Redeem 5.2 Post #8

have to admit…I had to look it up, what exactly is an Almanac? I knew that, traditionally, an almanac was published annually and contained predictors for the coming year, mainly related to weather and agriculture. I knew that the Farmer’s Almanac was, for centuries, a primary resource for astronomical events (“Old” was added to one version in 1848).

I did a little research and what caught my attention, printed on the title page of the original “Old” Farmer’s Almanac edition, was the description, “…great a variety as are to be found in any other Almanac OF NEW, USEFUL, and ENTERTAINING MATTER.” So an almanac could be about more than weather and agriculture, it could be what we regularly (annually) encounter in everyday family life.

Almanac’s record information in order to plan for, even predict, coming years. A tried and true method for nearly 3 centuries (meteorologists marvel at the 80% accuracy average of some Almanacs) – there is wisdom here to learn from.

It struck me that, continuing with the Redeem 5.2 idea, a Family Almanac would be a great process to record information and predict factors for planning a subsequent year. So we are creating a Steffen Family Almanac. This year will be primarily about recording family events, traditions, weather for our region and agricultural notes (pertaining to our garden and fruit trees).

And then there’s this: imagine the legacy that a Family Almanac communicates. In a world where a Facebook Timeline serves as a visual and public account, imagine resurrecting a more traditional method and creating your own family almanac.

Here are a few initial entries into ours…