Journaling

Last night David and I were eating dinner and talking about anything and everything. Somehow we got on the subject of Chicago (maybe talking about potential vacation spots if we decide we can't make London happen?). That lead to me telling David about how I almost went on a "study abroad" to Chicago during Spring Break with the Interior Design program my sophomore year of college. The conversation then bounced to our relationship and whether we would have been dating and what we we did instead of me going to Chicago. We were laughing as we tried to remember - and we kept getting that year confused with the following year when we worked 60 hours that week because we both felt that we would be getting engaged soon and wanted to have some extra money put aside. (Which was a good thing because we got engaged at the end of the week and were able to put that money towards our awesome honeymoon.) One of us would say something and we would both start laughing at our poor memories. Then David said "Lets pull out our old journals and see what we really did do that Spring Break." The rest of the night was spent looking through and laughing at all the crazy things we wrote about.

It was so interesting to go back and read about our dating time. In retrospect it was easy to see how perfect we were for each other and laugh at things like "I really think that I like him." Because, hello, of course you like him silly girl - he is going to be your everything, your whole world. He is perfect for you and you won't know what you ever did without him. But at the time, the emotions were so real and so uncertain.

We also read through much of our married lives. We laughed and laughed at the silly things we did, and the crazy things we wrote. There was definitely a pattern in my journal entries - I think I said "I'm so tired" at least twice per entry. And some entries like this one.. that is all that I had the energy to write.

Tuesday, 9-6-2011: "So tired..."

We laughed and laughed at the way we worded things or the experiences we had forgotten about. By the end, we were both saying how we wished that we were still as good about writing in our Journals. At one point we were religious about it, writing in it every night. I have years and years of my life recorded away in these books. There have been events like birthdays, holidays, getting engaged and married. There have been trials and opposition like stress during school, broken down cars, morning sickness, and miscarriage. There are entries about my testimony and faith and there are entries about nothing important at all.

There are too many "favorite" journal entries to post them all. One that had me giggling was this one: Thursday, 9-8-2011, "The problem with going to bed is that all the sudden it's morning again so quickly." You can definitely tell that I like to be with David and that the reason I was always so tired while writing in my journal is because we stayed up because if we went to bed then we had to be away from each other (during the night and then for the next day).  Another entry that made me just about cry was this one:  Thursday, 8-25-2011, "Shantel is very tired. She had a good day teaching today, but it was very busy. She also brought so much joy to her husband. - Her loving husband David, for Shantel Elise." I must have been too tired to write. I was in my first trimester with Lydia and was basically exhausted all the time. David is so wonderful to have written my in my journal for me. I'm so lucky to have him.  

We aren't as good at writing in our journals anymore, but I like to think that blogging has taken the place of our handwritten journals. In some ways, it is much better because we are better at recording fun events, silly things, and lots and lots of pictures. It's awesome because we have printed out each year into a blog book that we set on our side table in our family room. People can pick it up and flip through it or we can reference back through it. It is much more reader friendly (you know, for future generations and such). However, in some ways it's not as good. I was reading through our blog book of 2011 and thought to myself "I was pregnant then, I was pregnant while writing that post." And then a couple pages later, "I was having a miscarriage while I wrote that post. I'm writing about all of these other things, but I didn't write about what was really going on." At the time, it was much too painful to put out infront of the world by blogging about it. But now, other than a few references there isn't really a record of having gone through such a hard time in our lives. Thats not to say that there isn't a record of it, because I wrote in my personal journal about it - but it just isn't all in the same place.

Regardless, I love this new form of journaling that we have chosen to pursue.  I love that we can post about random things, or post about the way we feel, or post about things we've done. Most of all, I love all of the pictures of this sweet girl: 

She is getting into everything. The whole time I was laying out my journals to take pictures she was picking them up, crawling all over them, pulling them into a pile, pushing them away. It was quite the adventure. I would be so sad to read back through my journals and read things about her but not be able to have any pictures of her sweet face. I definitely think that blogging is the best form of journaling for us. There are just things that we blog about that would never make it into our journals, and those are the things that I love. However, I truly believe that journaling is so important. So I'm going to be better at blogging about anything and everything. I will blog about whatever I want, because that is what I want to read about in 2 years, or 5 years, or 20 years. I will blog about the things that I want my children to read about. I will stop worrying so much about what other people think about the things that I post, and focus on blogging as a way to record our families history. Because I love this: 

And I would love nothing more than to see this stack of two books turn into three books, then five books, then 50 books. Wouldn't that be an amazing legacy? 

I counted up my journals, and there are 20. One of them isn't pictured because I tried out a larger size (and realized that there was a reason that I liked the smaller size). I keep these journals together in a couple of shoeboxes and couldn't find that larger one. When we get moved in to our house and aren't in  the middle of such crazy packing i'm going to find it and make sure that it never gets lost again.  Here is my first journal and my last journal together. 

#1: September 1996 - January 2004       #20: October 2011 - Present

My Grandma and Grandpa Walker gave me my first journal for my 9th birthday (1996). 

 

At the close of that journal I wrote: "It took me seven years, but I am done with my first journal. Hopefully I will do better. -Shantel Walker"

 Little did that young girl know, once she reached high school she would start writing every day. Her journals would average 3-5 months each. Journal #1 took seven years. The following seven years she would fill up 19 more books. 

I loved going back and reading through my old journals. I am reminded about how good my life has been. I am strengthened by the testimony that I have shared and am grateful for the insight I recorded and can now go back and read. I'm sure that I will continue do a combination of blogging and writing - but in both areas I want to be better at recording our lives. Because... we have a good life. A great life. We are blessed at every turn and enjoy every moment together. 

I can't wait to print our 2012 book, and to continue to write this year and the year after that, and the year after that. I have a testimony of the blessings that come from keeping a journal. I'm so grateful for a husband who has the same desire to record his life and blessings - and who will sit with me for hours reading and laughing at what we wrote and just enjoying our life together.