I've been trying to write down things since they were born. My son is 4 and daughter is 2. The problem now is that I seem to have too many journals. I also write things down on calendars. It's getting out of control. Any ideas on how I can keep everything organized? Thanks.
with photos, I tend to go back and weed things out. I love everything at first and then once I have too many, I realize I only need a couple of good memories per event.
if you like to journal and take photo check out becky higgin's Project Life kit at beckyhiggins.com. I have been doing it for the last few years and it is a great way to keep track, and share, the little and big things that happen in your family. I did the picture a day way for a couple years, and then did a monthly thing for a couple of months when I needed a break. My daughter, now 12, loves looking at it and showing it to her friends. I highly recommend it!!
I was also going to suggest blogging. I get a book of all of my blog posts printed each year and we now have them as a keepsake for the kids to look back at when they're older. It's also a nice way for some of our extended family to look at what's happening in our lives and see recent pictures of our son. I update about once a week, sometimes more depending on what we're doing and how much time I have. I blog through blogger and I use blurb.com to print the books.
Keep one journal near by and add notes through the day or set aside a certain time at night when the kids are sleeping to reflect on the day while you write.
What about blogging?
Someone I know set up email accounts for her kids. She emails events, notes and special letters to her children and makes sure to periodically save the emails to a file. She said she plans on printing them at graduation and giving them to her kids.
I keep a file on my computer where I just type in the date, how old the kiddo was, and what happened.
I have also considered creating one file and putting it with my pictures. My son's pictures are organized by month. It would be easy enough to keep a Word file titled "March 2012" with all the memories of one or both kids this month, then next month one titled April 2012" in the folder with their April pictures. If it were me, I'd do both kids in the same folder/file b/c I would bet that there are a lot of pictures where both children are photoed.
Granted, with these ideas, you'd have to be sure to back up your files once in a while onto an external harddrive.
I was doing the same thing so I started a blog. It's great, I can post whatever I want and at the end of the year, I use BLURB (.com) and I upload my blog into a book, it's super, super easy!! It's been the best thing I've done to keep track of my family memories.
I have a journal type book that I write things in every time something fun, cute, first words, each new stage, funny things he's said or done or when something new happens.
I've included some momentos that I've taped in there: first prof sports game we took him to, article I kept for him etc.
Later, I will have it spiral-bound for him.
