Mother Goose

Travelin'Oma, Week 9, Day 3. I was inspired!

Mother Goose.

As I wrote about in a recent post, Joseph's family grew up memorizing poetry together on a weekly basis. It is a tradition we have tried to carry on, but not very successfully. I have had a mental block for a few years now about how to do it with small children to keep it engaging and not so long that there are too many weeks until we get to the end. However, today's Travelin'Oma post about Mother Goose inspired me! This is where we'll start. Next week we will begin with a classic from Mother Goose to memorize. I am really excited. I hope this is the beginning of a long tradition for us!

Activity Centers. Done and Done.

Travelin'Oma, Week 9, Day 2.

Activity centers. Done and Done.

With two VERY active young boys, this summer I began to look ahead to this winter, when they would be cooped up and inevitably have cabin fever. I was fairly concerned about what on earth I would do to keep them occupied. Then this project hatched in my brain. It took so much logistical figuring and refiguring and more refiguring to make it all work, but I am very pleased with the results. In addition to making one for each of my boys, I also made one for my niece, Madeleine.

These activity centers house alphabet and number magnets, washable crayons, washable markers, colored pencils, notebooks, and a magnet clip to attach artwork to the working surface while in use. The working surface is a magnetic whiteboard and can be used on top of the container, like a table, or with the pad attached and placed on a lap.

I have concocted all sorts of activities for the boys to do at their activity centers, in addition to typical art activities. Sorting objects by color, working on identifying letters and numbers, spelling, math facts, checkers, tic-tac-toe, etc. I am still making the activities - and some won't be age-appropriate for a little while still - but the ideas are flowing and I am writing them all down. Please comment (or email me) if you have any ideas you would like to share for activities to add to my collection.

Now, when a rainy, or snowy, day comes, I have these in my arsenal. And by creating new activities to use with them, there will always be something fresh and exciting to capture their attention, right? I guess we'll see about that...

In my boys' kits they have two boxes with letter/number magnets and one each of crayons and markers. The fifth box is waiting for specific pieces for activities I'll make.

The pad used to cushion the board on their laps can be stored inside the lid of the box:

Then, on the back of the magnetic white board, there is a removable handle for easy transport:

The board positioned as a "table" or desk:

Oh, and the bottom of the small boxes have magnets on them so the items inside are easily accessible without falling off (if they are in the car or something):

Love Letter

Travelin’Oma, Week 9, Day 1.

Love letter.

Dearest Joseph,

I have missed you so much these last few months when we have been apart so much of the time. When I know you are coming home soon I ache to hear the front door swing open and the bells jingling to herald your homecoming.

I am grateful for your kindness, your gentleness, and your willingness to overlook my faults. I never feel the oppressing burden of expectations you have for me that I feel that I cannot meet. You celebrate my successes and never seem to see my failures. You lift me and strengthen me. There is no one else that I would rather go through this life with.

Thank you for loving me. I miss you immensely. I can’t wait to see you Wednesday afternoon…

Love,

Your adoring wife.

"I've just got a lot of work to do"

A few weeks ago, I came home from shopping on a Saturday afternoon and Austin was out sweeping the sidewalk in front of the house. When I got out of the car, he sighed loudly, cocked his head to the side, and with his hand on his hip declared, "Mom, I've just got a lot of work to do." He then proceeded to take the broom inside, open the garage door (by himself), and gather up the weeding bucket, a garden tool, my mom's pink gardening gloves, a water bottle, and a small towel. He put the water bottle in one pocket, the towel in the other, donned the gloves and took off to the flagstones in the yard carrying the gardening tool and the bucket. He meant it when he said he had work to do: he weeded for about an hour and a half, while continually insisting that he just had a lot of work to do! When I asked him about why he needed the towel, he demonstrated by removing the gloves, pulling out the towel, and wiping his brow. "My head just gets all sweaty, Mommy," he told me. Then he replaced the towel and took the water bottle from his pocket and took a swig. Carefully putting the water bottle back, he slipped his little hands into the large pink gloves, and kept at his task of the evening.

Matthew came out to "help" about halfway through Austin's work. Austin kindly shared one glove with him but made Matthew go get his own garden tool.

Horsies

Austin is a very observant boy. The other day, while we were driving, he said to me, "Look, Mommy, there are two horsies. One brown horsie and one giddy-up horsie."

My question is: what color, exactly, could "giddy-up" be?

Where Were You When...?

Travelin’Oma, Week 8, Day 5.

