Keeping a Journal

My grandmother (Norma) has kept a journal practically every day of her life. She has shelf upon shelf of journals old and new. If you want to confirm an event or the weather of a particular day, go to grandma. She could find the information in her journals.

Grandma as been an inspiration to me of record keeping since I was little. I got my first journal when I was about 6. I wrote in it nearly every day. It is fun for me to look back and see what I wrote about. It is telling of what I thought was important at the time.

Make a FHE activity out of it.

It is evident that keeping records is important. Take the Book of Mormon and share a family favorite story. Share your testimony that the things written in the BofM are not just stories, but rather a record that people kept of events that actually happened. What if people hadn't written about when Jesus came? What if we don't write about our lives?

If you haven't already introduced journal writing to your family, now is a great time to start. Even if you have children who are too young to write, you can write for them, and have them draw a picture to go along with what you did that day/week/month.

Give each child who is old enough a piece of paper or a special notebook just for them to write about their day or about a particular activity they participated in recently. Encourage your children to write often their thoughts, feelings, testimony, daily activities ect.

Don't forget to do this yourself too! You may think you'll remember all the fun things your kids and your family does, but you may find that you don't and you'll wish you had written things down!

Happy writing!

Keeping a Journal