Building a Digital Care Package

"By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

~John 13:35 (ESV)

Have you ever sent a care package to a loved one? Care packages are a fabulous way to show our love for others, to comfort, encourage, or celebrate with them. Care packages also become an avenue to help others “find Christ in the every day,” by taking the opportunity to fill these packages with reminders of Christ’s love and care for the receiver.

When our oldest son left home for a semester abroad which would keep him away form home over some holidays, I planned to send a care package to help him settle in and overcome the homesickness; a care package that would help him focus on the Lord’s blessings in his life even while he struggled to find his feet in completely unfamiliar territory. Together, the family and I prepared gifts for him to open at special times. Some of these were just for him, while others were meant also to be a blessing to new friends.

We were all disappointed to discover this box would never make it through customs in time … if at all. We had been quite creative with our little gifts, but this discovery sent us back to the drawing board. Surely, we could still send a care package! We would just need to do it digitally.

Thus began my online search for ideas. What might I fill this digital care package with? How could I package it for that same feeling of receiving something unexpected from home? In this digital age, texts and emails are an expected part of life and do not deliver the same feeling as a box delivered to your door. Surprisingly, I found absolutely nothing in my searches. For the first time, Google completely failed me! There were a million results for care packages, for digital products to order and decorate care packages, for items to order to fill care packages. All the results for all my different searches were for the traditional care package, nothing converted this idea to a digital age. I found only one idea for digital ideas to text someone to show you care. Could I really be the first one to think of translating this classic idea into the digital age!

It took a little while for the creative juices to begin to flow in this new direction. Once they did, I came up with ideas to fill a digital care package with relative ease. The hard part was the presentation or delivery method. I wanted our son to feel like he was opening a box from home. I wanted this care package to hold surprise after surprise, each little item offering or recalling a blessing, bring a smile and some encouragement. I wanted it to be something that would last the semester. Of course, I could just send a little gift or link from time to time, but there would not be anticipation in that. That method of delivery felt so “blah” and did not approach the "care package" idea.

I began looking at my digital tools. What apps did I have which could help create something like this? How could I digitally send one item that would hide others within? I felt like I struck gold when my eyes fell upon an application that could do just that. Even better was the fact that it is an app most people already have access to, making this a gold nugget to share with the world.

Keynote became my delivery method, though PowerPoint or Google Slides should also work for you. I then filled this digital care package with links that would bless the receiver and shared the file with him. (Below I share the method for creating the care package and ideas for what to include. Join my email list and get the password for the member library so you can access the editable file I created and make it your own.)

Send a digital version of the traditional care package to bless a missionary family, a military member stationed overseas, a college student away from home, or anyone else you know who could use a reminder that Christ is in their every day. I would love to know how it is received!

Method:

I created a new slideshow with three initial pages: a title page, an index page, and “spoiler alert” page. The “index” page has a series of boxes labeled for when to open them and each box links to a later page added after the “Spoiler Alert” page. On these linked pages, the receiver finds the enlarged box with its “open when” label. When he advances the slide the box crumbles away (thank you, transitions) and a brief message containing a link appears.

Ideas for how you might label the boxes:

·      Specific dates

·      Specific holidays

·      Unconventional “national days”

·      Family specific celebrations

·      Spring break/vacation by day

·      Times of the day (8:00 am)

·      Order (first, second, etc.)

·      Get creative and adjust if for what you want it to be

Ideas for what you could “fill” the boxes with links to:

·      Anything digital

·      A gift card code

·      A music file or song

·      A favorite movie

·      Aa Pinterest board they would enjoy

·     An online plan or pattern

·      An article or post

·      A YouTube video (comedian, nature scenes, topic of interest, a sermon, etc.)

·      A Dropbox file where you have uploaded a file, perhaps video of your verbal message of encouragement