When my kids were young, three and six, we bought one of the first Macintosh computers for a home business. I thought it was a magic box and began looking for ways to use it. I tell you that lest you think I started keeping

So I started a journal for each of them. What triggered it, in addition to any-excuse-to-play-with-that-infernal-machine, was that I realized how quickly I could forget the funny or cute or poignant things they said or did or experienced.

A couple examples from each journal:

Jennifer

10/80 We were driving to Michigan. Jennifer said she had to go to the bathroom. We were on the interstate, and I started to look for a place with a restroom. After a few minutes, she reminded me that she had to go. I said, "Jennifer, I'm looking for you." She was quiet for a few seconds, and then she said, "But Dad, I'm right here!"
• 9/87 For a long time now (several years), Jennifer has been very protective of Michael. If we get angry with him or treat him unfairly, she intervenes pretty forcefully, and says, "Dad, he was just trying to....", or, "Dad, it was an accident." She often puts her arm around him (which he does to her, too) when they are playing alone. They fight sometimes and sometimes treat each other shabbily, but most of the time their relationship is such a loving one it makes me cry.

Michael

• ‘85 Michael was riding with me in the car and started to pick his nose. I (gently) pushed his hand away, and he said "Oh. That's right. Picking your nose is yucky, isn't it, Dad." After a minute he said "That's alright, Dad. I just pushed it back in." After another minute he said to himself, as if I weren't there, "Pushing is easy."
• 10/13/87 Michael riding in the car with me. Suddenly he said, "God knows the future." I asked him how he knew that, and he said, "He must because he knows everything." I asked him how he knew God was a "he," and he said, "He must be because God is a boy's name."

I wrote the journals not only to keep a record, but also as a way to talk to them as adults and influence them with their own children - thus the self-serving-sounding "gently" in talking about Michael's picking his nose.

I could never have guessed how much it would mean to me to have the journals. Re-reading them is so much fun, and it brings back not only what happened but even how I felt at the time.

Take picture and videos, for sure, but nothing takes you back to the moment the way the written word does.