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Beyond the Baby Book: Recording Children's Milestones

Most new parents vow that they will faithfully record and remember their baby’s every developmental milestone. From his first smile and first word to the benchmarks of elementary school, like learning to ride a two-wheeler and what happened during that first experience at camp, all will be captured and recorded for posterity. However, despite good intentions, many parents don’t keep up their recordkeeping beyond the first few months or years. Keeping records of several siblings is even more challenging. Often parents do a reasonable job on the first child, but rarely for later siblings.

Are there other ways to record important milestones beyond the tried and true baby book? Some suggestions:

Designate a calendar used just for jotting down milestones and, perhaps, brief comments: "Alexis’s first tooth." "Anna took two steps between her parents today. So proud of herself!" The information on the calendars can, someday, be collated—or just hold on to the calendars as records in themselves.

How can you capture what your child was like at each age? One family’s ritual occurred around each child’s birthday. The birthday child would complete a list of her favorite things at this particular age. On the list might be her favorite book, favorite friend, favorite food, toy, sports team, subject at school, etc. Preserve the lists from year to year to help give a picture of the child at each age. Also, kids love to go back and see how their tastes have changed—and remained the same—over the years.

Keep a separate photo album for each child. The captions can tell much of the child’s story. ("Madeline’s first day at day care. She loved the blocks.") One mother keeps photo albums with one page devoted to each month of her daughter’s first years. She labels each month and chooses the five or six very best photos of her child to put in this special photo album.

Of course, video tapes can help record a child’s growth. One family of five records the birthday celebrations of each child on separate videotapes, one for each child. They run the (growing) videotape throughout the day every year on the child’s birthday.

Audio tapes can also record kids as they grow. One uncle began recording his niece and nephews each Labor Day—a low-key holiday which falls at the beginning of a new school year. He’d ask them to talk about what had happened during the past year at home and at school and what they looked forward to in the coming school year.

A mother of four began keeping a journal of her children when they were born. She wrote every month for the first year, four times a year until age five, and then twice a year after that. She recorded their physical, social, emotional, and cognitive development and what a typical day in their lives was like. Sometimes the entries were short, but she found that once she began writing, it was a kind of catharsis. It helped her step back and see the bigger picture. Also, when she was struggling with a particular age or problem, it helped to go back and see what the child’s siblings were like at that age. She included photos in the books and she faithfully kept them until each child turned 21. The kids are grown now, but they treasure their books and read them from time to time.

Finally, it had to happen. Now there’s recordkeeping on the Internet! Sign up for an on-line baby book at: babybits@daxtech.com. Parents input information from pregnancy to age six, from medical records to "Your favorite toy at age one was…." This particular service (and surely there are others) can keep records of up to 12 children in a family and can print a customize baby book from the inputted information.