Revive25 in 2025: Revive Sky Memories

The 5th mini project for my Revive25 in 2025 Project is to revive sky memories. 

With the lunar eclipse on March 21st, I wondered when I began noticing and appreciating beauty in the sky. What were my oldest photos and memories? By looking back, I could then look forward to appreciate more sky moments. Could they be recreated intentionally or did they happen by coincidence or synchronicity?

I thought I had seen a lunar eclipse before and also wanted to remember the story details of the comet I saw in the late 1990's, so I went searching through my photo albums and digital photo collection. The earliest sky photo I found is of a rainbow I took in high school. I think this is perhaps common with everyone that when we had film cameras, we didn't waste photos by taking them of the sky. A rainbow was extra special. 

I have often heard that when we inherit photos, we should get rid of landscapes, places and things. It's the people photos that are most important. That may be true, but I think that photos of places and things also tell the story of who the person was and what they loved.

Many of my earlier sky photos were taken on holiday. Growing up in northern Ontario or living in Toronto, I didn't necessarily notice the sky on a daily basis. I have photos taken from 22nd floor condo view of Lake Ontario when I first moved to Toronto, but not many from just being out.

On our honeymoon, we went down to the beach in the evening with a bottle of champagne. The half moon was so bright and beautiful, we took photos of each other on the beach, zooming out to capture the moon in the background. We also enjoyed the sunsets on that trip. 

On future Caribbean trips, we loved the sunrises and sunsets. I went down to a pier to capture the sunrise every morning on our trip to Jamaica in 2012. Being close to the horizon when the sun is rising or setting, it appears much larger than it does after it has risen above the buildings in Toronto.

These views helped me appreciate the beauty of the sky but if we see it every day, it can stop being special. There's a full moon every month. Some are closer to the earth and called supermoons, but I think seeing it every month, it can stop being special. I love seeing full moons not too often and not too rarely. It's a fine line of how often we want to experience these events.

It's easier today with social media and the news reporting when upcoming eclipses, supermoons and nothern lights are happening. 

Anticipating the lunar eclipse, I thought I had seen one before. I wanted to connect these past moments that may have been lost in the clutter of photo collections and photo albums. I found my terrible photos taken with my point and shoot camera from the 2008 lunar eclipse on February 20th. Having a better camera now, I hoped to take better photos. 

Knowing the lunar eclipse totality would peak at 3am, my husband set up the camera settings before we went to bed so that I could capture the various phases of the eclipse. (He captured the bottom right photo of the quad at this time). I took the other three after totality. The auto setting captured the orange or "blood" moon we could see, but his manual settings captured the shadow beautifully. 

My plan was to wake at 2:30pm, experience the blood moon during totality then go back to bed at 3:30pm. It was still beautiful at 3:30, the orange was still visible as it appeared three quarter orange as the shadow moved away from totality, and then half orange.

Before going back inside, beautiful spiral clouds appeared. I wondered for quite a while if it was the beginning of Northern Lights. Once when I saw the Northern Lights, it began with rainbow shaped clouds. I was in awe of the clouds and didn't know whether to look at the lunar eclipse or the clouds. 

I stayed up much later than I planned, which helped me capture the phases of totality. 

The next day, I saw on a Northern Lights site that there had been Northern Lights during the lunar eclipse, so perhaps the very light green tinge on some photos were part of a very faint aurora. Either way, the sky was spectacular.

Another pivotal moment I wanted to connect that gave me a love of the night sky was in Sedona in 2015 for my husband's business reward trip. The company organized an astronomy evening where astronomers brought their huge telescopes into a field and gave us a lesson on the night sky. We loved looking at the planets and stars through the telescope; even seeing Jupiter's rings. My husband managed to get an amazing night sky photo including a satellite trails and the milky way.

Sedona has a dark sky designation, meaning they have regulations that limit light pollution so it's an amazing place to see the night sky. Connecting this memory is inspiring me to experience the night sky again in these low light pollution places.

I remember the first partial solar eclipse I witnessed in 2017. The Ontario Science Centre were handing out eclipse glasses that morning. It was chaos with so many people wanting the glasses. The lineup was so long but I was happy I got a pair. We set up a camera on a tripod at the park, but we didn't get a good photo of the eclipse. At least we could see it with our eyes while wearing the protective glasses. That evening we went to see Coldplay in concert. What a coincidence that we were seeing an eclipse on the day that we would hear Coldplay sing "the moon and its eclipse" on the song Something Just Like This. I made sure I captured the lyrics when they came up on the the backdrop and graphics. Connecting these two moments together helped me to remember the eclipse and the concert. Every time the song plays, I remember that day. 

