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I did this a few years ago. I compiled recipes from my late mother's recipe box and favorite cookbooks (her signature dishes) and asked other family members to share the dishes for which they are known. With the help of my brother, I assembled the recipes in a binder using page protectors. The binder can be updated and has pockets to hold recipes clipped from newpapers, magazines and printed off the internet. For a few years, we solicited new recipes from everyone every year, but we haven't updated recently.

I have boxes and files, and binders with tabs and plastic sleeves (from attempts to organize) and manilla envelopes and recipes hand-written on cards, tucked inside Mom's and Grandma's cookbooks. We (big Irish family) want to compile a cook book for our children and grandchildren (and those to come). Computers should make this a lot simpler than it would have been. It will contain our favorite recipes and lots of photos of our families from as far back as we have them. Nearly every photo or recipe will remind someone of a story - they'd be fun to include, too. Getting this project going is difficult with everyone's busy schedules, but it sure would be a great legacy and a way to honor those beautiful women who shared their love and knowledge of cooking and gardening with us. Even those who decide not to cook will enjoy seeing their family at work and at play, and will have something special to pass down. Many will be photos around a holiday or anniversary or birthday or picnic table. Those were the occasions when more of us were together at one time.

We talk - you actually did it, Ellen! ;) My heartiest congrats! I'm motivated!!!

Last year for my Mom's 70th birthday party/mini family reunion we put together a cookbook for everyone. We included the old family favorites from childhood, as well as any new ones people wanted to add. We handed out a binder style cookbook with a disc inside for those more technologically inclined. It was really wonderful to have them all in one place and be able to pass them on to the next generation. We plan on doing periodic updates, as we have several excellent cooks in the family. It was a lot of work to put together, but truly worth it. It also let me throw out folders of old stained 3x5 recipe cards and random scraps of paper I'd scribbled recipes on in a hurry. It is also a wonderful way to preserve the family history....through food!

This is one of the best presents I ever received. My oldest sister compiled our family cookbook a few Christmas' ago and it's a great resource and something to cherish.

My mom is now compiling another one for the newer generations of cooks in the family like my cousins and sisters, and am proud to say, myself, so that the old recipes will mix with the new, updated ones. (Seeing as "oleo" isn't really the way to bake these days! haha!) And computer printouts are much easier to read then handwriting on very old index cards!

We also have a family tablecloth that comes out during the holidays with all of our handprints traced and then my mom sewed the outlines and names to make it permanent. I highly suggest for anyone even thinking of doing something like a recipe book to just make the commitment, we have lost many family members and this is a wonderful way to remember them, as well as add to it when new ones arrive!

So send out some emails asking for your family members' favorite recipes and get organized!

I don't have much of a family left (just my younger brother who is more interested in eating), and neither my mother-in-law nor my sister-in-law cares about cooking (nor do they care about eating, for that matter:-), but I think sometimes that my mother-in-law's "cooking" might be partly to blame:-)). But my husband has encouraged me to write down every recipe I came up with, and many of them are inspired by either my family recipes (as much as I remember them) or by my travels, or both. So now I have a rather nice collection of recipes...all I have left to do is get somebody else in the family interested in cooking, not just eating:-)

dutchgal: I'm going to scan recipe cards and newspaper recipes, etc., and save them as photos. I'm hoping I won't have to type any, since I can fit just about anything on my scanner. It's a Lexmark all-in-one. Print, copy, scan, fax. I make sure I save them with a .jpg and then I can resize, crop, adjust and make it work.

Your idea sounds just great!

@brooke29 It has to start with somebody, and I'll bet you'll end up with a star pupil one of these days.

I have one that my grandfather made shortly before he died. A lot of the recipes are missing though, and my grandmother refuses to send them to me (you have to visit, Karyn).

Never mind that I can't even remember the last time I had a free weekend, much less time to drive from MD to upstate NY . . . .

You should really check out Matilda's Fantastic Cookbook Software by The Cookbook People. It's really an amazing product for making your own family cookbook.

I got a copy of it for Christmas and I've already finished making my cookbook. It included not only 114 recipes (about 35 with photos) but also an address book, birthday calendar and the start of a little family tree.

The software alphabetizes and organizes your recipes, so there's no clunky formatting like in Word. And all the recipes are stored on your own computer and not on a server somewhere where they can charge you to access it down the road (if they still exist).

I know I sound like a corporate salesman, but I really do love this product! More info here: http://www.cookbookpeople.com/

My aunt (a fabulous cook) gave me a handwritten recipe book for Christmas. It included a number of her signature dishes along with some from her daughter (also a great cook) and her mother (my grandmother). My aunt also included some of my grandmother's original index cards and notebook scraps of her recipes, and that made me cry. If I had a scanner, I would scan all of the original cards and type up the recipe underneath.

I'm currently working on a family cookbook to give my mom and her sisters for mothers day this year. I plan to use the online service at blurb.com where you can actually create and publish your own book.

I have been gathering and restoring old photos of my parents, their siblings, and my grandparents at various family functions and my plan is to include lots of those photos along with pictures of the completed meals.