For two years now, Mike and I have been keeping an annual memory jar: aka, a giant yarn-covered coffee can.
We seriously just think it’s the best. Ticket stubs, hotel cards, save the dates, hospital bracelets, placecards, programs, birthday candles, maps, invitations, you name it… If there’s a memory (good or bad) associated, it goes into the jar.
It is so much fun and super easy to keep up! We put the can on top of our china cabinet and add things to it whenever we remember. Or sometimes when I clean out my purse and find ticket stubs and hotel keys from the previous 4 months…
On New Year’s Eve, we take everything out of the jar and go over all of our memories from the past year. There are always so many events we forgot about or say, “Wow! That happened this year?!” We love this way of reminiscing.
The best are always the quotes. If something funny is said, we write it down with a date. Half the time, by December 31, we have absolutely no clue what the quote is about. Other times, they’re just hysterical, like so:
Note: I did not ask.
This year, I also purchased a line-a-day journal that can be kept for five years (which Samson is apparently very interested in). I got my mom this one for her birthday.
Each day has it’s own page, and you write the year number and a line about what happened that day. Then, you continue for five years. It’s an easy way to see what happened on a certain day over a period of time – and I can totally handle a line a day. I always try to start heavy-duty journaling and I just can’t keep the commitment. Maybe this will help me start a journaling habit 🙂
This is also pretty similar to the notecard memory calendar idea – except it’s compact, and if someone drops it, cards don’t go all over the place. (It’s possible that I might be speaking from personal experience with the notecard calendar. Total disaster.)
I think that these will both be longheld traditions in our family. We’ve already started adding to our memory jar for 2015…!
Off the Waller 