There was another partical eclipse in the fall of 2023. Unlike 2017 when it was 70%, there wasn't as much attention given to this one that was only 39%, especially with the total eclipse expected six months later. It was supposed to be rainy and cloudy. I didn't bother to look for my eclipse glasses. I went out to run an errand that took me longer that I thought it would. Driving home, it was partly sunny and close to the time that the partial eclipse would be at its peak for Toronto. The song, Something Just Like This came on my playlist and I heard "the moon and its eclipse." Hearing it gave me a nudge to try to "see" the eclipse even if I couldn't look at it directly without eclipse glasses.

When I got home, I put the zoom lens on my camera and went out to try to capture it. Barely anything was visible, it was just a big sunburst. I tried to take photos with my sunglasses and polarizing filters in front of the camera, but it didn't look like it worked. In ten minutes, I took twelve photos and gave up.

After lunch, I uploaded the photos to my computer, wondering if I could edit them in order to see something. What a surprise I got when I saw the partial eclipse in one of the photos!! I hadn't noticed it on the small LCD screen of the camera.

It surprised me how happy I was to have captured this one and how close I got to say, "maybe next time." I have often said that it's easy to say no or next time, but often it's worth it to say yes and try. 

This motivated me to be better prepared for the total solar eclipse on April 8, 2024 (one year ago today as I publish this post). I ordered solar eclipse glasses (paper and plastic ones that looked like real glasses). I never wanted to be without eclipse glasses again. I was excited that Toronto would have a 99% partial eclipse, but then a friend told me that it would be 100% an hour away. Hearing that a total eclipse is SO much better than a partial eclipse, we drove to Caledonia in order to see the total eclipse and it exceeded our expectations. It was cloudy at times and we worried that we wouldn't see it, but the clouds parted just at the perfect time.

I'm happy I took videos so I hear the excitement in my voice (even if it's a bit embarrassing) and the cheering of the crowd when it went completely dark in the middle of the day (you may want to turn down the volume before playing it). It takes me back to that moment.

I want to connect these moments, the lunar eclipses with the solar eclipses; the sunrises and sunsets; the rainbows and northern lights; the day sky and night sky. By connecting all these sky memories, they become more meaningful by recognizing where the interest and appreciation began and then grew. It reminds me of these happy moments and makes me want to experience more. 

A couple of days after the lunar eclipse, we arrived home from our neighbourhood walk just as it began to pour. I thought we were lucky to have arrived just in time. Ten or fifteen minutes later, the sun started to come out. It was still raining and I wondered if there was a rainbow. I remembered an earlier lesson I learned, if you want to see a rainbow, you sometimes have to be willing to go out in the rain. The rainbow I saw that afternoon reminded me of the rainbows we saw in Hawaii. These were other moments to connect.

We can't plan ahead for rainbows like we can with eclipses or supermoons, so I really want to appreciate when I get the chance to see them now. I want to make plans to experience these moments when we know they will occur. If I'm somewhere close to the horizon I want to see the sunrises, sunsets, moonrises or moonsets that appear more spectacular. I want to notice the sky when there are beautiful clouds, and especially I hope to some day see rainbow clouds (cloud iridescence). I didn't know they existed until a year or two ago. When I'm at my cottage in Northern Ontario, I check the Northern Lights forecast hoping to see the Northern Lights. 

Looking back at what we love, gives us hope to experience more. I hope I encourage you to follow some of your nudges to revive memories, connect moments and dream to experience more of what you love.

When we work on projects we're passionate about, I believe that we attract more of what we pay attention to. While I was working on this mini-project, I went for a walk on a rare warm day this spring and noticed beautiful and unusual clouds. They may not have been magical like rainbow clouds or a heart cloud, but I still took it as a sign that I was on the right path and to keep going and follow my heart.

