Ugh, this title makes me ill and I did not want to go there. But whatever; I mentioned this idea of remembering and sharing in regard to kids’ Must-See Places. Must See places are still trickling in (mostly East Coast) but I wanted to share this cool (and crafty…ugh) idea that my sister-in-law inadvertently gave me.

She loves traveling in her car. After several months of map ordering maps, planning stops (usually around a battlefield) and marking off welcome centers where she can pick up some hotel coupons she heads out with her little ford with way too many miles on it. Along the way she takes tons of pictures but then does something really interesting when she gets the film developed: she purchases a small mini-album, labels trip highlights then gives the book to my son.

My son absolutely pours hours into the thing, studying the labels “cactus” or “desert” while commenting on the photos. When we went to my brothers house and saw his mini real life cactus, my son was in awe.

So here’s the craft. After one of these trips the kid goes to his Must-See places list and marks off where he or she has just come back from. Around that time mom, dad, uncle or cousin (whoever) gives them a pithy photo album with like twenty shots in it–just the highlights of things they thought were really awesome. Of course, they’ll need one shot in front of a sign or something marking that they were really there, but the rest is just stuff they thought was great. It can even be some weird lizard they saw.

That means that those of us traveling with kids have to be super in-tune to what is just driving them nuts because those are the things they’re probably going to keep bringing up years from the trip. My son still brings up Disney’s Mickey Mouse waving to us in the distance and that was back when he was under two: now he’s over four.

Honestly, we older folk just look back at the pictures in our waning years but our kids would look back at relive the event and may have something they can think about when they have kids.

So it’s sorta’ like a scrap book but dedicated to that one First Trip. Like “My First Visit to Disney” with a cool little labels. A stage two of this idea is have a page for every time they revisit the place: that way they have a memorable transition of the place.