Heritage Days!

This past week we had Stake Conference. Among the messages that were given was a message that encouraged us to do genealogy. I have always enjoyed genealogy and have many family history based projects on the go, but as I considered this topic at this time I felt the desire to involve and include my children more in this work. About a month ago I was interviewed for the newspaper. In that interview I was asked about the interest level of my children and at that time I realized that family history work to them is not much more than sitting at the computer looking at lists of names. Family history is so much more and I want them to know that.

Recently I have been blessed to receive some of the written testimonies of my relatives along with some of their spiritual experiences in life. What a great joy it is to read those stories. As I have done so my desire to include my children has increased. As a result we have counseled together and as a family decided that once a month we will hold a Heritage Day. Our Heritage Days will be days filled with family history pursuits. We will play games, read histories, listen to those that are recorded, work on writing a new histories, write in our journals, scan photographs, organize digital scrapbooks, scrapbook memorabilia, learn how to index, seek out names for temple ordinances and any other pursuit that preserves memories or is family based.

As a result of this decision Charity and I spent our Sunday afternoon this past week preparing testimony journals. These are journals that we started about three years ago. I made 9 or 10 of them but only got the covers designed on about four. Charity and I got two more done and two more started. It feels good to be finishing up some of these long overdue projects. As I look back through my testimony journal I am reminded of some choice experiences and precious feelings I have had in my own life. I know that we continue to write in our testimony journals, those records will bless and enhance our lives and who knows, maybe even the lives of our posterity many years from now.