Present Memories

 I deserve a thank-you note

For giving you my presence all year long

I deserve a thank you note

That's the only present that I want

(Thank You Note by Salem Ilese)

I focused on "Present Memories" during part 4 of my 60T🖤60 Project (for more information about my 60T🖤60 project, go to my other blog My Life Is Like A Song). Present Memories is the subject of the book I want to complete by the end of my project. It also worked out well because I was invited to speak at a mothers' group during this period.

The deadline of my presentation added extra motivation to work on my book. I wrote, and wrote and wrote until I realized that it would take me all day to present it. It was still really useful to gain clarity and better organize the topics. The reason I called Part 4 "Present Memories" is that I believe we should focus on memories that improve our present. Our happiness happens in the present. 

It's helpful to travel back in time to understand what matters most and then travel forward in time to where we want to be and the memories we want to create. Once we’ve looked back and forward, we want to capture what matters most and enjoy the memories in the present. 

During the presentation, I covered strategies that research has shown to explain what and why we remember some things rather than others. I gave ideas on how to better remember what matters most. Being able to remember meaningful moments in our lives provides us and our kids a sense of self and identity. It helps us grow and connect with each other. Our memories are the story of our lives.

By enjoying our memories, we can make ordinary days into happier days because every day can’t be extraordinary, otherwise they would become ordinary.

We remember what we pay attention to.

To remember, we need to notice and this requires our attention and our perception - what we see, what we hear, what we smell and what we feel - physically and emotionally.

In the present moment, our memory is limited and short-lived. We remember what we experience only long enough to use it or not. If we don’t make a point of remembering what we experienced, we will forget it in 15-30 seconds and those memories will be replaced by the next information. Life keeps happening.

We remember moments that are significant to us. We could all go on an outing together and remember it differently. We would remember what we pay attention to; what gives us an emotional reaction and what adds meaning for us.

If we want to forget an event or an unpleasant moment; it's best to not think about it. By paying attention to that unpleasant moment, we are helping to remember it.

The other way that memories become meaningful is when we connect them together. We can’t remember everything. We want to be selective and relate what matters to other moments and how they relate to our life story and how we see the world.

Spatial Repetition

Research has found that spaced repetition helps us to remember. It’s like when we were in school, we remember better by reviewing after periods of time that become larger. So when something amazing happens that we want to remember, it will help to review it the next day, then a week later, a month later, three months later and a year later.

We also remember what we think about. We remember the stories we tell, the photos or videos we look at and we remember what we write. Journaling, blogging or sharing on social media helps us remember by writing and then by re-reading the details that may fade over time.

Focus on what we want to remember. 

The key to preserving memories for the future is to recognize what is worth capturing and letting go of the rest. Optimists pay attention to positive experiences, and so these events are remembered. Struggles are good to remember if they are relevant to the journey or they’re important lessons, but dwelling on negative experiences can lead to unhappiness and sometimes depression.

Bliss Point

I began my Revive55 Project in 2019 in order to preserve my memories and hopefully remember more but are more memories better? Is there a bliss point when it comes to memories? What is the perfect balance of enough memories so that they are optimally enjoyed but not too many so that they are lost in the clutter?

When we don’t curate our lives as we live them, eventually we will drown in the memories. One memory box becomes two becomes four becomes eight. 1000 photos becomes 5000 becomes 25000, etc.

It’s easier to keep up than to catch up.

This project was necessary for me because I had let things accumulate. As the years passed, I kept collecting more and more sentimental items without letting go of old ones. I wish I had been more proactive and found a better way sooner. 

Catching up is a project. Keeping up is a process. By putting a process in place to keep up with our memory keeping, we don’t need to do a big catch up project later and we also enjoy our memories along the way. 

That is one of the key things for memory keeping. Keep up the workflow and process of our memories so we don’t have to tackle it all at once later.

Hedonic Adaptation refers to the tendency of humans to quickly return to a relatively stable level of happiness after experiencing positive or negative events or life changes. 

It’s when we experience an identical stimulus that provides less pleasure the more it’s consumed. For example, a new car feels amazing at first, but eventually, it’s just a car. People who get a big bonus or a pay raise may be happier for a short period of time, but then will settle back to their original level of happiness. People may lose their job and be sadder for a short period of time, but then will settle back to their original level of happiness. 

Our favourite treat or our favourite song may get an emotional response when we haven’t tasted it or heard it in a long time, but if we have it every day or listen to it over and over again, the emotional response diminishes.

