Digging up the past

The most overwhelming thing for me is to know where to start looking for ancestors and family historical information. I have several of my father's father's war medals and memorabilia but to start finding what they all mean can be seen as an onerous task. I discovered this website today and will launch myself into the world of genealogy and archeology. May I find gold.


Your genealogy starting point online: http://www.cyndislist.com/

BOOK review: To Our Children's Children

To Our Children's Children: Preserving Family Histories for Generations to Come
http://www.amazon.com/Our-Childrens-Children-Book/dp/0385467974

I bought this book several years ago when I started looking at compiling childhood memories for my parent's 30th (1995) wedding anniversary present. My sisters and I complied stories and interwove photo's to illustrate these. I never knew anything about scrapbooking back then.

Having Nan stay brought back to me how useful this book is in jogging people's memories of the past. Just think about this question regarding the home you grew up in: Can you remember the view out of any of your windows? What did you look out on?

I remember the bush outside my bedroom door - not sure what it was called - but do remember it blocked a lot of the light, but it also stopped people from invading the house through that window at least. Growing up in a remote township in South Africa was fearful at times and this provided some relief. I recall enjoying climbing out of the window and hiding in the bush when we were playing hide-and-seek. I might just start using these questions in my Moment to Remember blog to start collecting the memories of our family growing up.

This also brings me to a decision to document everyday things more as well, why not have a layout that shows what the view from the kitchen window was like. Nan told me that her mother would look out her kitchen window over to the school and could see the children in the playground, how quaint. Interesting that this is an abiding memory for an old lady.

This book has questions about most aspects of life, childhood, school, parenthood, romance, etc

Bob Greene also has the Journal to accompany this book:
To Our Children's Children Journal of Family Memories
http://www.amazon.com/Childrens-Children-Journal-Family-Memories/dp/038549064X

Adding sound to your layouts

WOW! Just for Sienna, there is something to add to our layouts that will capture sounds for future generations to hear what we sounded like. I just need to see what is available in our state for the conventional layouts. I am sure that it won't be hard to add sound to the digital layouts through Photoshop.

Scrapbook Alive! Add Sound to your Scrapbook
by Andrea Steed (Nov 29, 2004)
http://www.scrapjazz.com/topics/Themes/Music/417.php

We do such a great job of preserving images in our scrapbooks so we'll remember them forever, but what about the special sounds we dont want to forget? Wouldn't it be great to be able to record a memory and then play it back over and over again simply by pressing a button on your scrapbook page? '

Scrapbook Alive by Imagination Project is a voice and sound recorder that can do just that. The Scrapbook Alive recorder can record up to 10 seconds of sound on a microchip. Sound clips are used in all sorts of media to help bring another one of the five senses into a presentation. A sound recorder on a scrapbook page is no different. Not only can you see the photos and read the journaling, but with a sound recorder, you can also use your ears to get a more complete remembrance of the memory.

?On line purchace: http://www.scrapmylife.com/vcom/product_info.php?products_id=390

AND

Create a Video Scrapbook in 5 Easy Steps
http://scrapbooksalive.com/create-a-video-scrapbook-in-5-easy-steps/

A video scrapbook is a fun way to share your life with friends and family. It’s also an excellent way of preserving your family history. There are numerous types of video scrapbooks. Some types include: adoption, anniversary, baby’s first year, bar mitzvah, birth announcement, birthday, Christmas, family reunion, graduation, memorial/tribute, Mother’s Day, quinceanera, retirement, school recitals/performances, sports, vacation, and wedding.

Remembering distant family

We visited my sister Maria, her husband Danny, and her Children Lydia & Michael in Feb 2008. I had not seen her since June 2005. Maria had been offered a Job in Scotland and the family immigrated there for a couple of years. Her two children are the same ages as mine and were under 3 & 1 when they had last seen each other. They returned to Sydney a year ago and I had not had a chance to visit till now.

I remember Sienna saying, of the trip, "who are they people mummy?" To which I replied: "my sister like Juliana is to you and her family like our family". I showed her some photo's because Maria was good at using technology to keep us updated, but Sienna was not satisfied. "But what do they sound like?" she asked.

As to the sound, I am going to explore what I can do to better capture the sounds we hear and peoples voices and link them to digital layouts as well as burn to CD for conventional layouts. I am a more visual (see) and kinesthetic (feel) person and that has been driving my conventional and digital layouts, but I need to appeal to people who are auditory (hear) and give them the opportunities to experience what is being shown in the layout.

Well Sienna got to see and hear them and enjoyed the interaction. This photo was taken when the 3 younger children went to the Blue Mountains while Lydia was at school. I love the layout because it represents to me the fractures that happen in the images of our mind as time passes. I have overlayed the photo to show the faces more clearly because although the environment is great to remember it is the faces we need to remember.

Memory and ageing

Nic's Nanna, the girls Grandma recently stayed with us for a week. It was only during this time that the importance of memory in ageing really hit home. Nan was able to recall significant events from her childhood and spoke easily about this but could not remember some things that had happened in the previous week or even within a matter of hours. Memory loss comes to us in a variety of ways and a diagnosis of Alzheimers or Dementia is devastating for families. Nan has not been given these diagnoses so I expect some of her memory loss may be purely aged related.

My point in all this is that after entering the Aged Care work force in 2006 as a Registered Nurse, I am increasingly seeing the effects of memory loss on people and when I speak to families very few have ever documented information their mother, father, aunt or uncle have said, done, experienced etc. Some residents have old photo's but many are not labeled so the subsequent generations have no idea who is in them.

It was great having Nan stay and the girls enjoyed the experience, but I was saddened by the fact that Nan has memories that are locked in her mind that my children may never know because no-one had asked them to record their experiences. Nan was born in Scotland and her tales while she was staying with us just showed me how different life was for her as a young child as compared to me, and now my own children. Her generation appreciates everything they have, but our children could grow up expecting things and possibly never having to work that hard to achieve them.

Always remember, never forget

Have you ever tried to recall something important and wished you had some way of triggering that memory. Photo's are a great way to help. But out of context a photo two generations from now will mean nothing. If we want to ensure that our legacy is know throughout our generations then we need to find creative ways to preserve and cultivate them.

I started the art of scrapbooking in 2003 after I was diagnosed with Post Partum Depression only a few months after my second daughter, Sienna was born, and following a serious car accident. Previous to this in 2001, I had suffered serious injuries in a motor vehicle accident only weeks after my first daughter, Juliana, was born and was unable to care for her for 3 months.

It was during this second post traumatic event that I realised that my memory was challenged with the pain, stress, sleeplessness and usual pregnancy related memory loss. I tried to recall the events around Juliana's birth and especially her first 3 months and I was hard pressed to remember anything that good. I felt like I was about to travel the same road again and was determined to take more photo's and record the information surrounding them.

This journey has given me a interesting perspective on how art & craft can improve a person's well being. There is more an more evidence to show that art therapy improves the outcomes of challenged children and emotionally and mentally affected people. We are seeing this being introduced in aged care facilities as well. I would like to propose that scrapbooking and the art of preserving memories is a therapy of its own but, in so doing provides a memory book for future generations. This appeals to my altruistic need, I can justify the time spent as a way of providing for others and a bonus that it helps me.

I am hoping to provide you with images and expressions of how creativity can improve the way we see life and leave behind a legacy for our children and their children.