Journal Jar

This is a project I have seen pop up in a few different spots and it really struck a chord with me - although not at first.  The idea behind a Journal Jar is that you list a heap of prompts or questions, print them out and fill a jar with them.  Then if you are a regular journal writer (I guess I'd call it diary writing, because I associate journalling more with writing on a scrapbook page) you have something to go-to when you have no inspiration of what to write.  This idea didn't really interest me because I do keep a diary - one of my new projects for this year - but it is just a recap of what happened that day or what is happening in our life now - not an abstract journal where I write my fears, achievements, ponderings, etc.  What did appeal was a different spin on this from CreativityForLife.com where it has a whole list of questions and prompts designed to record your life.  This interested me.  I think every scrapbooker is a memory keeper and a historian in that we want to preserve the here and now for later on.  But what about the times before we were scrapbookers?  What if we don't have photos of certain events? What happens to our memories of our childhood and our family that may no longer be around?  Enter the Journal Jar!

I made this Journal Jar for my mother.  It is filled with 101 questions and prompts (I used the list on the website and altered it to suit) that will help her record her history.  Despite my efforts to encourage her to scrapbook, she just isn't that interested - it's something she doesn't enjoy like I do.  She isn't really a writer either, but she did have a mean typing speed on the old typewriter (you know, the ones that had a ribbon of ink!) and worked for a time for the Bureau of Statistics doing clerical work.  Her strength was English - spelling, grammar, etc.  My hope is that she will use this jar and the accompanying blank book to record her history - what she remembers and how things have changed.
I am currently working on another one for my mother-in-law and then I will also do one for myself.  I guess I can call myself the family historian.