Every Picture Tells A Story .. Every Story Brings a Picture to Mind

How many times have you heard a family story about your parents or grandparents, but there is no actual picture to validate that story?  A simple story can put us right into the picture even if there is no picture of the actual event.

For example there is a story in my family that we can call “Baby under the cherry tree”.  When you think about that in your mind we see a baby in a stroller sitting under the cherry tree. 

• ·        So what else can we add to this to make it more appealing?  The baby is crying!  Is it hungry, unhappy, sleepy or any number of other issues.
• ·        Grandparent comes over to the house and sees and hears grandchild crying under the cherry tree alone.  The parent is in the house.  Why?  Can you see the grandmother questioning this scene?

Going back to the story above, this takes place in a small Midwestern town close to the Mississippi river back in the late 1940’s.  The child’s father and uncle had purchased a coffee shop in town and it just so happened that the river overflowed its banks a week after the purchase.  The streets flooded all around it and the brothers had to sandbag the doors and around the building.  You could say they were not off to a good start! 

Due to the flooding of the town and the newly acquired coffee shop, the brothers had their wives doing the baking of pies, cakes and cookies for their coffee shop at home.  The baby was crying and would not stop so her mom put her outside under the cherry tree so they could get the baking finished.  In the meantime, grandma stopped by to see them and to also see what the high water was doing to the town.  She was really upset that ‘baby’ was outside crying all alone, but the mother and aunt told her that they just needed to get the baking done for the coffee shop and were watching her out the window!

Now, can you just “picture” that whole scene in your mind and how those snapshots would look like?  There are so many “pictures” that come to mind when we don’t have an actual photo of the event.  I am sure that you have heard stories from a family member about something funny or dramatic that happened to them or another family member, but there is no photo of the event.

These are the reasons we 1) take photos of everything, 2) we put those photos and stories into memory books for future generations to read and reminisce for years to come.

Photo Organizing Solutions can help you put those stories in writing with a memory book that includes photos and stories of events even if you don’t have a photo of a particular event.  

Let me help you.  Contact me at www.photoorganizingsolutions.net, or email sue@memoriesbysue.net for more information about this service.

Radio Interview March 31st

The Off Beat Radio Show

Photo Organizing Solutions will be interviewed on The Off Beat Business Show on March 31st @ 12:00 pm - 12:20 pm and then again at 8:00 pm.I will be talking about saving your family photos and WHY you need to do this.  

Susan Hamilton is very good at letting people know there are all types of "Off Beat" businesses are out there that you need to know about.

Don't forget, tune in Wednesday, March 31, 2015 at http://offbeatbusiness.com/the-show/

Help! My Photos Are Everywhere!

Historian

Seems I get this statement each time I talk to a new prospect!  My photos are everywhere and I don't know how to tame the jungle!  

This program, Historian, is one way to tame that jungle and make sure you can find all your photos by year, month, day, person, event or even by favorites (rated with a star rating system).  It is easy to work with, and makes finding things so easy!

When you first install this program it will open a Memory Vault that you will name with your own tag.  Every time you download that camera SD card, it will go into your own memory vault.  Then you can go through and tag or name each photo right then and add them to the correct file.

The memory vault is divided up into categories: family, events, and key words.  This is just the beginning of making those categories your own.  You can go further under family and made a file for each family member, or grandparent, etc.  You can take the event file and add holidays, birthdays, trips, sport activities, or anything that applies to your family.

This software is easy to use and has lots of special upgrades to help you be more productive when searching for all those pictures.

Contact Sue Thornton at www.photoorganizingsolutions.net for more information or to be added to our newsletter list.  We don't share your name with any other lists.

Back-Up Your Computer

It is so important to back-up your computer on a regular basis. If you have ever had your hard drive crash, then you know what is involved in trying to reconstruct all the data and most importantly the family pictures. So frustrating!!
Wikipedia defines back-up as follows:
In information technology, a backup, or the process of backing up, refers to the copying and archiving of computer data so it may be used to restore the original after a data loss event. The verb form is to back up in two words, whereas the noun is backup.^[1]

Backups have two distinct purposes. The primary purpose is to recover data after its loss, be it by data deletion or corruption. Data loss can be a common experience of computer users. A 2008 survey found that 66% of respondents had lost files on their home PC.^[2] The secondary purpose of backups is to recover data from an earlier time, according to a user-defined data retention policy, typically configured within a backup application for how long copies of data are required. Though backups popularly represent a simple form of disaster recovery, and should be part of a disaster recovery plan, by themselves, backups should not alone be considered disaster recovery.^[3] One reason for this is that not all backup systems or backup applications are able to reconstitute a computer system or other complex configurations such as a computer cluster, active directory servers, or a database server, by restoring only data from a backup.
It is also suggested that you can use an external hard drive for back up of all of your personal photos. Many of my clients will back up all their photos to the EHD just in case. Of course there are other places that you can use for back up of your computer. There are various Google applications, (Google Pictures, Documents) where you can put those important items. As a certified photo organizer it is suggested that you have at least 3 places to back up your items. How many EHD's do you have laying around that are full? Make sure that you check them out periodically to make sure they still work correctly. I call it a "test drive" just to check them out to make sure they work. Some of the early EHD's were pretty small, and now that we all take so many digital photos we keep getting larger and larger EHD's.


There are several brands in the market place. I won't recommend one over the other, but you can do your research and get the one that works for you.
The cloud is also a place that you can use for computer back up. There are several companies that have good products. The prices seem to be pretty consistent across the industry. One that I recommend is called BackBlaze. 

