Tuesday, August 19, 2014

Placing Importance On Memory Keeping



A little while back, Grace was watching an episode of Play School where the presenters were taking photographs of Jemima and Humpty and all of the other toys and compiling an album.  The show finished and she came running up to me with such a look of excitement, thrilled at the prospect of sharing what she thought was a brilliant suggestion.

“Mummy, Mummy, I’ve got a really great idea!  Let’s take some photos and print them out and then stick them into a book so we can look through them.”

I smiled at her enthusiasm and yet at the same time, felt horrified that the concept of a ‘photo album’ was so foreign to her.  Why did she not know what one was?  When did I stop printing out photos?  Why had she not experienced the same pastime I remember so fondly as a little girl?… flipping through my Mum and Dad’s albums, full of photos of myself and my sister as babies, of my parents and aunts and uncles as children, all of which led to lots of questions, the sharing of tales and plenty of reminiscing.  Photos that captured memories and milestones and the changing of eras.  Photos that embodied ‘family life’. 

I decided then and there that making time to start on some memory keeping projects was a priority. 



My first efforts have been spent on updating our hallway gallery where a collection of frames have displayed several wedding photos ever since we’ve been in our home.  While those photos were no less precious after all this time, somehow, displaying a handful of family snapshots seemed a better fit for this space now.  With a combination of frames from Country Road, Spotlight and op shops in white and timber, some favourite photos of us and the girls are now on display… a mix of posed shots and other more candid ones.  Not only is our new display more meaningful to the girls, but swapping the black frames for lighter ones has really lifted this space. 

Next up, I've begun to sort through our cupboard of haphazardly stored photos.  Cuddled up under a blanket on the couch at night with a cup of chamomile tea, I've been gradually going through our collection, sorting through one small pile at a time and putting them into bundles for projects I have planned. I’m going to finally  complete the girls’ traditional baby books as well as Sophie's first year album (like the one I made for Grace), begin an on-going family record of photos using Project Life resources (as well as on-going albums for each of the girls) and print out some photo books of holidays we've been on.  I promise to share these with you as I work on them…


How about you?  Do you still print out photos or have you too fallen victim to the digital age and the habit of viewing memories on-screen only?


4 comments:

  1. What a lovely encouraging post. I have really fallen victim to the digital age. Not one of my children has a baby album and I simply have a handful of photos printed that sit in a drawer. I think I need to make memory keeping a priority too - but the task can be so daunting when so many photos are taken, I think choosing which ones to print will be the hardest part!

    ps I think I've seen the episode of playschool you're talking about!

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  2. Oooh Amanda I hear you! I think we take far too many photos now because it's so easy to delete the bad ones (but we don't!) that to sift through them all and create albums seems such a big task!
    I finally finished our wedding album to have it arrive by our six year anniversary, and I'm almost done with our travel albums and hoping to scrape in a bit under the six year mark on those. Then I'm starting on the kids "first five years" and some family yearbooks... Phew! Let's keep at it! Good luck!

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  3. I have to admit I am really bad at printing out photos. Though you may have just inspired me xx

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  4. I used to be so good at printing photos particularly when Miss 15 was a baby and the early years of Miss 10 but it has been too long since I have printed out photos. I did have this brilliant idea to print out photos each month that way it wouldn't be too overwhelming but I haven't put it into practice sadly. Thank you for the reminder Amanda. xxx

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