Making Memories

For the past couple of months I have had this humungo pickle jar sitting next to my sink, just waiting to be used for something creative. It even served as a vase for my Mother's Day flowers...but I knew that this awesome glass pickle jar had a greater purpose. And then suddenly there it was...on Pinterest of course! I had been looking through my thousands of pins & likes,  i'm a complete pin hoarder, and found a pin I had saved ages ago, the Memory Jar!

This was the perfect activity for us to do this week as we have been hiding inside from the 90+ degree temps with the AC on full blast. I gathered a few magazines I had around the house, a bag of ribbons, glue, & scissors...that's it! I told the kids we would be spelling out MEMORIES, so we needed to find those letters so I could cut them out to use on the jar. It was a fun learning activity as well as a craft activity since it involved recognizing letters in the alphabet. Normally I would let them use their safety scissors to cut things out for the project but the letters were so small that I decided to do it myself while they used their scissors to practice cutting shapes out of old newspapers. After I finished cutting all the letters out, we glued them onto the glass and picked out a pretty ribbon to represent summer, and we were done! The great thing about the ribbon is that we can change it to match whatever season it is. They have already picked out which ribbons to use for each season! You can really decorate this jar in a million different ways...glitter, paint, or mod podge. The ideas are ENDLESS! 

Our goal for our memory jar is to write down things that made us happy throughout the year and on New Year's eve (or day) we will read through each memory so we can remember what a great year we had and appreciate the little things even more. I would like to make this into a tradition that they will carry on with their own kids someday.

When I asked them to write their favorite memory of the year so far to add to the jar, this is what they each wrote:

• Bobo,"going to the beach"
• Peanut, "visiting with Grandpa & Grandma"

I love that they both picked moments from our trip to North Carolina as their favorite memory, mine will also be from this trip as well ♥

Have you made your own Memory Jar??? If so, I'd love to see it...please post a link in the comments section of this post ^^


*here is the original pin where I got my inspiration >> http://pinterest.com/pin/166492517444456063