Remember the days when we had to drop the film off to be developed? We would go on vacation, take hundreds of photos, have them developed, and they went into an album. Today, we take thousands of pictures, and they stay on our phones or cameras. Some of us may upload them to a computer, but then what? Do you print them and add them to an album? Do any of them make it to a frame?
I was 6.5 months pregnant when 9/11 happened. We were vacationing on Martha’s Vineyard with friends. Like all Americans, we were stunned and shocked. I wondered how I could bring this child into this crazy world. It also got me thinking about how I would document his life and the lives of other children we may have over the years. This is how my scrapbooking obsession started. Each child has their own baby scrapbook and from there on I started family albums. What started off as 1-2 books a year, is now at 7-8 books! This is due in large part to all the traveling we do.
I can’t think of a better way to preserve our travel memories than to scrapbook them. Each layout tells a story. I can look back on any of the 40+ albums and instantly be brought back in time. For example, when pulling pages out of the albums to photograph, I was reminded that Nicholas hated pizza when he was 3. We had gone to an Italian restaurant, and he ordered the pizza. He disliked it so much; he vowed never to eat it again. Well, 11 years later, pizza is his favorite food.
Another great memory, we stumbled upon a Veteran’s park while in Salt Lake. It was a beautiful memorial. Here we met a widow of one of the veterans with her dog. My boys fell in love with the dog, while my husband and I enjoyed speaking with her.
Typically, I run about eight months behind in my scrapbooking. Currently, I am working on summer of 2019. I don’t stress about it because it allows me to relive each moment or vacation when I am scrapbooking it. When I was scrapbooking Alaska, I had such a sense of calm looking at those photos. I can’t wait to scrapbook my Rhine River cruise and relive those moments.
As you can see, I love to scrapbook and have such a great time being creative. I have also taken to making canvases out of my favorite photos and hanging those around the house. It helps the memories last forever.
What about you? How do you preserve your travel memories?
My Mom was funny when it came to clothes and such. Growing up, she rarely spent money on herself. As we got older and starting buying our things, she started to do the same. She would see something that me or my sisters was wearing and go out and buy it. Oh and if it came in multiple colors, she would buy one of each. At any given time, you could check out her clothes line (yes she still used one) and see the same shirt in every color of the rainbow. One day my middle sister came by with a pairs of shoes. They were a type of sandal and she told Mom they were super comfy. Mom went out and bought herself a white pair.
That summer, my parents, kids and I took a week long trip to Washington, DC. We spent 6 days walking about town, taking in all the sites. My Mom wore the shoes everywhere.
She put some serious mileage on those shoes. Upon returning home, my sister, Kristen saw her in them. She said “Oh Jeanne, where did you get those moon shoes?” Well needless to say, we all thought it was funny, but Mom did not. We never saw those shoes again. LOL!
It’s the little stories like this, that help us keep it together during the month of March. This week in particular is rough. She was sent home with hospice this time 5 years ago. However, I am determined to remember the good vs the bad as the 24th of March comes upon us.
