Final Questions for “It’s all About You !”

SPENDING TIME:
1) To what organizations have you belonged? List those important to you.
2) What community projects have you worked on? What volunteer work have you ever done?
3) Did you ever make a float for a parade? Were you ever in a parade?
4) To what political party have you belonged? Why? Have you been actively involved in politics? (campaigning, candidate, supporter, etc.)
5) Tell about your health. Have you ever been hospitalized? Why? Did you ever have to use crutches or a wheelchair? What illnesses have you had? Do you wear glasses or a hearing aid? When did you begin to wear them? Do you have any ailments now? Explain.
6) What was your first full-time job? How much did you earn? What were your responsibilities?
7) What other employment have you had? Whom did you work for and for how long? What were your responsibilities? What work have you liked best? Are you retired? When? Was it a big adjustment?
8) Have you had any hobbies? What are they? Do you have any collections (stamps, coins, rocks, embroidery, etc.)?
9) Have you traveled? How many states have you been in? Countries? Have you been on a ship, plane, train, bus? Explain. What was the biggest rip taken as an adult? When, where, and with whom?
10) Have you ever met anyone famous? Tell about it.
11) What moments do you remember most? Tell about one of your sad/happy times. Tell about your most embarrassing moments. What was one of your proudest times? When were you the most frightened? What is the funniest thing that has ever happened to you?
12) Have you ever seen or been in a disaster? What kind? When? Where? Have you ever been in a flood? Fire? Hurricane? Car accident?
13) Have you ever served in the military or been involved in wartime service? What kind? When and where?
14) What do you do with your time now? What do you want to accomplish before your life is over?
15) Have you lived through historical events? Tell about some of them-first man on the moon, Kennedy assassination, Pearl Harbor, The Cold War, WWII, Berlin Wall built and torn down, the Depressions, major inventions developed, etc.

CHILDREN:
1) What are your children’s names? When and where were they born? Tell about it and how you felt when you found out. How did you choose their names? Are any of the names “family names” passed from one generation to the next?
2) What was each child like as a baby? Cute? Cranky? Did he/she ever get spanked? 3) What chores did she/he have to do? Did you give him/her an allowance? Did he/she behave in school? What grades? What did he/she like to do best? Did he/she keep a clean room? Did he/she do something special to surprise you?
3)What are some of your favorite memories of your family life when your children were growing up?
4) In what ways did you raise your children as you had been raised? In what ways did you raise them differently?
5) What has been most difficult or trying for you as a parent? What was the least difficult?
6) How did you feel when all your children left home?
7) Do you worry about your children?
8) Do you have any grandchildren? How many? How did you feel when you found out you were going to be a grandparent for the first time? How did you find out? How many great-grandchildren do you have? What do you like best about being a grandparent?

FEELINGS:
1) Do you believe in God? Why?
2) To what religion do you belong? Do you go to church regularly? What is it like in your church? What do they teach you? Are you a teacher?
3) Were you baptized? How, when where? Tell about it.
4) Have you ever gone on a mission? Where? Tell about it.
5) Have you ever had any spiritual experiences? Tell about them.
6) Do you believe in life after death? Are you afraid to die?
7) Write your testimony of your religious beliefs.
8) What are some of your favorite scriptures and quotes?
9) What are some of your favorite books?
10) As you look back, do you have any favorite years? What made them so special? Is there a time you would like to live over?
11) What do you value most in a friend? Who are some of your dearest friends? Tell about them.
12) What issues or causes have you felt strongly about?
13) In times of trouble, who or what has helped you pull through?
14) What major happenings in the world have affected your life most?
15) How do you feel about the future?
16) What advice can you give?
17) What is your creed for living a good life?

President Spencer W. Kimball said: “I urge all of the people of this church to give serious attention to their family histories, to encourage their parents and grandparents to write their journals, and let no family go into eternity without having left their memoirs for their children, their grandchildren, and their posterity. This is a duty and a responsibility.” May 1978 Ensign, pg. 4

Even More of More of “It’s All About You!”

