Journals and Papers

I’ve been noticing recently that retired seniors are coming up with activities they can do, which are meaningful, creative and a lot of fun. Some of these activities are off-chutes of others, such as scrap booking and taking journal writing to a new level.

I’ve met one lady who wanted to take photos of me at my home-based business office. We both live in a rural area, and “just for fun – and something to do”, she was taking pictures of local businesses, printing them, adding business cards and brochures, and notes about the business and compiling it all into a scrap book page. One thing to note here is that in the country, not all businesses of the norm. Some are quite different and encompass anything from ranching to knife carving to taxidermy. Once her project is finished, she’ll have a memory book full of interesting businesses and people she met along the way. (In the future, it can always be donated to the local library.)

Not knowing what to do with his time when my Father-in-Law retired, he decided to continue his computer work, but made a shift from business to personal writing. His days are always busy and sometimes it’s hard to keep up with all he does. So everyday at night or during the day he writes a few paragraphs about his activities and people he was with. He adds such things as ticket stubs, cards, receipts and photos. He’s not even six months into his daily journal and he has already filled up a 3 inch binder full of writing and collectibles from his activities. He loves doing this, as it is an activity that again lets him interact with others, not to mention his children love it too. Now we get to know what keeps him so busy!

I am sure there are many other ideas on how seniors are keeping journals. Please comment on them and share your ideas here on this blog.

Have you ever looked through an old photo album and stared at a photo wondering where it was taken and who the heck was in the photo? Sometimes when we’re on vacation or at an event we take snapshots of something that must have been important to us at the time. Maybe we met someone that day who was really funny and we made a connection so we took their photo. Maybe they are a distant relative from a family reunion. Whatever the story, if it is worth journaling about, then add the photo too.

Is this much different than scrapbooking? Not really. However scrapbooking usually takes into account a complete vacation or event worth recording. I’m talking more about individual incidents or memory journaling, where you can use one or two photos to compliment a journal entry and vice versa. 

If you have some ’snapshot moments or stories’ that you’d like to remember, consider printing your photos and putting them into an album that also acts as a journal. Try a larger format journal - 8″ or 9″x 11 3/4″ to 12″ with blank/unlined sheets. If it is acid free, that’s even better as you’ll be preserving the journals for years to come. Make use of an acid free pen too.

You can get artistic and make it ’scrapbook-like’, or simply write your journal entry around it. You can even consider a theme for your photo journals e.g. Where are my cousins now?  or Favorite tour guides and what made them so special.

I’ve often thought about starting a wildlife photo journal. Living in the country we have so many incidents relating to animals and we take photos. It might be cool to remember years down the road when and what happened when we took the photo. If I do, I’ll share it with you.