Where were you when...?

When I was younger, I recall my mom telling me about moments she would always remember and what she was doing when they happened – when the men landed on the moon, when JFK was assassinated, when Reagan was shot. At the time it didn’t occur to me that over time I would have my own moments like that.

On September 11, 2001, I was a junior in college at Brigham Young University. That morning I was in a class in the basement of the Talmage Building, my Secondary Ed 276 class with Nancy Wentworth teaching. Much of our work was done on the computer and so during the course of the 8am class I was checking my email and briefly saw something about the World Trade Center on a news clip at the top of the page but didn’t look into it any further. When my class was done, around 9am, I came out of the building and walked across the parking lot when my dad called. He asked if I had heard that the World Trade Center had been hit by a plane. I told him I hadn’t heard it yet but that it must have been what that news clip was about. I still didn’t really understand the impact of this event at that point. He told me that I should hurry to somewhere where I could watch it on the news and so I kept walking toward the Wilkinson Center where I was headed anyway. When I got to the bookstore entrance of the Wilk, it was almost impossible to wade through the throngs of students, faculty, and employees standing and staring at the television screens throughout the store. I was beginning to grasp the gravity of the situation, and was feeling overwhelmed as I watched the images on the screen and listened to the newscasters share what little information they knew at that point. As I finally pushed my way through the onlookers, I made it to the main area of the building with tables and chairs packed in for students to study, eat, or visit. These days, on one end of this large courtyard-type area, there is a large screen television playing the news throughout the day, but back then there was not. That day the university did something unprecedented and set up a huge projection screen and displayed CNN on it so that students could gather here (instead of the bookstore) to watch what was happening on the other side of our country.

As students slowly gathered at the table I was seated at, they were all friends that I had met on study abroad a year before in Jerusalem. It was a surreal experience to be sitting with them on this eventful day because almost exactly a year before we had been sitting together in the auditorium of the BYU Jerusalem Center having an experience much like the one we had on 9-11. A year before we had been watching CNN coverage of the pillars of smoke rise from car bombs that we could see from the balconies outside the Jerusalem Center at the beginning of the Second Intifada. This year we watched pillars of smoke rise from the Twin Towers from damage caused by terrorists. Similar conversation occurred at both times: “What happens now?” “What does this mean for me and my family?” “Are we going to be safe?” Our hearts were extremely heavy, during both events, with concern for those injured, dead, and their families who were suffering. We also reflected back on the rest of the events the year before that resulted from violent choices. A year later, we couldn’t help but wonder what would unfold as a result of these violent choices. We continued to watch as the newscasters slowly fed us more information regarding what happened that fateful autumn morning.

Photo by Shayna Marchese www.flickr.com/photos/malarchie/

In lieu of the usual Tuesday devotional, the university had a meeting to lift our hearts in prayer in behalf of those involved in this tragic incident.

Throughout the rest of the day, and through the weeks that followed, hearts were heavy as we learned of incidents that happened that morning. Many tears were shed. We were also inspired by the stories of humanity that arose in time of crisis – of the firefighters who risked their lives to save as many as they could, the last phone calls to family before death, the sacrifices of many Americans to care for children, husbands, or wives who did not yet know the fates of their loved ones. Many found religion once more and a newfound patriotism rose in the hearts of our countrymen. “United We Stand” was displayed in windows, on doors, and other public places, declaring our allegiance to this great nation. It was a grief-stricken yet beautiful time to be an American.

I will never forget where I was that day, and I hope to never forget to feel the way I felt in the days that followed: love for my neighbors, pride in my country, and an awareness of the fragility of life that helped me to appreciate each day – and each moment – more fully.

Exhaustion

Travelin'Oma, Week 8, Day 4.

Exhaustion.

Today I am very, very tired. It is partly because I am getting over being sick, partly because my children haven't been sleeping very well at night lately, and partly because I am trying to help them learn - and that is exhausting. I feel pretty strongly about raising children to be independent, but I was reminded today of how taxing that can be on a mother.

All I wanted my two-year-old and four-year-old to do this afternoon was to pick up the toys in the playroom, a job that could have taken me ten minutes to do. Instead, we had a battle verging on the magnitude of Gettysburg for several hours until they finally finished the task at hand. For the first hour or so, I maintained my cool (to some degree) while I slowly took away privileges that I had offered at the beginning as a reward for cleaning up - candy corns, popcorn, and a movie after dinner. Not only were they less than compliant in the cleaning up department, but they were fighting, yelling, hitting, and throwing as well, all inappropriate behaviors in our family. By the end, I was not very happy (that is probably an understatement) and they were lucky they didn't have to go to bed before dinner. However, it is now clean and they are in bed, I will be going to bed in a few minutes, and I am still glad that I work so hard to help them be independent, even when it makes my life difficult.

