"External facts about a life can be researched generations later, but the inner life is irrevocably lost unless written during one's lifetime."
-- Nan Phifer, Memoirs of the Soul
I've been a scrapbook addict for 10 years. I've lined my bookshelves with album after album of family memories. But when Alzheimer's snatched my father away, I wanted to do more.
I wanted to tell my grandchildren about my dad. I wanted them to know who their great grandfather was.
What started as a simple genealogy search for my ancestors blossomed into a Life Message. My family were poor, blue-collar workers living in the inner city of Cincinnati. I didn't expect to find anything significant to write about. No war heroes, no Mayflower travelers in my bloodline.
What I found, though, inspired me to write the story. A simple story of German Catholics crossing the Atlantic to settle in the poorest section of the city, on the Ohio riverbanks, helping to build the first Catholic churches, sending their children to Catholic school, and passing their legacy of faith down, child by child, family to family.
I remembered the stories my grandma told when I was a kid. I remembered sitting outside on the stoop on muggy summer nights and listening to my parents and aunts and uncles talk about the Great Depression. Putting those stories together with my ancestry search became a passion, a fire inside me. The fire is still burning as I dredge up more fuel in the form of memories.
Once the process is started, the brain cooperates.
But getting started...
That's the thing, isn't it?
I can't count how many people tell me, "I can't write," or "I'm not creative." Well, you may not be able to write the breakthrough novel, but my simple plan will have you writing interesting and true stories for generations to come.
And we'll learn simple scrapbooking techniques as we go, along with photo preservation and genealogy resources.
Our main focus, though, is writing Your Life Message.
The 1950's, St. George Parish, Cincinnati.
"Baden's," a cafe, or saloon more popularly known then,sits right behind our house on the next street over.
"Baden's." For sure we lived in a German neighborhood.
And several generations later, in Tennessee!
Digital layout I created last year with photo of grandchildren Brandon & Rachel at the yearly Thresherman's Show. I thought the steam engines and tractors would grab the kids' attention, but it was the children their own ages playing instruments, strumming country and bluegrass, and clogging that swept them away. For these two super-hyper little ones to be so mesmerized was indeed a scrapbook layout opportunity! I've never seen them sit so still and quiet for so long.
"Only be careful and watch yourselves so that you do not forget the things your eyes have seen or let them slip from your heart as long as you live. Teach them to your children and to their children after them."
-- Deuteronomy 4:9
"God has given you a Life Message to share... You have a storehouse of experiences that God wants to use to bring others into his family... Your life lessons: the most important lessons God has taught you."
--Rick Warren, The Purpose Driven Life
BettyAnn Schmidt
Wife, Mom, Grandmom
From inner city Cincinnati to farm life in Tennessee -- and writing about the whole journey.
Tri-State ScrapShare Retreat
