Topics described in the diary include daily activities, physical health and emotional states for Granger and for those around her, the weather, visitors and those she visited, etc.

Daily activities include household chores, gardening/farming chores including taking care of the hens, baking and cooking, amounts paid for items, writing letters, etc. Granger describes her grief after her husband's death in October 1908 and makes note when she and her daughter Marian were all alone without anyone visiting after his death. Other names that appear frequently in the diary include Cora, Fred and Maud, Bird and Beatrice, and Granger's other daughter Malisa or Malissa (Granger's own spelling of names varies throughout the diary).

The author wrote briefly most days. The back of the notebook includes a few pages where Granger made note of several people's deaths, starting with her husband's, as well as some addresses, a medicinal recipe, etc. Some pages toward the end of the notebook were not used. Granger's daughter noted at the end of the regular diary that her mother had died and would no longer be writing, as well as noting her own grief about how much she missed her mother. There is also on the next page a note dated March 18, 1919 that Clarissa Fish had died.

A note about the author's name: the diarist rarely noted her own name, once indicating "M. M. Granger" when writing about her husband's death. Research and other evidence points to her name being Mary (Prosser) Granger. The dealer from whom Spencer Library staff purchased the volume indicated her name was Anna, but this appears unsubstantiated.