Illustrations

Travelin'Oma, Week 8, Day 3.

Illustrations.

One reason I just love children's books is because of the incredible illustrations. There is a huge variety and some extremely creative endeavors out there. Here are a few peeks at some of my favorite children's illustrations. They aren't necessarily my favorites from each individual book (because mine are still packed and I couldn't scan the pages I wanted to) but they should demonstrate the general feel to each one. (I put the name and author of each book, but not the illustrator - horrible, especially because it's the illustrations that I love, but I need to go to bed...)

Welcome to the Zoo by Alison Jay:

King Bidgood's In the Bathtub by Audrey Wood:

Knuffle Bunny by Mo Willems:

The Kissing Hand by Audrey Penn:

Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak:

Orange Pear Apple Bear by Emily Gravett:

Oh, Were They Ever Happy! by Peter Spier:

Jackson Hole, Grand Tetons, and Yellowstone

Travelin'Oma, Week 8, Day 2.

Jackson Hole, Grand Tetons, and Yellowstone.

A couple of weeks ago we went on a trip as a family to Jackson Hole where Joseph presented some of his research at an education conference. After the conference, we headed through Grand Teton National Park and then Yellowstone National Park. I had never been any of those places before. They were breathtakingly beautiful! It was snowy and very, very cold. We had a fabulous time and plan to make another trip there, maybe next year.

Here are some fun pictures of our excursion (you can click on the collages to enlarge them):

Blogging Comments

Travelin’Oma, Week 8, Day 1.

Blogging comments.

I love it when people comment on my blog. It makes me so excited. Maybe because it’s an indication that people actually read my blog occasionally. Maybe because it means that somehow they had related to what I wrote. Maybe because it means someone besides a relative thinks my children are as adorable as I happen to think they are. For whatever reason, I really like the comments.

However, I have a hard time commenting on other peoples’ blogs. Why? Wouldn’t they appreciate the same feedback that I relish getting on my blogging efforts? Of course they would. And yet, I still have a difficult time bringing myself to typing something in that comment form. I think it’s because I’m not funny or terribly profound and a comment form is just the right size for witty one-liners or short sage advice, and I just don’t have lots of that.

Participating in this writing class has encouraged not only my writing on my own blog, but has also helped me to take the leap of leaving comments on other blogs that I read. I still have a long way to go, but hopefully I will get a little better at discarding my insecurities to reach out and demonstrate to others that I appreciate what they have written on their blogs, even if my comments aren’t brilliant every time (or ever…).

Thank you for your comments, my small readership. I really appreciate them. And for those of you who don’t comment, I completely understand and figure that until I become more prolific in my commenting, I can expect no more from you.

Paradigms

Sorry, Travelin’Oma! I was sick with the flu at the end of last week and over the weekend, so here is my make-up work for Friday.

Paradigms.

paradigm: n. a set of assumptions, concepts, values, and practices that constitutes a way of viewing reality

When I was a sophomore in high school, I had my history and English classes combined into one class named “Diversity of Peoples,” taught by Mr. Klimasmith. The first week of class he introduced us to some ethical dilemmas and we had heated discussions about how each of us might handle them. This led us to an in-depth lesson on paradigms and how we each have a paradigm that shapes the way we make decisions and the way we live our lives. As the rest of the school year progressed, each piece of literature, each culture, and each event in history that we studied was considered in light of our individual paradigms as well as attempting to understand more fully the paradigms of the actual people involved in the situation. We tackled some pretty major issues in that class – including my first introduction to the conflict in the Middle East – and we didn’t skirt religion, morality, or war. It was fascinating. It was also an incredible pedagogical approach as I consider it in hindsight.

I always remember that class when I have debates with others about topics that we may not see eye to eye on. I try to understand their paradigm, even when it is difficult for me to relate to. I often disagree with others on politics but I try hard not to be disagreeable. As I remind myself that they do not view the world the way that I do, it helps me to seek understanding even if I still don’t rally to their side of the fence.

A Team

Travelin’Oma, Week 7, Day 4.

A team.

