The Chronicles of .........

I guess like most mothers (or parents/grandparents/people generally) I am often challenged by how to chronicle our lives both for my own desire to have the record and for the future, but also how to share our lives with family and friends far away.  Like many of you I have the children's art from years of preschool and onwards and various elementary school projects filed away by year as well as boxes of photos (from the days before digital!).  Its always such a battle to decide what to keep (the paper mache volcano was a great project but really????)
Allan's mom called this morning from our town of Pietermaritzburg in South Africa to thank me for the photobook I made, had printed and sent to them that was our 2010 in photographs (and some text).  Although we email every few weeks - they are still on dial up - its hard to share photographs.  You could tell by her voice she was thrilled and I can imagine she will pour over each photo time and again. 
Of course Facebook has made sharing photo's and our lives easier for those who have ready access to FB and the internet.  I do love how I am connected to so many people across the world.  But I worry that just posting albums on FB is not enough.
A few years ago I started scrapbooking - not very well - but enough to actually get some printed photos into albums.  There are times I love to spend a few hours doing these books but sometimes its months in between these moments and I get behind quickly.  Of course I have many of these scrapbooks done and now they have to be stored.....somewhere!
The discovery of online photobooks has been a revelation!  I love the small ones I can get printed for an occasion for around $10 - just upload - do a little formatting and VOILA! Easy to mail overseas too!

This past summer of 2010 I felt strongly we were at a particularly special moment in our family having come through some hard years emotionally and not knowing, going forward, how much longer our kids will vacation with us for weeks at a time.  So I set out to chronicle the vacation in a different way.  I bought a journal - a lovely turquoise leather journal from Nikaido in Steveston Village. 

 I wrote on every facing page leaving a blank page opposite - I loved the diligence of daily writing - made easier by being on a dappled patio in Orange County or poolside in Palm Desert and having the time.  We each chose a word for the vacation:
David - Delight
Lindsay - Excited
Allan - Adventures
Me - Together
So we made a vacation motto: " We will delight and be excited while having adventures together".  The journal held the memories and when we came home I printed the photos and interspersed them in the text.  Its a wonderful chronicle of the summer of 2010.

I have a new camera and I am SO looking forward to being more intentional with my chronicling this year and making more of the day to day, small moments that make up life as well as the bigger occasions. I think having a blog will help with that!

Scrapbook of my Dallas TX trip in April 2010 in progress