TRADITIONS-HOLIDAYS:
1) Tell about your family traditions. Food, music, reading, etc.
2) What were the traditional or favorite recipes served at family gatherings?
3) Did you have family reunions? Tell about them.
4) What did you do on New Year’s Eve?
5) Tell about Valentine’s Day. Did you make valentines? How did you deliver them? Did you have a valentine box at school? Did you ever get flowers or candy?
6) Tell about Easter. Did you dye eggs? How? Did you hide eggs and Easter baskets? Did you go to church?
7) Tell about decoration or Memorial Day. Did you take flowers to the cemetery?
8) Tell about the Fourth of July. Did you have fireworks? Did your family have a picnic?
9) Tell about Halloween. What did you wear for costumes? Did you make your own? Buy one? Did you have a party? Did you play tricks on anyone or visa versa? Were you scared of ghosts, goblins, and witches? Did you go trick-or treating?
10) Tell about Thanksgiving. Did you have a turkey. What else? Who came to dinner? Did you go somewhere besides home to eat?
11) Tell about Christmas. Did you celebrate it? Did Santa visit your house? Did you ever see or talk to him? Did you write him letters? Did you hang a stocking? What did Santa leave in it? What time did you get up in the morning? Did you have a tree? Buy it? Cut it? What were the decorations like? What gifts did you get and give? Tell about your most memorable Christmas. Tell about Christmas Eve. Was it hard to get to sleep? Did you have a nativity scene and talk about Jesus?
12) How did you celebrate your birthdays? Did you ever have a party? Tell about it or them. Which birthday do you remember most?
13) What was the best gift you ever received when you were growing up? What was the best gift you ever gave?
14) Where there any other traditional events celebrated in your home? What family traditions have been most meaningful to you?

DATING/MARRIAGE:
1) How old were you when you started dating? Tell about your first date. Did you date a lot? Did your parents have to approve of your dates? Tell about your first kiss. Did you think you were popular? Were you ever shy? What did you think about yourself? Were you engaged more than once?
2) How did you meet your mate? How old were you? What attracted you to him/her? Tell about your courtship. Where did you go on dates? Describe him/her. Tell about the proposal and engagement ring. How long did you go together before you were engaged? How long were you engaged?
3) When and where was the wedding? What did you wear? What is your strongest memory from your wedding? Who was there (in general)? Tell about your honeymoon.
4) What was your adjustment to marriage? Were there any surprises?
5) Did you know how to cook when you were first married? Were there any cooking disasters?
6) What work did you do to make a living? Did you both work?
7) Tell a favorite story or two about your mate.
8) Have you been married more than once? If so, when, why, and to whom?
9) How are times different then than now? Entertainment, cleaning house, chores, toys, transportation, money/economy, working, cooking, raising a family, shopping.
10) What do we have now that you didn’t have then?
11) What did you have then that we don’t have now?
12) Tell about the home(s) you have lived in. Your first, second, etc. Where have you most enjoyed living and why?
13) Did you and your mate ever disagree about anything? Did you sulk, pout, or argue? How did you solve your problems?

If you can't follow through with these questions and interviews now, please be sure to copy and paste them for your future reference. These questions are great starters!

Even More of “It’s All About You!”

More questions to help complete a personal history. (This is going to be such a treasure! I’m excited for your family.)

GRAMMAR SCHOOL:
1) What was the name of your school, where was it, and what did it look like? How did you get there? Walk, ride? How far was it from your house? Were you ever late?
2) What did you do at recess? What games did you play? Did you ever have a Maypole or a field day? What was the playground like? What was lunchtime like? School or sack lunch? Where did you eat?
3) Did you ever play hookey? Tell about it.
4) What classes or subjects do you remember? Did you have homework? How much? What kind of grades did you get? What were your favorite/worst classes or subjects?
5)What teachers do you remember? Did you have a mean/good teacher? Were you ever teacher’s pet?
6) In what activities did you participate? Were you ever on a school team? If you were a member of a club(s), what was it? Were you ever involved in music or drama? Were you in the school band? Did you go to school dances? Were you involved in sports?
7) What did you like best about school? What did you like least?
8) What honors did you receive? Were you ever a school or class officer? Did you receive awards or prizes for achievements in athletics, scholarship, etc.?
9) What songs or dances were popular?
10) What kind of clothing did you wear? Were there fads? How were they different than clothes worn by young people today?

JR. HIGH SCHOOL:
Repeat the same questions that were given in Grammar School with this one additional question:

1) What did you do on Jr. High Graduation Night? What did you wear? Did you have a date?

HIGH SCHOOL:

Again, all of the questions are the same except for this one:

1) What did you do on High School Graduation Night? What did you wear? Did you have a date?