I love family history. I. Love. Family. History. The stories, the newspaper clippings, the journals, the personalities, the fitting together of all of the pieces. I love all of it. I feel so much closer to my ancestors as I learn their stories and find out more about their lives.

One of the things about it that I delight in the most, however, is how much closer it brings me to those family members around me that are still alive. Specifically my mom. We work together on projects all the time, but our greatest teamwork comes together in our family history endeavors. We plan and organize and divide and conquer. Several years ago, when she was living in Washington and I was here in Utah, she would gather information from her family and sort through documents that she had and I would do the leg work here at the Family History Library in Salt Lake City. I was able to find so many of our ancestors and clues to what their lives were like and then pass the information on to her where she could make more connections and send me on more errands to search for more. It was a fabulous system. Sadly, since she moved here a little over three years ago we have not always been great at keeping up on this love of ours (graduate school, having three small children…hmm, I wonder what the holdup has been!). But we still talk and plan and glean what we can to help us when we get back into it full swing of our research.

In finding out more about my ancestors, I have learned to appreciate and love those who have come before me and who have paved the way for the life that I lead, but that appreciation and love has grown more so for my own mother than anyone else. I am glad that she is one of my greatest friends.

Little Orphant Annie

Travelin’Oma, Week 7, Day 3. May I first state that I feel the same way as my mother about Halloween. I hate it. She wrote a great post about it today and if you wonder how I feel about this atrocious holiday (although you probably aren’t doubting my sentiments about it much anymore), and want to see a funny picture of me when I was six, you should check it out. This assignment was my “inspired” post, inspired both by today’s Travelin’Oma post and by the discussion about poetry on her blog awhile ago. This was a perfect chance to write about it.

Little Orphant Annie.

When I met Joseph (my husband) and we were fast becoming best friends, I told him one night that the way I felt when I was with him was just like this one quote that I didn’t really remember but it starts, “Oh, the comfort, the inexpressible comfort…” He finished quoting it from memory right there and told me that he felt just the same way. Later that week he gave me a gift: that quote in a frame, beautifully wrapped. We still display this cherished memento of our love and friendship in our house.

Oh, the comfort —
the inexpressible comfort of feeling safe with a person —
having neither to weigh thoughts nor measure words,
but pouring them all right out,
just as they are,
chaff and grain together;
certain that a faithful hand will take and sift them,
keep what is worth keeping,
and then with the breath of kindness blow the rest away.

- Dinah Craik, The Best Loved Poems of the American People

The night that he quoted it, after I recovered from the pleasant surprise that he knew the rest of that quote by heart, I asked him how he knew it. It was then that I was introduced to one of the greatest heritages that my in-laws gave to their children. They taught them to memorize poetry. Every Monday night, for family night, one of the first orders of business was working together as a family to remember whatever the poem (or quote, or scripture, etc.) was that they were currently learning. Each member of the family had a notebook where they kept a copy of the things they memorized. What an incredible legacy to leave for your posterity!!

When we get together for family reunions, a tradition that is always reenacted is the reciting of Little Orphant Annie (by memory for all of the immediate family members), led by my husband and his sister.

"Little Orphant Annie's come to our house to stay . . ."

Charms

Travelin’Oma, Week 7, Day 2.

Charms.

Just this last weekend, Joseph and I went on a trip with the kids to Jackson Hole, Wyoming, as well as the Grand Teton National Park and Yellowstone National Park. I had never been any of those places before. They were absolutely beautiful! (And VERY cold this time of year, I might add.)

Joseph presented at a research conference in Jackson Hole and then we went out with our children to do a little bit of exploring. While we were at the visitor’s center in Jackson (a marvelous place, by the way – it has examples of all the local wildlife and a large patio area that overlooks the elk refuge area – very cool), we were trying to figure out a good way to do souvenirs for this trip as well as other traveling we do in the future. Since traveling is very important to both Joseph and I, we like to have a way to remember the wonderful things we do. Largely this has been done in the past by collecting postcards. This time we decided on two specific traditions to carry on from now on.

The first still involves postcards. Now we will have each family member who is old enough to do so choose a postcard from where we visit. On the back I will write the person’s name and the month and year of the trip. Additionally, we may ask the kids what their favorite part of the vacation was and then write it on the back (or have them do it once they are old enough). We will compile the postcards in a book of some sort and then be able to glance through them to remember what people remembered most from our trips.

