4 Easy Ways To Save Your Family’s History

You don’t have to go all out to preserve your family’s name and create a legacy. In fact, spending a lot of money on something like a mausoleum might sound nice, but it doesn’t truly represent your family. There is no story behind a tall, marbled tombstone. Instead, you need four realistic yet easy ways to save your family’s history.

Consider Storing a Time Capsule

You don’t need a mausoleum, but you could make a time capsule instead. Twenty-five or fifty years from now, what relics do you want your family treasure hunters to dig up? It could be an old photo, postcard, or a favorite DVD. It really can be anything, but it should be something meaningful and valuable to the next generation so they can proudly display it.

Take a DNA Test

A DNA test tells you more than just your ethnicity or nationality; it’s a genealogy passport to unlocking where your family originates and connecting you to family members you’ve never met. If you have some secrets to unravel or want to create a digital footprint for future families, start with a DNA test.

Start Taking Video and Voice Recordings

It would be pretty cool to hear what our relatives sounded like in the past, but unfortunately, it’s hard to imagine without a recording. If you want to let others know what you sound or look like, take a video or voice recording of yourself.

In fact, one great keepsake many family members love is seeing how you live right now. Take a video of yourself getting ready for the day or combine videos of family members welcoming the newest additions to the world. Give your future loved ones advice and a good joke (maybe a dad joke), and make them smile for generations to come.

Create a Genealogy Book

Start by building a family tree, then document your findings in a book. One of the coolest ways to save your family’s history and trace your genealogy is to publish a book about it. Family members of the future will be grateful that they don’t have to spend long hours tracking down information for their children’s family heritage projects. Now, they can tell the teacher they have a book for that!

When creating your genealogy book, consider making a digital version over a hardcover—or do both! A digital version is perfect because it can help preserve handwritten photo captions. If your favorite thing to do is create memories with the family, document it so it’s preserved for the next generation of family researchers.

Heritage is one of the things that bring families together. It’s not the luxury of passing down an estate; it’s really about what memories were made and shared in parts of childhood homes. If you have to leave a legacy behind, make it a valuable one, like a journal documenting every member of the family tree.