, especially during the holidays. After all, the season of joy is meant to be spent with the people you love and unfortunately, some of them aren’t able to be present physically. So how do you express your gratitude and appreciation for them if you can’t give them a hug or a smile? The following tips will help you strengthen that bond and bring you closer as friends.
Schedule Video “Dates”
There’s nothing quite like being able to see the other person – face to face – but when that isn’t a reasonable possibility, the next best thing is to chat with them over video. With tons of platforms available (Zoom, Skype, FaceTime, etc.) there’s really no reason at all not to do this. Plus, there are other apps to use that are specifically designed for multiple friends to ‘get together’ at one time. Talking and laughing is just fine, but why not broaden the scope of your call to incorporate:
- Cooking or baking together. Pick a recipe to try and talk each other through the steps while you do them! At the end, you can sample your deliciousness (or horrid mess!) together.
- Watch a movie together. Remember when you used to tell her to be quiet in the movie theater? Well, now you just press mute! Though you won’t likely do that to your far away best friend, you’ll re-discover the fun of ‘going to the movies’ again even if they do live hundreds of miles away.
Send them Gifts
Everybody likes to receive things and of course your best friend would love to get the occasional gift from you. The gifts don’t have to be lavish, but rather simple things that make them smile. Functional, beautiful, and thoughtful gifts go a long way toward connecting the two of you despite the miles.
- Send them a batch of homemade cookies or bread. It’s proven that when something is baked with love, it tastes even sweeter.
- Egift card. The beauty of an egift card is that you don’t have to send something physically through the mail. You send it via text or email, so they receive it instantaneously.
- Have a bouquet of flowers delivered to their work of home. Are they having an especially hard time not being able to get back for the holidays? Send them a gorgeous holiday bouquet to brighten their spirits.
Combine Your Talents
What could be a better way to strengthen your friendship than to collaborate on a fun project? With the holidays on their way, you can give it a little festive twist!
- Start a scrapbook together. With the amount of time the two of you have been friends, you’ve likely got a thousand pictures together. So many adventures and events, all still on your phones. Why not start creating a scrapbook, one page at a time. You can finish your side of one page, and then send it to your friend to finish the other, and then as they are completed, add them to your scrapbook binder.
- Create an Advent Calendar for each other. Opening the little doors or windows on an Advent calendar has long been part of the anticipation and joy of the holidays for many people. Take it one step further by creating an advent calendar for each other. You can put in photos of the two of you, favorite images, places you’d like to travel, recipes, suggested videos, and other surprises.
- Get on Spotify and collaborate on a holiday playlist. Every musical genre has its own brand of holiday music. Whatever you happen to like, build a playlist for the two of you to play throughout the season.
Craft a Calendar
The greatest gift you can give a friend is the gift of your time, and your ear to listen. Make a calendar together online or a physical one to copy and share with them that designates specific days and times for video chats, phone calls, and physical meet ups. Modify as needed, but having one, to begin with, will help solidify your friend commitment toward one another.
Make a New Year’s Resolution Together
Being friends who live apart isn’t easy. With the New Year coming, now is the perfect time to make a real commitment toward understanding each other more, listening more, and being there for each other. Your resolution might be along the lines of making sure you work on seeing each other at least once or twice in the coming year or vowing to talk more on the phone.