POST HIGH SCHOOL EDUCATION:
1) Did you attend school after high school? Where? How long? What was your major course of study? Did you graduate? What honors or degrees did you earn? Did you belong to a sorority or fraternity?
3) Apart from school, what have been your most important learning experiences?

More of “It’s All About You!”

How’s your determination to get answers to yesterday’s questions going? Still thinking about the need to do so? If you’re answer is “yes,” don’t feel bad, you’re not alone. Here are a few more questions. (I just had a thought that maybe you could add some of these questions to your “conversation jar.” You’re children love to here about your life, too!) Well, here’s the questions.

GROWING UP:
1) When you were a young child, what did you look like? What was your hair color? Did you have freckles? Were you fat or skinny? When you were a teenager, what did you look like?
2)What is the very first thing you remember?
3)Where did you live? What do you remember about your home(s)? Draw a floor plan of your home(s). How big was your yard? How many rooms did your home have? Did you have a barn or other buildings? Was there an attic or creepy room that scared you? Draw a map of your neighborhood and where your friends lived.
4) How big was your room? What did it look like? Did you have to share it? Could you keep it messy if you wanted?
5) How many people lived in your house? Did relatives come to visit? Did they stay long?
6) What appliances did you have in your home (for cooking, washing, heating, etc.)? Did you have electricity or did you use lamps? Did you have an indoor bathroom or an outhouse?
7) What was your favorite thing in the whole house? Did you save anything?
8) Were you ever punished? Why and how were you punished? Where was your favorite place to go when you were sad or angry? Did you ever run away from home or just hide from your parents? Why? Were you ever grounded? Did you ever talk back to your parents or other adults?
9) What was your bedtime? Did you ever have sleepovers? Tell about them.
10) Who pulled your teeth? How was it done? How much did the Tooth Fairy leave for a tooth?
11) Did you live where there was snow? Did you make snowmen? What other things did you do in the snow?
12) Did you have best friends? Name and describe them. Did you have fights and secrets?
13) Were you ever teased? How and who did it? Was there a bully who picked on you?
14) What household chores did you have to do? What kind of work have you done for pay? How much did you earn? What responsibilities did you have?
15) Was your mom a good cook? What were some thing you had to eat? Did you have a special place at the table? What were your favorite foods? What were your least favorite foods?
16) Did you have any pets? Tell about them. What were their names.
17) What did you do for fun? What games did you play? Did you have a favorite toy or toys?
18) Were you ever sick? Tell about it. Were you afraid of doctors or shots? Did you ever go to the hospital? Have you had stitches or broken bones? Did you have your tonsils out? Were you ever quarantined? What medicines did your mother give you? Did you ever have warts?
19) Did you have any favorite books or stories? Did you go to the library?
20) What did you want to be when your grew up? What did your parents want you to do or be?
21) Do you remember how much things cost? What years? (clothes, toys, food, gasoline, movies, stamps, etc.)
22) Did you get an allowance? How did you spend your money? What could you buy for a quarter?
23) How old were you when you learned to drive? How often did you get to take the family car? What kind of car was it? Did you have your own car?
24) Who most influenced your thinking? At what age? Why? Did you have a mentor-someone you admired and followed?
25) As a teenager, how did you get along with your parents? Your brothers and? Did you like being a teenager?
26) When did you move away from home? Where did you go and why?
27) What types of recreation did you enjoy? Did you go swimming, fishing, skating, state fair, amusement parks, camping, traveling? Tell about it.

Tomorrow I will give you questions about “Grammar School,” “Jr. High School,” “High School,” and “Post High School Education.”

It’s All About YOU!

Yesterday I promised you that I would give you some questions to help you get information from your grandparents about their lives. Here’s the first set of questions. (I want to give credit to Lindsay Powell for these questions that I found in a manual entitled 2008 Family History Fair. It had no copyright.) During the next few days you might consider saving these questions for they would help you get your history recorded and even your children’s history, too. Wouldn’t it be lovely to make the “beginnings” of your children’s histories in the form of a little book that has these questions provided? (Just an idea!)

YOU:
1) What is your full name? Were you named after someone? Did you have a nickname? What was it? How did you get it?
2) What is your birth date? Where were you born (city, county, state, country)? Were you born in a hospital or at home? Was there anything unusual about the circumstances of your birth? Do you know how much it cost for your delivery, Dr. and hospital stay? What was your weight and length? Did you have hair?

