One of my absolute favourite memories as a child is sitting down with my Granny and trawling through family photo albums. You know, the leather bound ones with the plastic film lining, filled with hundreds of family snaps from years gone by.
We would flick through each one, stopping to have a laugh about the dubious choice of clothing, or reminiscing about how small my cousins were, or how much the house and garden had changed over the years. Everyday moments that mean nothing to others but for me, moments that tell the story of my childhood.
My older sister and I on our first day at school – I think I was a little excited!
The phrase “Time sure does fly” springs to mind when I look at how much my two boys have grown over the last couple of years and I realise that my passion for photography stems from wanting to hold on to precious moments with them as long as I can. I don’t want to forget any of the details of their childhood. I am currently planning a photo album for each of my boys to look back on when they are 18 so they can reminisce just like I did!
Sadly though, a lot of us snap hundreds, if not thousands of photos every day and have them sitting in limbo on their phone or computer, forgotten about except those chosen few that are shared on social media or shown to the family on the odd occasion you scroll through your photo gallery. Printing photos to be stored in albums has become a thing of the past as we whizz forward into the technological era. The years are also whizzing by though, so a gentle reminder for you all… print those photos! Why? Well here are my 3 reasons!
1) CDs are slowly becoming a thing of the past so the same may be said for USB drives in a couple of years!
All these digital ways of storing your images are great and don’t get me wrong, I use them too! BUT, will they be around forever? Just look at what is happening to CDs – how many of us actually own a CD these days? The majority of us now have our music on streaming devices and the like. Technology changes at the drop of a hat so please don’t think that Facebook, Instagram, Dropbox etc will be around forever. Back up all those photos you have on the web but also make sure you have a physical copy of each one that you want to cherish so they can be looked at and enjoyed for a lifetime.
A couple of years ago I had a devastating experience. All but a handful of photos of my youngest son as a baby were stored on my laptop. One day, that laptop decided that it would no longer switch on and it was later discovered that the hard drive was corrupted. Was the hard drive backed up anywhere? No. All those photos of him from newborn to 4 months old – gone. I am so grateful that I had some photos printed and I also have some photos from a newborn session and cake smash displayed on my living room wall. Those personal images on the laptop though, I’ll never see them again. Don’t be like me!
2) An album truly stands the test of time.
Remember those photo albums I was talking about? They are still around over 30 years later for my sons to flick through. I can even pick out some images to embarrass my sisters (only joking, I’m not that mean, honestly! )
An album can also be passed on to family members someday. What would you rather receive as a family heirloom – a USB drive or an album you can treasure and pass on from generation to generation?
3) Your children will appreciate them someday
And with that, I’m back to where I started. Looking back in time and relishing the moments spent with members of your family is utterly amazing. To be able to relive that moment one more time is priceless.
The image at the top of this post is a collection of old photos I recently had a look through at my grandparent’s old house. Some of them may be photos from well before I was even born but just by looking at them, I’m there with my granny again one more time and that to me is everything.
I want my children to look back on photos of their childhood and also to know their heritage and one day they’ll be flicking through the albums with their children and grandchildren and they will be so grateful that I chose to print those special memories for them as my parents and grandparents did before me.
Send me an email and let’s chat about how I can capture memories to be cherished for years to come.