Our 9/11 Tradition

I've posted this in the past, but 9/11 is a special day of remembrance in our family. I'm a bit surprised that it is not a national day of remembrance, but I'm also encouraged to know that the events of 9/11 are being shared with a generation who is too young to remember the day from their own experiences.

This year I volunteered to give a presentation to the 6th Graders at Sandy Elementary about 9/11. I approached the presentation from a historical perspective, and I smattered a few of my personal memories of that day; I was in Manhattan on that unbelievable day. I spent hours and hours preparing a power point that I thought would be appropriate for 6th Graders and do accurate justice to the day. The theme of the presentation was "remembering the heroes of 9/11."

At the end of the presentation, I asked the children how they could remember 9/11. I was stunned with some of the answers they gave. They are SMART, THOUGHTFUL kids! Many of them have an adult in their life to has told them of their personal experience on 9/11. Many of them already have 9/11 traditions with their families. I was quite surprised that many of them wanted to share their thoughts. Perhaps I underestimate 6th Graders. I learned a lot from them.

In keeping with our family tradition, we all went to the Healing Field in Sandy, Utah (now our home town), and we spent some time reflecting on that day. The following are some of the pictures. With the exception of one of these pictures, Bradley was the designated photographer for the event, and he did a fabulous job!