Memories, Sweet Memories

By Rachel H

I consider myself a pretty nostalgic person. When we visit my parents, I can spend hours looking through old photos, reading old report cards, and browsing through my old sticker collections. Some of you may remember my The Amazing Sense of Smell blog when I recalled all the memories that a specific scent can capture. I want my children to also enjoy reminiscing on their childhood. I want them to ask questions about their heritage and their relatives who passed on before they got to know them.

I have many ways that I try to create and save memories, but am always looking for more. Here are a few ideas I wanted to share today, and I would love for you to include comments at the end of this blog to give all of us more ideas on how to preserve memories for our children!


When both of my children were born, I never had an official baby book, but instead used many ideas from Creative Memories products to create a “First Year Scrapbook.” I included photos, stories, and other memorabilia in this scrapbook. I also kept a calendar during their first year of life, and then used this calendar to write about specific milestones in the scrapbook. As we got busier, my daughter’s scrapbook has remained stagnant at month eight, but I promise to complete it soon!


I have kept a diary since I was in the third grade! My first Hello Kitty diary looked very similar to the one above and had many entries about playing in the creek and making our girls only club. My entries transformed as I got older and were then about boys, crushes, jobs, colleges, weddings, and all of life’s difficult decisions. I think I am now on my fifth or sixth journal. The others are hidden away, and I am sure I would die of embarrassment if anyone read them now, but I smile when I think of the day I am gone and my kids can read the journals and know that the events and emotions they encounter in their lives have been experienced by their mom before. I hope they enjoy reading about how I handled difficult situations and decisions. It saddens me that I have not made time to write entries like I used to though. I bet I only crack open my journal once every four months now, as a life with children is much busier than it was when I was alone in my apartment and had all day to write! I hope to get back in the swing of things and write more so that my children can read about how much joy they brought to my life!


Another idea I have is to purchase an “All About My Grandmother” book like the one shown above. Both of my parents have their own book that has endless prompts for them to write a response. Questions can vary from, “Who was your first best friend?” to “Tell us about the house you grew up in.” My parents are graciously taking the time, little by little, to fill out these books and pass them on to my kids one day!


Recently, we had a photo session with one of TSP’s Favorite Photographers, Zoe Zen. Zoe captured the photo above of my immediate family and it is now on a canvas in my family room. We had never had a professional photographer take a family photo before, and I could not have been more pleased with the results. We also got shots of just the children, or just my parents, sister and I, or just the girls, etc. We got many combinations and many unique photos. I am excited to pass these prints down to my children one day. My mom has battled ovarian cancer for the past eleven years, and we were elated to get this family photo during a time when everyone was healthy and mom had a break from chemo. We’ll always cherish these photos!


Lastly, I bought a “Memory Box” for each of my children at Home Goods when they were born. We keep these boxes under their beds. I throw everything into these boxes! Report cards, ticket stubs, artwork, teacher notes, articles from the newspaper, first teeth, baby hair swatches, autograph books from Disney, photos, etc. One day I will organize them, but for now, it is perfect to keep everything in one place and I think my kids will have a blast going through these when they are older.

I hope I have given you some inspiration to start preserving some memories for your children. Please share your ideas below!

Posted by Triad Smarty Pants at 5:00 AM