In the world of social media, blogging, and e-mail, you'd be hard pressed to find many who still write with pen and paper.
But what started out as a simple journal entry blossomed into a set of books that has traveled great distances to keep five women together.
"We just really didn't want to ever be apart from each other," said Dawn Eagle from Lake Villa, IL.
It's a journal that has been to several states and four time zones. But for Melissa Lanzourakis, Dawn Eagle, and three childhood friends from Sioux City, its a way to keep in touch with each other.
"Tonya (Christopher) is in LA, Morgenne (Basye) is in Phoenix, and Alison (Storm) is in Greenville, South Carolina," said Melissa Lanzourakis from Sioux City.
The journal had modest beginnings.
"Our friend Alison Storm started a journal," said Lanzourakis.
This slowly caught on with her four friends.
"From there is just kind of became a tradition amongst the five of us that we had this journal that we call now a 'traveling journal' and its been going on for ten years now," said Lanzourakis.
In a time before people shared their lives on social media sites.
"This was before Facebook, this was before that 'Traveling Pants' movie came out," said Lanzourakis.
Now it contains stories only the five of them can appreciate.
"The nice thing it's like a history book of our friendships," said Eagle.
The journal has gotten bigger over the years.
"We're about to start our third journal," said Lanzourakis.
...and traveled great distances.
"They've [the journals] traveled 38,000 miles we did the calculations once," said Lanzourakis.
This is about one and a half times around the world.
That soon got the attention of the Wall Street Journal and The Today Show.
"I could not even fathom that the Today Show would want us on," said Lanzourakis.
"Everybody's next reaction was something more like 'I gotta lose weight!'," said Eagle.
But the ladies also hope that their journals will catch on with others.
"I think it would be really neat if people feel inspired to want to reconnect with friends," said Eagle.
For now they are going to enjoy seeing each other in "The Big Apple."
"Most I'm excited for is to spend a weekend in New York with my girlfriends' like I'm very excited for that," said Lanzourakis.
You can catch the ladies sharing their story with Hoda Kotb and Kathie Lee on July 18th at 10AM on Today.
They've also started a website for others to start their own traveling journals.
