Childhood…Captured and preserved.


Bad perm? Check. Bangs? Check. Embroidered windbreaker? Check.

Bad perm? Check. Bangs? Check. Embroidered windbreaker? Check.

My mom did an excellent job of documenting my childhood. When I say excellent, what I mean is, I literally have 25 scrapbooks cataloging, photographically, my life from the time I was born all the way through my four college soccer seasons.

Isn’t that incredible? I don’t know how she did it. I have FIVE siblings, and they all have the same. And the scrapbooks aren’t just the simple “insert photo into this sleeve” kind. They are works of art. The woman spent days standing at her desk, working on pages and pages, all so we could have record of what we did.


Here are just a few examples of what she photographed that I would never remember without the photos:

– She taught all five of us how to weave baskets
– She photographed all of us on our first day of school every single year. What a record of fashion, amiright?!
– Endless photos of me with all my favorites toys that I carried everywhere throughout different phases of life (Cabbage Patch dolls, My Little Ponies, Pound Puppies, Raggedy Ann to name a few)
– The Mickey Mouse hat that I refused to take off for an entire year of my life
– That time I played Queen Jezebel in the school play
– How she would sometimes make cookies at 4:00 in the morning and let us eat them for breakfast instead of cereal
– All the years going to Florida for Christmas and taking weird sibling photos on the beach


These are just a few examples of thousands of memories my mom preserved. My gratefulness to her is really indescribable. 

Now I’m not putting pressure on any of you mothers reading this to invest in a Creative Memories habit (shout out to all of you who understand that reference). But I am calling attention to a lost art—the art of photographing and preserving memories. 

We have SO many digital images. I’m constantly deleting things on my phone to make room for more photos of my nieces and nephews. And yet, where will these images be 10 years from now? On our phones? Saved on the cloud? Lost? 


I’m speaking to myself here because I don’t have a great system for my iPhone photos. But I do have a great system for my clients. (See how I snuck some self-promo in here?!)

And that system is this: for my longer documentary sessions, I give families a printed album of their photos. It provides something tangible to my clients to help them see the value of getting photos of devices and into their lives.

I would love to hear from you guys about what moments in your daily life you want captured. In this season, what are your kids doing that you want to remember? What memories would you like to preserve for them when they are 28 years old and writing blogs about you?

0 Responses

  1. Wow, your Mom really had a gift! It sounds like she is an exceptional Mom and I love the cute memories you shared like basket weaving! I think about how I need to be more intentional about printing out photos often…thanks for this reminder! 🙂

  2. Aww, how sweet is that! My mom loved scrapbooking, and it was something I always did with her as a kid–unfortunately the international lifestyle has kind of made it impossible to lug heavy scrapbooks everywhere. There are perks to digital files, but scrolling through a slideshow just isn’t the same as paging through an album made with love!

    1. Oh I can’t imagine getting them overseas! I just had to get them across the country when I moved to Colorado and that was hard! They will still be around if you come back though, 🙂

  3. These scrapbooks are such treasues! I am totally overwhelmed by my digital photos and videos. I have several back-ups in place, but still lose sleep over not having any printed. I’m now inspired to make scrapbooks!

    1. It can be SO overwhelming Erin! That’s why I always suggest to my clients making books online, from places like Artifact Uprising or Socality Prints. It’s so much faster than regular scrapbooking but you still get something tangible!

  4. I love scrapbooking! My grandparents did a great job preserving memories through photos. My mother – not so much. I have several scrapbooks for my kids to fight over someday, and even now, at 11 & 16, they like to sit and look through them.

  5. My mom did such a great job with this as well! I hate scrapbooking so I’ve been trying to find an alternative that won’t break the bank!

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