"My Love Letter To You"

Those who know me know I'm obsessed with my children! I'm very much aware of how delicate life is and that it can be taken from us at any moment. If I should ever leave this earth before my kids I want them to know how very important and dear they are to me. That's why I am a fanatic about documenting details of their lives in their baby books. On the front page of each I have written, "This is my love letter to you." Every stage of development, songs we sing, cute and funny phrases they've said, first dates, every tooth lost, baby food labels, tags off Christmas gifts, Valentines, first love, anything and everything that I never want to forget is logged. All three of my kids love to sit down with Mommy and read "their" books as if they were beautiful award winning novels. I keep them handy so they could be pulled out and updated at any moment. My 7yr old will say, "Mom get out the baby book I have something I want you to write in it." My 16yr old will say, "Mom are you going to put this in my baby book?"

Most of you are probably saying, "I don't have the time for that" well sometimes I don't either. That's why I have a basket that I drop things in, report cards, pictures, letters they've written, etc. That way when you "do" have the time you can grab the items and insert them in the books. This way the kids can also add things to the basket that are important to them too. The books don't give you much room to write, maybe one or two pages per year, so I write in the columns, and even cover up pages I won't use with a white piece of paper, that way i won't miss out on any info. due to the lack of space. I try to get the kids involved as much as possible by having them stick stickers they get from the doctor in there or by tracing their hands each year, this way they feel apart of the book and helps them retain their memories.

It's never to late to start a baby book. I had my first daughter when I was 20 so I didn't have much time to keep up with it, however I did keep a piece of paper handy on the fridge to write down firsts like smiles, words, solid foods, etc. A couple years back i took those papers and filled in her book the best that I could. From that point on it's been updated with report cards, school Id's, essays shes written, even her thoughts and feelings written by herself.

Keeping a Baby Book is very similar to scrap booking, it just takes less time, less money, and it only looks perfect in the eyes of those it touches. Now my love and memories of my babies will never be forgotten.