Photo by Chu

For the last few weeks I’ve been thinking about how I wanted to start off this new blogging journey. Should I share some of my scrap goals for the year? Chat about my plans for Faves: the 2011 Edition? Share my 28 @ 28 list? I hadn’t really settled on what topic I would choose – I just new I wanted it to be something special.

And then Adam’s grandma passed away. And all those ideas seemed a bit silly.

Last Saturday, Adam and I left for a last minute five-day trip to California to attend his grandmother’s funeral. The last time we had been in CA was in July, when we had stopped over for a week on our way Hawaii, specifically to spend some time visiting with his grandma.

When we were in college, we visited her quite regularly as our university was only a short distance away. But with deployments and living both overseas and out of state thanks to the military, our visits had become few and far between. Although both Adam and I knew in the back of our minds that it’s was always a possibility with her being 86 years-old, I don’t really think either of us left that visit in July thinking it would be the last time we would get to visit with her.

Adam’s grandma was much like you’d imagine a grandmother to be. Watching Adam interact with her was somewhat comical as at 6 feet tall, he towered over her petite 4’9″ frame. She spoke with a thick Columbian accent which made her both difficult to understand and incredibly endearing and cute at the same time. Our visits with her were never what one would call exciting, but that wasn’t the point. Watching her face light up when she saw that Adam had once again come to visit her made our time spent there absolutely worth while. There was never any doubt about how much she loved seeing him and how proud she was of all that he had become.

On our drive home from the cemetery on Tuesday, Adam and I were talking and he made a simple statement – how he wished he knew more about what his grandma was like when she was younger. What was she like when she was our age? We of course know the basic facts of her life, but it was a bit of a sad moment when we realized that there are so many little moments and memories unique to her that are now forever lost. It made us wish that we had made more of a concentrated effort to ask and document these stories on our trips to see her.

It was at this moment that I turned to Adam and said simply:

“You see. THIS is why I scrapbook.”

Sure I love products, design, photography and technology as much as the next girl. But the heart of scrapbooking for me will always be the stories. Documenting all those little life moments that reveal who we are right now at this moment. Maybe I’ll never have children or grandchildren who want to know more about what my life was like when I was younger. But it makes me smile knowing that if one day someone does want to know more about what my life is like right now, there are five years worth of pages and stories documenting mine and Adam’s life together. And that is a really cool thing.

So I end this post by sending a huge thank you to a tiny little grandma. Thank you for reminding me that this hobby is about more than just the bells and whistles – what we’re doing here truly has real value. And thank you so much for being a part of our lives. I hope you’re dancing in heaven with your loving husband whom you’ve waited so long to see. You will be missed.

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