The second souvenir tradition we decided to start was to begin purchasing charms for a necklace for me of things that remind us of trips that Joseph and I have been on together. One per trip. The charm does not have to be purchased on the trip, however. It can be purchased afterward if there is something specific we want to have as a way to remember the adventure that is not to be found in local gift shops. We are doing this retroactively as well. This was wonderful to reflect back on all of the trips we have taken together and laugh at the fond and not-so-fond memories we have of certain places. Funny enough, the item chosen is not necessarily typical for that location. We had a great time reminiscing and trying to think of creative charms to represent each experience.

The charm we bought for this last trip was an elk charm. While we were driving through Yellowstone, we saw many different kinds of wildlife, including a herd of elk grazing and drinking at a river. Joseph got out and took many, many pictures. He also took pictures of a herd of bison and a bull moose. The elk is a fun way to remember this part of our vacation.

We will still certainly purchase special souvenirs on some of our trips in the future and we have many beautiful items in our home from our travels around the world in the past. However, it is memories that are the best souvenirs and so I hope to carry these specially selected memories around my neck frequently to remind me of the wonderful times Joseph and I have had together.

Being Alone

Travelin’Oma, Week 7, Day 1.

Being alone.

I used to hate being alone. I think it was because I was afraid that if I was alone it was because I had to be alone. I associated being alone with being lonely. And I was lonely for many of my growing up years. Being lonely was hard and a much too frequent part of my youth. Thus, being alone symbolized being lonely.

In college, I started to overcome my dislike of being alone – but only a little bit. One summer, my sister and I were roommates in an apartment that was for 3 people, with one “single” room and one “double” room, but it was just the two of us for the summer. My generous sister, who would much rather have had her own room, was wonderful and roomed with me in the double room because I didn’t want to have my own room. I wanted the company. We had a great time together and I love being with her and it also helped me not have as much alone time.

Eventually, I have come to enjoy having time alone. Maybe it’s a result of having three children and having virtually no time to myself! But maybe that’s not all. I think my evolution in this arena came about as I became more comfortable with myself. I am not afraid to be alone anymore. I am still lonely sometimes, but being lonely is no longer equivalent, in my mind, to being alone. I still really enjoy being with people, even if not actively interacting with them, but now and then some time just for me is soothing and comforting, even if just as a reminder to myself that I am okay with who I am and that it is alright for me to be alone now.

Show Them You Care

Travelin’Oma Week 6, Day 5.

Show them you care.

Why is it that so often the people we love the most are the people we don’t treat as thoughtfully? Why are we often more careful with perfect strangers’ feelings than we are of those we love who are around us daily?

I am a culprit of this behavior myself. It makes me sad, but I still do it without meaning to. I think it is because I presume that my family knows I love them and so my actions toward them seem less important than my actions toward others whose impressions of me are guided largely by those actions. That isn’t an excuse, just an attempt to explain it to myself so I can work harder at fixing it.

The ones I adore and love above all others deserve to feel loved and adored by me.

I once again resolve to try harder to be better.

Choosing

Travelin’Oma, Week 6, Day 4.

Choosing.

Note: This is not intended to be preachy in any way. I consider my graduate degree and all that it entailed to be an essential part of my experience in this life, and additionally, I absolutely loved it. It was the right thing for me to do at the time. But now it is right for me to be a mother and I am so grateful for this privelege. This is about my journey. I hope that it gives strength to women to embrace motherhood.

After we had been married a little over a year, I gave birth to our first baby. I taught school all year while I was pregnant and then had Austin the last day of school. When he was about a month old, we went on a road trip to Bozeman, Montana – the three of us. On that trip we decided to look into me pursuing graduate school in the fall. The process of deciding if it was a good idea for me to get a master’s degree at that time of our lives was a difficult one and very spiritual for us, and is a story I won’t share at this time. Miracles occurred as everything fell into place and I was able to begin classes in the fall, when Austin was about 3 months old.

While in graduate school, we had our second child just 18 ½ months after our first was born. Matthew was born December 20, just days after my last final for the semester, and I began taking classes again about 2 weeks later in addition to teaching Calculus at BYU five days a week, all with a commute each day from Sandy to Provo (about 45 minutes) with a newborn in tow. Choosing to have Matthew when we did was another very difficult and spiritually guided decision, and not at all possible without the help of many loved ones who picked up the significant slack our choice created.

I finally finished my thesis and then graduated when Matthew was about 18 months old. While in school, I had loved my interaction with my professors and peers. I had loved researching, reading, analyzing, discussing, and learning. Part of my experience included teaching math classes for undergraduates. I really loved that. We very seriously considered moving and having me pursue my PhD in a prestigious mathematics education program. At the very least we planned to have me continue teaching as an adjunct faculty member at a University in semesters that they needed me.