FAMILY:
1) From what country did your ancestors migrate? When was it? Where did they settle? When and where were they born? What ship did they travel on?
2)What is your father’s name? What is his birth date and place? What do you remember most about him from your childhood? What did he look like (body build, hair and eye color, etc.)? What work did he do? Is he still alive? If not, when , where, and how did he die?
3) What is your mother’s name? What is her birth date and place? What do you remember most about her from your childhood? What did she look like(body build, hair color and length, eye color, etc.)? Did she work outside the home. What did she do at home? Is she still alive? If not, when where, and how did she die?
4) How many brothers and sisters did you have? Give their full names, nicknames, birth and death dates & places in the order they were born. (Include children who died early in life or at birth.) Where did they fit in?
5)How did you spend your time together? Did you ever take vacations with your family? Where did you go? Tell about some vacations that you remember.
6) To which family members did you feel closest to. Why?
7) Was “English” the only language spoken in your home? If not, what other language was spoken and by whom?
8) What part did religion play in your life? Did you attend church regularly? Of what church did you belong?
8) Did your family have enough money? Was it ever a concern to you?
10) What were one or two of the worst times in your family life?
11) What were one or two of the best times in your family life?
12) Are their any family heirlooms that have been passed from one generation to another?

Tomorrow I will provide questions for “Growing Up.” Have an historical day.

Wow…! Grandpa and Grandma, Please Tell Me More!!!

How much do your children know about their grandparents’ younger years? Do you realize that their history offers one of the richest sources of tradition and identity within your family? Children are a captive audience if you can get grandpa to tell about his favorite childhood activities or if you can get grandma to tell about her first “crush.” Schedule time to visit grandparents or to have them come to your home. Have dinner and use your conversation jar to stimulate questions. Perhaps you could even make up some questions that are made specifically with the grandparents’ histories in mind. (Be sure to let the grandparents know in advance that you will be fishing for stories from their background.) Maybe you will want to wait until after dinner to begin the sharing time. Get comfy and cozy with pillows and blankets and start asking questions. Before you know it, you’ll be laughing and hoping that you can remember every detail of the stories you are told. Thus, you might consider recording the stories if your grandparents grant you permission.

Tomorrow & the next few days, I will share some questions you might ask to get a complete history from anyone—but it would be especially nice for you to record grandparents’ answers for your Family History Record.

Family Activity Fun Box

I am sure, if you are like me, usually you don’t mind fixing dinner if you know what you want to prepare. The challenge is in the decision of “What shall I fix?” I think the same holds true with spending quality time with your family. If you can’t think of something to do, you allow television or other non-planned things to take over the time you could spend together as a family. So, what can you do to prevent this? How about making a Family Activity Fun Box.

I’m sure I don’t need to give you suggestions but I will anyway because it will help me get mine done for times when my grandchildren are here. I think I’ll use a cute box and have fun decorating it. (Your children can help you, too.) Think of all the activities you would like to do with your family and write them on slips of paper. During this step be sure to include family members. Some of the things I would like to do will be different than yours because my grandchildren range from the ages of 9 years-old to newborn. Here are some suggestions to get you thinking: 1) bowling, 2)read a book aloud 3) play “hot/cold” 4) go for a walk 5) swing 6) play in a sandbox 7)hide treasures in the sandbox and then allow everyone time to dig for “buried treasure 8) have pizza delivered and play a game 9) make cookies and take them to a neighbor 10) lay on the ground and look at the stars by night or the clouds by day.

Be sure to replenish the slips of paper either by replacing them or by adding to the box as family members come up with more ideas. Truly, if you don’t have alternative ideas for filling your time, the unwanted fillers will monopolize your family’s time.

Family Focus Game

Here's my blog for today. It's in a JPeg file for you to open in another page and print. Or just click on it. It will then give you a page where you can go into edit, then "select all", then in edit again you can command "copy". At this point you can go in to your favorite word processing program and in edit of that program you can command to "paste." At this point enlarge it to fit your page and print. This is a great game or activity for large groups including extended family. Get Grandpa and Grandma to play. Use it in Family Home Evening.

Hooray! It's Daddy Day!