We can prevent hedonic adaptation by not enjoying our memories too often, but we also have to enjoy our memories to ensure we remember them.  It’s a fine line. Not too often, not too rarely.

There is also something magical about finding something we haven’t seen in 10 or 20 years, like a time capsule taking us back. This is great for things that are more factual, like report cards or things that we’ll be amazed how much things have changed.

Revive From Archive

Chronological photo albums or digital collections are a great resource like a library, but we don't necessarily want to read every book or look back at every photo. The meaningful moments can become lost in the clutter or what I call: the archive.

Art galleries and museums own much more than they show on display. Much of their collection is in storage.

I want to encourage you to Revive From Your Archive. Rather than organizing all your photos, revive your most meaningful ones. 

Curating exhibitions by theme is a more interesting way to enjoy our memories.

I love going to the art gallery when they have exhibitions where they display pieces of art from various places in the world and connect them in a meaningful way. 

Art galleries will also curate special exhibitions by connecting pieces by artist, by theme or by time period. These exhibitions highlight the art in a way that makes us appreciate it even more than a single painting. Sometimes in the exhibits, they showcase mementos, letters, or timelines, not just pieces of art.

It helps to tell the artist’s story or a story of a time period. Our special exhibition can tell a more meaningful story than just one photo. 

Our permanent collection should be what is most important to us and our family. They are our milestones and our peak moments. They are the people we love. They may have mementos connected to them and stories. They are the photos and mementos that we display in our house or screensavers. They are the first things we see when we enter our home or the last things we see when we go to bed at night. It showcases who we are and what is important to us.

When we first put photos in frames for our permanent collection, we notice them and they made us feel happy, but eventually, we stop noticing them. Taking something out that has been put away for months, brings back the magic. It's best to not let our permanent collection become too permanent.

Our special exhibitions are the interesting stories that will link some things to others. They could focus on one family member, like an art gallery may have a special exhibition on one artist. It  could focus on places weu’ve been; on activities we love to do; on our traditions; then and now comparisons; changes over the years; etc. We can also use mementos or household items to enhance the theme.

They don’t have to be big projects either. Sometimes I make a card with old photos of the person. I’ve used a cartoon app to alter the image for special moments. I have made collages on an 8.5x11 page or photobooks for really special birthdays. Using iMovie or Final Cut Pro, I’ve also made highlight videos with little snippets over the years.

By using our photos to make these gifts or cards, we are spending time with our memories instead of time going shopping for gifts and cards.  This helps us to remember.

The first special exhibition that I recommend you create is about you. Who were you? What did you love to do when you were young? As we grow up, other people influence us whether that is well-meaning parents and teachers or mean or envious classmates. As Charles Bukowski wrote: “Can you remember who you were, before the world told you who you should be?” If you have childhood photos and mementos that you haven’t sorted through, this is a great time to look to recognize what is most meaningful for you. Being a new parent can be a way to reconnect with your younger self.

1. By looking back, we can see who we were. 
2. By being present and noticing our current life, we can see who we are. 
3. By looking forward, we can be proactive in being who we want to be. 

I printed three pages with photo memories I created with these 3 themes to remind me at times when life gets busy of who I intend to be so that I choose better actions today to get me there.

Present Memories

Studies show that remembering happy times from the past helps us be happy in the present and gives us a hopeful vision for the future. As long as they bring back happy memories, it will boost our happiness.

Look back to connect meaningful moments. Look forward to create more and capture them and savour them in the present.

The end goal is a workflow that works - it’s that feeling of the moments that matter being captured and preserved. We connect the dots through our life to figure out what we love, what we connect with and what matters to us. 

We can extend that happy moment, by anticipating it - for example anticipating a vacation or an outing - and then reflecting by enjoying the photos or stories afterwards. Studies show that we can boost our happiness by keeping happy memories in our mind. So taking the time like organizing our photos, taking videos, keeping mementos around is a happiness strategy.

In the present, remember happy times from the past and plan for future memories.

Embrace technology

While preparing this presentation, my MacBook crashed. If I hadn't backed up and synced my photos and memories; I would have been forced to spend almost as much repairing an older computer that wouldn't end up lasting as long as a new one. I had learned how to ensure that technology failures did not impact my memory keeping so the only pain I got from my computer crashing was financial. I spoke about technology in my presentation, but it's too lengthy for this post. The most important thing is to embrace technology, learn how your devices work and what would happen if they broke. Would your memories still be preserved?