Upon careful consideration, we decided that for now I would not work toward a PhD. However, after graduating in April 2008, I was slated to teach a class at BYU starting in September. I was so excited. Then a series of miscommunications occurred and we had to make a decision: was teaching really what I should do at this point in life? This was a particularly hard choice because by giving up this teaching position, I would likely give up all future opportunities to teach at BYU as well. After much prayer and thought, we chose not to have me teach. But I didn’t make the most important choice involved until about a month later.

Although I had always wanted to be a stay-at-home mom, I had really liked being taken seriously by very intelligent people who were leaders in my field of research. I also relished having an identity separate from my little ones whining and pulling on my sleeves or handing boogers to me. Another aspect of University life that I knew I would miss was trying to give access to mathematics to students who struggled so mightily to succeed in this arena. Thus, giving up this part of my life was worrisome to me, but I felt complete peace in my decision to do so.

Being at home all the time and not creating lesson plans and grading papers when I was at home was a tough adjustment to make. My boys were going through a very trying phase and I was once again pregnant – with Elizabeth. My pregnancies are very difficult and this just added to the chaos of our lives. I was sustained by the peace that I felt from knowing that our decision was the right one, but I was still feeling adrift without direction for figuring out who I was and what I wanted to be.

Once a month had passed, and I had daily reflected on my situation, I finally came to a conclusion that has had a great impact on my life. I decided that I could be “just” a stay-at-home mom and still be me. I didn’t lose my identity by making this choice, I found my identity. I am so much happier now than I ever was while I was in graduate school and trying to live two lives. I have one life now, and it is so rewarding. It is also sometimes frustrating, exhausting, tedious, mundane, and thankless. But it is what I want to do and who I want to be.

I still participate in book clubs, quilting, and other creative activities that don’t necessarily involve my children. This is very important to me. But I have found new joy in cleaning my house, planning meals for my family, and doing laundry. And the greatest joy comes in teaching my children, playing with them at the playground, and snuggling with them on the couch.

For me, being a mother is not a consolation prize to having a meaningful career, it is a gift and a blessing and a conscious decision I have made. Many women choose to have children, but I think more of them would be happier if they also chose to be mothers.

A Traveling Tip for Adventuring With (Young) Children

Travelin’Oma. Week 6. Day 2.

A traveling tip for adventuring with (young) children.

This will be short and sweet.

When I was young and we went on trips as a family, my mom dressed us all in the same clothes (at least the same shirt) so that it was much easier to keep track of us. What a great idea! Additionally, if one of us got lost, she always knew exactly what we were wearing. Plus, pictures were pretty well coordinated as a result!

Can you guess which one I am? It's not that hard to guess... I am the oldest in my family.

P.S. Never mind the disastrous fashion statements of my "lace keepers" on my shoes in the first picture and my jeans in the last picture. I like to tell myself that it was "in" back then.

Journal Keeping

Travelin’Oma Week 6, Day 1. Oma had some family emergencies last week and so we had a little break. I missed it! I’m so glad this class is 12 weeks long!

Journal keeping.

I have four very good examples of people that come to mind when I think of excellent journal keepers. Debby (my sister), Rebekah (my cousin), Tom (my uncle), and Jenalyn (a friend). They have been fabulous at providing a benchmark of what I strive for but fall tremendously short of. In fact, the rest of our family often calls Debby when in need of finding out when something in the past may have happened (even if it was important to us and not central to her own life) – it is often recorded in her journal. In my ideal life, I am a perfect journal keeper. But in reality, I am VERY far from it.

I think the main problem with this is that I am such an all-or-nothing person. If I can’t do something all the way, I don’t like to do it at all. So a 4 sentence entry in a journal isn’t worth it to me when I know that I would really need 4 pages to do the memories justice. This all-or-nothing attitude is something I have been working on for years and am getting much better at in general, but sadly, it still applies in a significant way to my journaling efforts.

In an attempt to overcome this, I am going to record here 5 ways that I have kept up with my personal history in other ways throughout the years so that I can remember that I am doing something to record my life, even if not in ways that I think of as “ideal.”

1. Weekly family update emails
2. Blogging
3. Photo albums
4. Letter writing (with copies of the letters)
5. Verbally sharing memories together as a family so that the memories stay fresher in my mind so that when I get around to writing them down they are easier to remember.