The other day I mentioned that Jeff gave each of our children (individually & when they were little) 1/2 hour every Sunday to play whatever they wanted to play. Sometimes he played Barbies or with dolls. Sometimes he played games. Sometimes he wrestled. Sometimes I would find him answering questions that the child would have. I found that the bonding between Jeff and each of the children was amazing. I don’t think any of them have ever forgotten the love that was felt during those times. So, with Dad’s in mind, I’ve been wondering what Dad’s could do (or Mom’s) to create quality time with their children. Here are a few ideas: 1) Pack a picnic and go for a surprise outing to your favorite place—the back yard, the canyon, a park, Grandma’s. 2) Go to Deseret Industries or other discount or Seconds store and allow your child to find a “Theme” treasure—a book on animals, an amazing cooking utensil, a game for “memory’s sake,” an outfit for “An Evening of Dancing” 3) go to a ball game, fishing, hiking, a nature walk, digging for worms. 4) go to the library and explore a child’s interest with him or her. 5) listen to different types of music and dance and/or sing, too! 6) Ask questions like, “What’s the most important job in the world?” or “Who is your hero?” 7) Lay on a blanket on a cloudy day and find different shapes in the clouds. Don’t forget to listen to your child’s ideas as they start to flow freely. 8) Make something with “Dad’s tools!” 9) Read a book together. Show enthusiasm by reading the book faithfully each day or night as pre-determined. Be sure to review the previous reading day’s pages. 10) Dad, you could also make of list of things you want your child to know in the next year and then systematically work on these. 11) Work on a scrapbook.

No more "Boo Hoos" because of the "Tube!"

I received the following as an email the other day from my dear friend Carol. (Thanks Carol!) I have no idea whether this really happened but surely it could have. I sense that there are many children all over the world that feel television, computers, and the telephone are all competition for attention they need so badly. Read this and let me know what you think:

A teacher from Primary School asks her students to write an essay about what they would like God to do for them. At the end of the day while marking the essays, she read one that made her very emotional.
Her husband, that had just walked in, saw her crying and asked her, “What happened?”

She answered, “Read this. It's one of my student's essays.”

“Oh God, tonight I ask you something very special: Make me into a television.
I want to take its place. Live like the TV in my house. Have my own special place, and have my family around ME . To be taken seriously when I talk....I want to be the center of attention and be heard without interruptions or questions. I want to receive the same special care that the TV receives when it is not working. Have the company of my dad when he arrives home from work, even when he is tired. And I want
my mom to want me when she is sad and upset, instead of ignoring me... And... I want my brothers to fight to be with me... I want to feel that family just leaves everything aside, every now and then, just to spend some time with me. And last but not least, make it that I can make them all happy and entertain them...Lord I don't ask you for much... I just want to live like every TV.”

At that moment the husband said:
“My goodness, poor kid. What horrible parents!”

She looked up at him and said, “That essay is our son's!!!” Author Unknown

Have you ever tried removing the television for an extended period of time? While we were raising our family, we eliminated television for extended periods of time several times. It didn’t hurt the children one bit. In fact, it seemed like those times were more blissful and our family was connected. Usually we would justify returning to the television so that we could watch General Conference.

General Conference ended last week and so we have a six-month period where television can be eliminated. What a perfect time for a family experiment. What can your family do without television? Here’s what I thought of: 1) Plan, plant, weed & water, & harvest a garden together. 2) Go for walks, hikes, or runs together. 3) Spruce up your yard. 4) Have cooking school. 5) Sing songs. 6) Learn how to play instruments together. 7) Make popcorn balls. 8) Visit friends and loved ones. 9) Go to a nearby canyon or park and have a picnic. 10) Play games. 11) Make a family video. 12) Have a puppet show. 13) Play with play dough. 14) Make collages of seeds, grains, or things you can find from your yard. 15) Read stories together. 16) Have a talent show. 17) Catch grasshoppers. 18) Do a project or craft together. 19) Play music and dance and be silly together. 20) Do service projects together. 21) Work on merit badges with your sons or value experiences with your daughters. 22) exercise together. 23) Get on the floor and play with your tiny ones. 24) Visit local museums, libraries, parks, etc. 25) Draw (scribble) together. 26)Go for bikes rides. 27) And, don’t forget to get your children’s ideas for things you can do together & write them down.

I hope I’ll be seeing you on one of your evening’s outings since you’ll now make time to visit. Put me on your list, okay? We would love to see you!!!