My Two Cents on Journaling

They say a picture is worth a thousand words. I don't know who "they" are, but in my experience a picture is worth about five. Who? What? Where? When? Why? Sure, if you're trying to describe the Taj Mahal to someone, a picture will certainly do a better job than any words. The average album or scrapbook though...

As children, my sister and I would spend hours on the "little couch" in our great-grandparents' living room flipping through album after album of old photographs. Gram and Grampy enjoyed answering, "Who is that?" "Where was this picture taken?" and, "How long ago was this?" Although we loved to listen to them talk about their friends and family, we were just kids and most of their stories went in one ear and out the other. The amount of history that was lost when they passed must be unfathomable!

My grandmother has always been a journal keeper in her own way. She doesn't keep a diary (that I know of), but she keeps newspaper clippings and writes names and dates on almost everything! She is a bit of a hoarder, so she has calenders full of birthdays and anniversaries stashed away, and boxes of old notebooks and artwork in the attic. We all tease her and say that we're just going to throw it all away some day so why bother keeping it. I'm sure that when we decide to clean her out, we'll all spend days reminiscing over her treasures!

The point I am trying to make is that journaling is a very important part of keeping an album, whether you choose to scrapbook or not. You know the who, what, where, when, and why of every photograph in your possession. Your children might not. Your grandchildren won't.

Journaling doesn't have to be extensive to be effective. I have a friend who is an amazing photographer and develops hundreds of photos every year. Although she likes to look at my scrapbooks, she prefers to keep her photos in albums. She does, however, use albums that have the little area for writing notes or comments next to every photo. I love these albums! It's the next best thing to scrapbooking! Recording nothing more than the date, names of the individuals in the picture, and the occasion or place it was taken ensures that you (or anyone else who might be looking) don't forget!

Journaling works pretty much the same way when scrapbooking. Although I have many pages with paragraphs of thoughts, I have more with nothing but a title (to capture the mood or clarify the occasion), a name and a date. Sometimes less is more - sometimes more is more! Use your own judgement. When you look at your scrapbook page and think all of the who, what, where, when and whys have been answered, then you're done!