In our current age, we have access to endless resources of memory keeping.
So limitless that it can quickly become overwhelming to decide what and how to compile your memories. I am all about living in the moment, being present and not stuck behind a camera or cell phone, but I do want to balance that with making use of the abilities I have to preserve moments of our lives.
My daughter recently poured over family albums I had printed for hours. She told me all about her memories from when she was one year old. Ha.
My philosophy on memory keeping is simple: “Something is better than nothing.” Here are some simple ways I streamline this process.
Chatbooks: I’m not a sponsor for them but I can’t help but share how easy their system is to use. I snapped pictures of all of my kids’ favourite art pieces from the year and it took five minutes to load them to the Chatbooks app, pick a cover and order a 6x6 book for each of them. This also lets me recycle the originals (gasp) and cuts down on clutter. Keep your favourites obviously but when your kid draws 10 pictures a day we can’t keep them all.
One Second Every Day:This is an app that prompts you to record a one-second snippet of your day, every single day. It’s new to me but I’m excited to compile each month into a 30-second video of what our days held. Just think what five years will look like.
Lists:Keeping journals or writing memoirs can be overwhelming but surely a list is manageable. Think “Top 10 Meals in our Rotation,” “People we saw over Christmas Holidays,” or “Games our family loves to play.” Try and keep one spot where you record all of your lists – your own “listography,” if you will.
Those are my top three ways I stay on top of the memories I want to preserve. I also organize all photos by month to go into photo books, but I’m a good four years behind. Yikes!
