Creating keepsakes.

Creating Keepsakes For Them And You

A few years ago I learned how to knit. No, I’m not kidding. It was kind of a train wreck, but I managed to make Sweet Husband a really, really…interesting…scarf. I worked much harder on the second scarf that I made for my mother. That one came out quite a bit better, but nobody would mistake it for store-bought, that’s for sure.

Years ago, I did counted cross-stitch. I did one of those for my parents and my in-laws, and I was really proud of them. But that fad didn’t last much longer than the knitting thing.

I also made one really great scrapbook from a trip we took to Disney World when the kids were pretty young. I sat at my parents table in Florida and worked on it for a week, and I was really happy when it was done. But, I never did do another one. 

Who’s Crafty? (Not Me)

So, overall, I’m not crafty. I’ve made some attempts, as you can see, but nothing ever really sticks with me. I consider myself among the least creative and artistic people I know. So, creating keepsakes in this way is best for others.

But I have tried. Sometimes successfully.

And I greatly value keepsakes. They are worth the time and effort. So here are a few different things that you might want to try to remember the good times you have shared with your loved one.

Creating Keepsakes: Photo Books

For 25 years, we created a photo calendar around Christmas of our “Year in Review”. It was a labor of love completed by Sweet Husband, and our parents loved the results. Every month was a different picture of our kids engaged in some fun activity. We kept this tradition going probably longer than we should have, but every year I go through all 25 of the calendars, and it definitely helps me remember the things we did with the kids through the years, and watching them grow up through pictures is absolutely priceless.

Creating a photo book is so easy these days, and I encourage you to create a few for your dementia patient. Mom has a few of them that have been given to her, and she loves to leaf through them. The best kind have some writing on the page, as well, so she can identify who is in each photo. 

I also recommend you create a very old photo book. This can easily be done by scanning in old photos and then uploading them to a website like Shutterfly or even Walmart’s Photo Center. You can then create photos from decades ago, which is exactly where Mom’s brain is right now. She loves looking through the really old photo book and remembering people from her distant past. 

Creating Keepsakes: A Recipe Book

Recently, Sweet Husband ran into someone from his childhood. Actually a friend of his brother, the first thing this guy asked was for my mother-in-law’s beef stew recipe! Fortunately, Sweet Husband’s sisters are the keepers of everything kitchen related from my Mother-in-Law, so her recipes will continue to live on. I’ve had similar requests through the years from my brothers, who remembered quite fondly Mom’s take on meatloaf and pot roast. 

I don’t know if it’s just my own dementia patient, but Mom remembers everything she ever cooked in her life, and just how to prepare it! We talk a lot about different things she used to make, and how to make them. These conversations have gone a long way in helping me keep all of these homestyle dishes in my own kitchen schedule. 

To create a complete recipe book, I recommend that you enlist the help of several of your relatives. That way, you can add things that their parents remember, and things that your loved one grew up on but stopped making for one reason or another (I’m gagging at you liver and onions!!!).  

Creating Keepsakes: A Video Of Memories

When Nanny was getting ready to move to Florida from New Jersey, she was about 80, and sharp as a tack. Big Brother Bob had the brilliant idea to videotape her talking through her entire life. He even brought some costume pieces, so she could wear a helmet talking about World War 2, and wave a flag talking about the Bicentennial. He had a list of questions that we had brainstormed based on what we knew of her history, and he just kept her talking for hours.

It is the greatest thing I’ve ever seen. 

This is a fantastic way to use technology to introduce your loved one to future generations. Maybe Nanny died when Robber Baron was six months old, but he has video of her holding him and talking to him about how much he is loved. Priceless. 

Even now, I will video Mom when she is talking about different things, so I can share it with other people. Last weekend, I taped her talking to Luna, the dog, about where she hid her treats at home so Luna could find them. When I came home, Luna and I looked, and guess what we found?  

Saving Writings (Cards And Notes)

I’ve got no creativity or artistic ability, I admit it. But, boy do I love the printed word. There is nothing more pleasant or satisfying to me than reading things that I received from people I love long years ago. Nothing endures, in my opinion, like things that are put into writing, and I think it’s important that you save things that have value to you from people who have value to me. I’ve got a note from Pop in my wallet, and just last week Robber Baron found the deposit check we wrote to the builder of our home in my favorite book. 

Hopefully, you have an album or a shoebox or somewhere else to save all of these important papers. In our house, that’s what is in the safe! To heck with the deed to the house—I’m protecting Mom’s birthday cards from fire and theft!

Travel Logs

You have now come across one of my deepest regrets. When we were first married, someone suggested to us that we keep a travel journal, and how valuable it would be to us in later years.

I don’t always listen. Okay…rarely. 

If you can, during those long hours you spend visiting with your loved one, try to run them through all of the places they’ve seen and all of the countries they have visited. Pop had a near-photographic memory for their trips. But now he’s gone. Mom doesn’t have nearly the memory Pop had, but she can still talk at length about some of her favorite places, and I’ve managed to put together a pretty accurate travel log of everything they did over the many years they were married. 

“Hopeless” Chests

I don’t actually know when or why I started calling it a “Hopeless” chest, but I’m guessing it was somewhere in high school when I never thought I’d get married. 

Either way, I hope you have one of these, because all of the memories of a lifetime can’t really fit in a book or a shoebox. My hopeless chest is a mess of things, from the street sign near my childhood home to a signed baseball from Yogi Berra. It’s got the detritus of decades of things I’ve done, places I’ve gone, and just plain stuff I’ve collected. 

When things started to decline with my parents, I started a hopeless chest for them, so there would be things I would never forget. It’s got papers and cards they received in their early years, and the Bible Mom had as a child. There is Pop’s favorite flannel shirt in there, right next to photos of them from one of those photo booths on the boardwalk in Wildwood, NJ. 

There are just things that you need to keep that won’t fit in a book. Find, build, buy yourself a hopeless chest, and make sure these memories are preserved for the next generation.

You Can Always Just Buy Stuff, You Know

So we’ve come to the keepsakes that I like the best—the ones I can buy in a store! One of my favorite things to buy and hang around me are signs with words. I’ve got street signs in the backyard from Wildwood and Pacific Beach, for example, and a good Eleanor Roosevelt quote in the bathroom to remind me it’s never too late to start over. 

But my favorites? That’s easy. They came from Mom. She wasn’t one with words, and didn’t often express her love for me. But she bought me signs. “Girl Boss” proves she was proud of me professionally, and “Home is where the heart is” proves she respected my job as a parent. 

She shared her feelings with me in keepsakes I’ll never get rid of. She understood me.

And, the other day, I found Mom wearing her scarf at the facility. Proudly. 

THANK YOU FOR READING THIS FAR

Wow! You made it! Thank you for reading about creating keepsakes!

Hey, since you’re here! You may as well check out part 1 of my Mother-In-Law story, here, or if you’ve read that, check out part 2, here! Or maybe you want to hear more about Pop, here. Or, check out our other topics here! Either way, I appreciate you!

Please leave a COMMENT about any tips you may have!! Or comment with YOUR story! Any dementia stories? Let me know!

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