Journaling the Easy Way!

I think most people would agree journaling on your scrapbook pages is important. It not only tells what happened in the photos and shares the memories and experiences of those moments in time, but it also leaves a legacy for future family members and friends, especially when you use your own handwriting. (Learn how to turn your handwriting into a font HERE.)

Even though journaling is important, we often leave it off our pages because we feel we don't like our handwriting, what we want to write is kind of private, or we feel we have nothing to say. In order to combat these issues, let's find some solutions so we can keep the journaling flowing and keep those precious memories alive!

If you don't like your handwriting, there are so many handwriting fonts to choose from, you could probably find one very similar to your own that you do like. There are a million choices when you google 'free handwriting fonts,' and most come with easy to follow instructions on how to install the fonts for immediate use. I like my handwriting when I write slowly and have time to make the lettering look nice, but I don't always have a lot of time to do that, so I turned my slow nice looking handwriting into a font HERE so I can use my computer to type my own handwriting, spell check it, center it, and make it any size I need! WOOT!



If what you want to write is a bit private such as a wedding proposal or first kiss, you can try hidden journaling. This works great for traditional scrapbooking and hybrid scrapbooking, but is harder with digital scrapbooking. With traditional or hybrid scrapbooking its easy to write your journaling on a tag and flip it over, or on a journaling block and slip it behind a photo. With digital scrapbooking you can write the journaling and change the opacity of the font so that it is barely visible; or if you are posting to a digital scrapbooking gallery, leave the font completely invisible or write 'Private Journaling Hidden,' so that you don't have to rearrange your layout where there is a hole where the journaling is supposed to be. 



If you find you have nothing to say about the photos, or if you keep trying to (unconvincingly) tell yourself the photos tell the whole story, try showing the layout (or just the photos) to a friend or family member not pictured in the photos and see if they have any questions, use your answers to their questions as journaling. They might ask you to tell them about the photos. Record what you say and write that as your journaling. If there is no one to ask, try the newspaper reporter trick, ask yourself:  who, what, where, when, and why? Then use that as your journaling. If you are into lists like I am, try a top 10 (or 5 or 3) list. Tell your top 10 (or 5 or 3) favorite memories, meals, songs, places, landmarks/paintings/sculptures, moments, quotes, song lyrics, smells, sounds, feelings, games, activities, or anything else that comes to mind. Another great way to get your journaling done is to have someone else do it, lol! Sometimes with photos of my kids, I will have them do the journaling. I have them write about what is happening, how they felt, what their favorite part was, how it made them feel, and if they have anything else they want to add. If you don't have kids or grandkids, ask the other people in the photo to tell you their favorite part of the event. Sometimes its nice to use a journaling prompt. These are the beginning of a sentence that you finish in your own words, for example:
My favorite part of the trip was...
This event reminds me of my favorite song because...
When this first happened, we...
Doing this made me feel...
My favorite food/landmark during this trip was...
This photo reminds me of...
The sounds I remember include...
My favorite way to spend the day was…
If I could talk to my teenage self, the one thing I would say is…
It made me smile when...
The experience I will remember from this is...
I felt most energized when...
I was inspired when...
I felt happiest when...
if/when we do this again i will...
Three things you could leave without and why...

Some other types of journaling prompts to try:
Write a thank you note to the hotel/plane/restaurant/people you were with/yourself, write a postcard to a friend, tell about something you would have done differently, describe the weather/hotel room/landmark/meal/clothing, imagine you are the landmark/painting/sculpture explain your life and memories, why did you enjoy this memory, what was it like to come back home after a long vacation, the funniest thing that happened, what you learned, what you worried about, describe the drive/flight/travel time, tell something you are glad you packed or had with you during this event.

I hope this helps you add a bit of journaling to your next layout, and don't forget to add the date! Be sure to check out my FREE journaling mad libs type block and my other journaling blocks below!