Hostess Journal : A Lovely Keepsake To Cherish
This weekend my family is having their Christmas get together. Although we aren’t an overly large family (about sixteen of us when all assembled at my mother’s house), it isn’t often that we are all able to get together at the same time, usually no more than two or three times a year. With many of you having company over for the holidays, I thought this would be a perfect time to bring you a little information on starting a hostess journal, which is sure to be cherished by you and your family for generations to come.
I have always wanted to do this but only just now did. I simply purchased a journal, lined or plain, it makes no difference.
My journal is for Bountiful, our new home.
Whenever we have company over (What a gift it is to be able to entertain friends and family!), I write the date at the top of the page, the names of our guests, what we served, and any special memories or a little summary of the gathering.
My first entry was for our impromtu Christmas party.
(I really do have horrendous handwriting but I know my children will be glad I wrote this in my own hand one of these days. They may also wonder why I didn’t go into medicine…)
The second entry was when my Mother, Father, and Grandmama came over with my nephew and niece for dinner.
Their anniversary was coming up and so we gave them a gift and I wrote down what it was in addition to the other information.
That time,. I had everyone sign the book. Katy especially enjoyed this.
We took some special photos, so I placed them in an envelope and tucked them inside.
Of course, this would be a lovely idea for a scrapbooker to expand on but I prefer to go with the lesser pressure option right now, you can always go back and scrapbook later.
My niece, Elle is just a few months old, so I traced her wiggly hand on the page. 🙂
I know I’m going to cherish this and it is such a simple idea.
What a wonderful keepsake to pass down to my kids, too!
Special thanks to my dear friend, Maralee McKee, for taking time to talk with me yesterday about the wonders of keeping a Hostess Journal. I just knew she’d be a wealth of information and she has been keeping one for about fourteen years now. I’ve heard of other ideas where folks kept a special table cloth and had each guest sign it in permanent ink. I love that idea but the journal is something I can pick up and flip through, remembering what I served to people and drawing ideas for future guests.
Just a simple, lovely idea I thought I’d bring you in time to make your Christmas entries. This would make a lovely hostess gift as well.
Merry Christmas. Take time to draw joy from the simple things!
Gratefully,
Christy 🙂
Grandmama, Katy Rose, Mama, and niece, Elle.
Joy is not in things; it is in us.
-Richard Wagner. Submitted by Sara. Submit your quote here.
You continue to inspire me and so many others….. Hope your Christmas is a true blessing for your family in your new home.
Wish I had started that many years ago. What I did do, was serge a piece of muslin for a table cloth, get permanent fabric quilt makers, and let everyone sign the table cloth. We’ve done that for several Christmas’s and Thanksgivings, and it is fun to go back and see drawings or thoughts family and friends have made. I guess this can be done for each child’s birthday as well. Enjoy!
What a wonderful idea!
Growing up, we’d have in excess of 30 people at our home for Christmas dinner… I think back now and wish I had done something like this before my mom, and almost all my aunts and uncles passed away.
Another fun keepsake idea is to take a plain tablecloth and let everyone sign it. Sharpie markers work, and if you’ve got someone who is able (and willing!) to embroider all of the signatures and notes, it will become a permanent memory and keepsake to hand down.
What a wonderful idea! How I wish I had been doing this all these years. My thing now is to make sure I take pictures everytime we have a gathering of any size. We’ve lost both of my parents and my husband’s father in a 3 year time frame and the last pictures we took of them are cherished ones. I encourage everybody to take pictures because you just never know. People may get annoyed with you but in years to come, they’ll appreciate them.
I love this idea! Of course I love all your ideas and I’m copying lots of them. My poor hubby thinks I’ve lost my little mind!
We have a Grandmama too! My children call my Mama Grandmama – except for the 2 yr old who calls her G Mama (grin). She tells them she’s the queen and they are the princesses. I have three girls and one boy, he’s too old for that stuff he says.
I am so inpsired by the pictures of your home and your posts on this blog! I am on a quest to make my modern subdivision house into the little old farmhouse I’ve always dreamed of. I even gave it a name – Gentility. I wrote about why I picked that name on my blog this morning. Hope you’ll check it out!
I forgot to add the link to my blog post:
http://mamaandthefourgs.blogspot.com/2009/12/welcome-to-gentility.html
I never was one for sentimental things such as this when I was growing up nor when I was a younger adult. However, as the years have flown by I’ve begun to learn how important it is to have some sort of record, whether it be a journal like yours or just some photographs, to help jog the ol noggin so the memories can be as fresh as the day they were made. Such a great and wonderful idea Christy!!
Oh Sweetface, you amaze me how much you accomplish ..”groan” I am either lazy or slow . I have those days when I accomplish zero. But I am sure on the ball today . I HAVE to get my cards out today. I am ready to go the post office , so now I only have to address my cards. LOL I am working Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. Someone
has to take care of the sick and afflicted. I work so the ones with
children at home can be with them. A lot of snow predicted here ,so I am packing some extra things in case I can’t get home from work tomorrow. Love , Joy, and Blessings to you and your family.
Dear Betty L.,
Thank you most kindly for being one of the ones to work on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day! You can’t close up the hospital and send ’em all home on holidays, so somebody’s gotta be there – and kind folks like you make it easier on people with little kids whose Christmases with their parents fly by so fast!
(Thank you, Christy, for allowing me to thank Betty here!)