Oscraps

Do you have someone you love to talk to?  Or someone that you would love to pass a story on to?  Sometimes we struggle with journaling because we don’t know who our audience is.  It feels awkward to write to no one and we don’t know what to say to the air.  Today’s journaling tip helps overcome that block.  And it’s as easy as pulling out your stationary or opening up your email program.  Letter writing!  Letter writing is a wonderful way to add journaling to your page.  It gives you an audience for your writing and sets the tone for your words.  Pretend like you are talking to an old friend or your future grandchild.  What is it that you want to tell them about this particular event or moment in time?  Do you want them to laugh or be pensive?  Consciously deciding who you are creating the journaling for can help fuel your fingers into getting the words down.

Writing to our children and loved ones is a great way to start our journaling.  Since many of us scrap to capture those memories for the future, a note to loved ones that they can read later when they are older or have a little perspective can be a perfect fit for the page.  Peppermint has a great emotional page to her child that makes me tear up thinking about my own son.

And Selena had a little fun with a period of time with her son that was trying her patience…and managed to poke fun at herself as well!

But we don’t just have to look to the future, turning our lens on the past can give us a way to talk about ourselves and feel less self-conscious, as Laurie did here.

Sometimes, we also have some unfinished things left to say.  When you are missing someone, as I often miss my mom, writing a letter to them gives a chance to tell them the important, or even less important, details of our lives.

And who says our letter recipient has to be real?  It was easy to find a slew of “Dear Santa” letters in the gallery, but Linda’s jumped out as unique.  Not only did she write a letter, but she pretended to be someone else writing the letter!

If you’re struggling to figure out what to say on your layout, try picking an audience for you page and writing it for them.  There are lots of great “writing” and “correspondence” kits in the store that can inspire you!  Phyllis Theroux said that “sending a letter is a good way to go somewhere without moving anything but your heart”.  Try letter writing for your journaling and see where it moves you!