Workshops for peronal historians or memory book writers

LIVING LEGENDS - LEVEL I
E-course (offered by email)

Writing Your Life - One Story at a Time
with Carol M. Upton

This 6 - week course will provide participants with a simple structure for understanding and writing family stories. Find your unique voice, get motivated and utilize instructor-guided reading and writing assignments to make progress with your memoir. You will receive feedback from other participants as well as the instructor on all of your writing exercises.

Have you been feeling the urge to write your family stories but can't seem to get started or keep going? Do you want to breathe new life into the telling of your family tales? Join us in the comfort of your own home - you will produce a series of polished family stories and have a great time doing it!

Topics are not limited to, but will include:

- Giving yourself permission to write
- What stays and what goes
- Showing versus telling
- Difficult topics - what are we NOT writing about?
- Personalizing your characters
- Important Events / Heroes in our lives
- Plans for moving on with our family stories

6 weeks of life writing exercises, feedback, handouts, practical information and resources delivered to your in-box for the price of $100.00.

Courses begin:
January 26 and March 30, 2006 and other dates TBA.

Capturing Family Memories - Getting Started
Feb 18 and 26, 2006
$48/2 sessions
1-4 pm. Chaster House in Gibsons
See SCRD Fall-Winter course catalogue or email through the SCRD website.

CAPTURING FAMILY MEMORIES - GETTING STARTED
2 half-day workshops for those who want to breathe life into the writing of their family stories.

Everyone has stories and experiences worth telling - for ourselves and for those we leave behind when we pass on. No one has seen the world through your eyes. Your family stories are unique and deserve to be preserved as a lasting legacy.

These two half-day courses will get you started recalling and writing your family stories. In the first workshop, you will receive tips on organizing your material, learn about the elements of writing and be provided with some memory-provoking questions. You will begin writing your family stories in class and go home with an assignment.The following week, we will discuss what you have written. Tips for creative editing, dealing with writer's block, graphic design and binding of your final product will be provided.
Bring a favourite family photo, recipe or other piece of memorabilia to the first class.

POCKETFUL OF MEMORIES - GETTING STARTED
with Personal Historian Carol M. Upton
See Calendar at: www.artescapestudio.com
Class Location:7610 Eureka Avenue,
Halfmoon Bay, BC V0N 1Y1

Go beyond the ordinary and create a timeless gift for yourself or others. Your focus will be learning how to turn your memories into words. As well, you will spend the first hour making a small personalized notebook to bind your handouts and then you will make a second notebook to use as a keepsake or as a gift to package memories.

This class is designed to inspire and motivate participants to write their own family stories. We will discuss why you can write, despite what you have heard, believe or worry about. We'll talk about the importance of writing our life stories and we'll build short writing exercises around your themes - e.g. births, siblings, winter celebrations, family recipes, beloved pets, and new discoveries. Bring a favourite photo, recipe or other bits of memorabilia to class. Resource material and memory-provoking questions will be offered; we will write and share with the class several 'postcard' stories and we will discuss tips to keep those stories flowing. Enjoy the fun and take home your own pocketful of memories! You will gain a multitude of ideas for Christmas gifts. Lunch will be provided.

2006 dates TBA