Do you ever wish you could stop the clock as your children’s school days go flying by? Preserving their photos, certificates and artwork are the next best thing! These tips help you enjoy your items right now instead of them becoming a burden as they accumulate over time.
Memorabilia: File those certificates and booklets as soon as they come in. Save them from the grease stains and the trash bin! Each child could have his own file folder for each year. Be careful not to store photos in with the memorabilia as the ink can bleed onto the photos.
Artwork: You can scan and shrink artwork, or just take a picture of it and put it into your scrapbook. This works especially well for those pieces that are messy (glittery) or three dimensional, since you can just discard the original.
Sports pictures. Consider keeping a small album for just sports pictures and certificates. You can use photo safe file folders in an expandable file folder for storing these until you put them in.
8 x 10 + 5 x 18= This is your Life album! Want a “snapshot” of childhood memories? Use an 8×10 on the left sides of your album with 5 snapshots from that time period on the right sides. Use this 2-page layout theme for each of the 18 years from birth thru age 18 and you will literally have an “album of a lifetime!” To organize the pictures, be sure to keep them in a photo safe box and label them with a photo labeling pencil.
Submitted by Lynn Jackson
