Photo Albums

I haven't put the photos in date order; that's what was stopping me from doing it, but I've done one album with mainly my son, another my daughter, then there's a family holidays one [oh, and a family pets one]. Negatives are all in a box and another box is for the remainder. I stayed up half the night doing it then woke at 7 and carried on. I'm finding it quite therapeutic [but you should see my living room ]. When I've done the photos I have boxes and boxes of Racing Posts going back years, with articles about favourite horses; just when I think I'll stop saving them Frankels first foals are being born so I HAVE to add those to the collection.

Adding onto this question of photo albums going out of style. Letters whether love or between friends and families will disappear. I have letters written by my father to my mother when he was posted abroad. Letters written by Grandmother to me. Also all the letters between me and my mother in law written during the seven years I lived in New York. Several friends in GB also wrote to me during that time and my New York friends once I came back. E-mails aren't kept for a long time.
The family letters are especially important to me as all of them have died.

I've been given 2 albums of photos taken on my son's digital camera, the photos are of my darling granddaughters. There is a company/companies that will print albums for you when you e-mail them the photos required. Both sets of Grandparents [and that includes my ex and his wife] have had them for birthdays and Christmas. I have several old fashioned photo albums all half full, I hated the onerous task of putting photos in albums. Much prefer this new method.

Tegan - The first thing I intended to do when I retired (5 years ago) was sort out our photos. I have some in albums but most are shoved into a large plastic container, in no order whatsoever. I was going to set about sorting them out, doing a few each day. I couldn't do it! There are literally thousands of them. I started putting them into sections - holidays, family etc but it was too much for me, I got so muddled and stressed I gave up.
Occasionally it crosses my mind to get on with it and I really must but I can't face it. I admire your resilience

I've bought some from W H Smiths; they're selling them half price but there's a sign next to them saying 'when these are gone we're not restocking'. I realised there was a problem when Tescos said they didn't sell them any more; mind you, I may need to go back and get some more. I've even got loads on disc as well, but my son switched the computers and they're on another one. I now take photos with the digital camera but haven't got a clue what to do with it [and I've just remembered the drawer with the photos of the grandchildren]. I'm swimming in a sea of memories at the moment...

Tegan, do you have a shop called The Works where you are? They tend to have a good selection of photo albums.

Trouble is I'm now wanting to re decorate my whole house as well after watching that bloomin' programme....at least I was able to show my grandson one of the photos of our long departed Burmese cat curled up in the basket with the dogs. He said 'Granny, I thought cats and dogs didn't like each other' so at least I was able to put him right over that. And I was able to find the photo of my son walking down a country lane with his inflatable dinosaur, Bruno [who lives in the loft].

This was going to be my winter project so I'd better get a move on I have boxes and boxes of photos to go through.

At least if they're in albums I can flick through and find photos I'm looking for. I used to spend hours doing our albums, with drawings relating to different events etc. How they just ended up being thrown in a draw is beyond me [I think it's when I went back to work part time]. What I am embarrassed about is how many rubbish photos I've taken over the years, although some of the photos I'm going through now are probably ones that weren't good enough for the albums. And the photo that started it all [one that I needed to find as I wanted to copy it] is the only one that has a mark on it, so I need to find the negative [that could take months].

I've used photo binders and sleeves to hold photos supplied by www.arrowfile.com/index.php?route=common/home
At least with removable pages you don't have to get the chronological order correct the first time.
It's a daunting project though isn't it?

I don't think having photos on the computer is as satisfying than the physical experience of having them in a proper photo album.

I feel the same about having actual letters, rather than e-mails. Although I send e-mails for convenience, there is nothing to beat a typewritten, or better still handwritten, letter. In the future there will be no old letters to examine and cherish.

My teenage DGC love looking through our photo albums. They ask for them to be brought out and it is a novelty to them.

Sound familiar Tegan. Since having my first DGD I have found myself bringing down endless boxes of photos so I can show my own daughter how alike her and her daughter are. I then spend far too long reminiscing. I am about to be brave and have them all digitalised so I can store them on a disc along with my current photos. I'm sure when I'm no longer here the kids will happily trawl through digital photos rather than boxes of albums.

Good luck x