 I currently have several 3-month FREE trials through BackBlaze that I am giving away. If you will contact me, I can give you the information for this special offer. First come first serve!

Check out my website at www.photoorganizingsolutions.net for more information about us.

When was the last time you......

When was the last time you transferred the photos on your smart device (phone or pad) to your computer?

These are things that everyone needs to do at least once a month!  We take so many photos with our phone, iPad, Android tablets and phones we really do forget how many we actually have on those devices.  If they crash will you be able to retrieve them?  Everyone always says they can get them from the cloud, or DropBox or some other service, but first you need to make sure those services are the best for your type of use or business.  

Does your file structure sort of look like this?  Those photos are there on your computer, but can you find the specific one you want?  A file system is a must when tagging and filing all those photos.

When was the last time you backed up your computer?

There are several good cloud backup companies out there.  One you might want to check out this month is called BackBlaze.  If you want to try it out, I can give you FREE access for 90 days, but you need to act fast!  I have 3 FREE coupons left and when those are gone I can't get any more!  BackBlaze will backup your documents and photos continuously!  You don't need to remember to schedule because it takes care of that for you.  I love it!

Check out www.PhotoOrganizingSolutions.net and sign up for my newsletter for a FREE gift.  @suethornton65 

Preserving Family Recipes - Part 2

 

 

My last article talked about preserving family recipes and putting them into a printed recipe book for family members.  There are many great uses for this type of unique gift.  Think about family reunions, or a wedding gift for family members.

Your mother was a great cook and she had all those great recipes written down on scraps of paper and shoved into a box but not organized, how will you ever get them put together in an organized way?  When you decide to do a family recipe book there are steps that need to be taken to ensure the book is organized and functional.  Here are some of the steps you should follow:

1.      Organize your old recipe cards, cut outs and those scraps of paper.

2.      Put them in categories such as:  meat, poultry, desserts, appetizers, side dishes, etc.

3.      Scan all these items.  Put them into folders labeled like the categories above.

4.      Then create another folder for the stories and pictures of how your family enjoyed the various recipes.

I talked about these steps in my last article, so now we need to discuss actually organizing the Family Cookbook Project.

We all long for the welcoming sight of a buffet table simmering in familiar dishes at a family gathering.  Sights, sounds and smells motivate us when we are getting ready for a family meal.  The second helpings, the full stomach and the laughter of good conversation that we remember long after the holiday meal. 

Here are a few suggestions on how to really begin organizing all those recipes into a Family Cookbook Project. 

·         You want to have everyone organize and scan THEIR recipes, take photos if possible

·         Discuss with family members how you want to organize the book

·         Will you combine the duplicates into one recipe or pick out the ones thought best

·         Create a family history with photos of the dishes and who originally cooked that dish

 

No matter how you decide to produce the cookbook, someone needs to organize it.  It can take a lot of time, be loads of work on the part of the organizer, but also become a rewarding experience for the entire family.  As a group make some decisions like the following before going further.

·         Determine the size of the project and set deadlines weeks ahead.

·         Set up reminders to follow-up with each contributor.

·         Will you want to produce a printed copy of this book?

·         Decide the number of recipes you want submitted from each family member.

 These are great tips and there are more in this series.  Stay tuned for more information and further breakdowns of the various steps that are outlined in this article.

You can sign up for my newsletter on my website, www.photoorganizingsolutions.net and also get more information about my company.

 

 

 

Preserving Family Recipes

Jeannette Van Houten of Union Beach, New Jersey said “food links you back to the moment in the kitchen when your grandmother, mother or grandfather let you sneak a taste.  It is the moments of love that we often take for granted.”

Would you like to make a unique gift for your family this year?  How about tackling the project of a family inspired recipe book!  This is something that all members of the family can be a part of by suggesting recipes that they remember as part of their childhood.

Food is the ingredient that ties family memories together.  When you think about family occasions from the past – holidays, birthdays, Sunday dinners, anniversaries, special events, and reunions – the memories you often want to preserve are connected to food.

Close your eyes for a moment and you can suddenly smell the way melted butter and sage wafting through the house hypnotizes you for an entire Thanksgiving afternoon until it’s presented at the table.  The stories told over the best ways to cook that harvest are part of your family’s folklore.  You knew exactly when to pick the corn, how to wrap a fig tree or the best ways to preserve five pounds of basil leaves.  The cookbooks you collected on vacations are functional home décor that remind you of journeys traveled.

Favorite dishes have become every reason we race to be together around the family table.  They remind us of happy times when we enjoyed each other’s company over home-cooked meals and conversation.  I remember that my Mom would bake a ham and have her homemade potato salad whenever we were all going to be visiting at the same time.  It became a joke about the ham, because she always said that we could have several meals from that one dish – lunch sandwiches or dinner slices!

A family recipe book could be a wedding gift to your daughter, son, nephew, niece, mother, father or other family member.  When deciding to do a family recipe book there are steps that need to be taken to ensure you have a book that is organized and functional.  Here are the steps:

1.      Organize your old recipe cards and cut outs

2.      Put them in categories such as:  meat, poultry, desserts, breads, etc.

3.      Scan all the recipe cards and cut outs

4.      Then create another folder for the stories and pictures of how your family enjoyed the various recipes.

I will go into more depth in my next issue on actually putting the book together.  Contact me at sue@memoriesbysue.net or call 469.544.9525 for more information[i].

This recipe is written in my mother's hand and every Thanksgiving she would make this and put into a special jello mold.  We had this salad every Thanksgiving and Christmas for as far back as I can remember!

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[i] Parts taken from Flip-Pal.com/week 43 article