Conclusion

Our memories are inside us. They are not the photos, videos and mementos. Floods, fires and technology losses happen. 

The photos and mementos help us to remember. We can keep the memories alive by spending time enjoying our photos, mementos and memories; not too often and not too rarely.

The key to preserving future memories is to recognize what is worth capturing.

Chasing dreams...capturing memories.

Revive From Archive: Meaningful Moments

Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II passed away yesterday. When moments occur that mean something to me, I love to revive memories relating to these events.

Her passing reminded me of the last time Queen Elizabeth visited Toronto in 2010. This was a time in my life when I didn't say...maybe I'll go next time. I had been to the Vancouver Olympics a few months before and wanted to continue to pursue my passions (and interests). 

When I learned that The Queen would be in Toronto, I decided to go with my SLR camera in hand. I am grateful that I did since she never came back and I love the photos I captured.

 

I'm thankful that I wrote a blog post about my day because it is reminding me of details that I had forgotten. You can read it and see more photos here. There was a lot of luck (or synchronicity) and resourcefulness involved in capturing the photos. Looking through the photos on my current computer, there is one that I included on my blog that I don't have. This reminds me that I still have photos from that day on an old computer that I want to revive.

The other thing I want to do is to connect moments with this story. I haven't figured out how I want to capture these connected stories yet. Do I want to put everything together in a video format? A photo album? Memory box? In an app/website? For now, I am just making a list of the moments I want to connect like:

• Seeing Prince Charles (now King Charles III) and meeting Camilla (now Queen Consort) at the Royal Agricultural Winter Fair in 2009 (click here for my blog post)
• My first time seeing Buckingham Palace in 1992
• Tower of London visit including view of Crown Jewels in 1992 with the guard saying "Move along; they're just diamonds" that made us laugh.
• Diana death (where and when I heard the news); Diana memorial fountain in London; exhibit in Toronto (where I bought an English Rose tea cup and maybe a program? - I want to revive that memory of the exhibit)
• Seeing Buckingham Palace July 7 2005 (the day of the London bombings)
• Royal York Hotel - my visit for a meeting
• Buckingham Palace tour in 2018
• Growing up in a town she visited as a Princess (in lieu of her ill father King George VI)
• Queen anniversary cards to my parents and parents-in-law
• Queen Jubilee Morning Melody I composed 
• Queen Elizabeth II death (where and when I heard the news); interviewed by CTV News

As I remember other moments that fit in this category or experience more, I can include them to add even more connections. I love the idea of putting all these stories together somehow. It adds more meaning when they are all together.

Revive From Archive: Physical Prints

A few weeks ago it was World Photography Day. I found out a little late in the day, so rather than taking a new photo that wasn't that meaningful, I thought it was a perfect time to revive one of my photos that had been a little lost in the archive.

On that day, it was also opening day at the CNE and it reminded me of a photo that has been described by my hobby photographer husband as one of the best photos I have ever taken. It was taken in 2004 after a mother and daughter day at the CNE where we went to see the Canadian Idol top 5 perform. While leaving, my daughter paused at the fountain. I had a zoom lens on my camera for the concert so had to step back quite a way, but with a quality camera (Nikon SLR) I captured a beautiful photo of my daughter. The lighting and the colours were perfect. In my photo album, I framed it with blue and pink paper to match my daughter's outfit.

We got an 8x10 print and enjoyed seeing it on the plate rail of our dining room for years (top left below). 

When I purchased very long Monet prints at the Musée de l'Orangerie in Paris a few years ago, I replaced the framed photos with it. Sometimes when we keep the same photos on display, they become part of the background that we don't appreciate them anymore. I thought that putting the photo away for a while would make it more special when I revived it.

I took it out of my photo album to scan it, so now I have a digital copy. I changed the date of the photo in my photos app so that I can find it by going back to 2004 (years from now, it will be easier to remember approximately the date of the photo than the date I scanned it). If I had my photos in folders on my computer, I would have added it to a 2004 folder to find it again more easily.

When I was trying to find the photo in my photo collection before realizing that it was pre-digital camera, I found another photo from 5 years later when we tried to recreate the moment.

I love connecting these two separate days together to notice how much taller my daughter got and that her love for blue hasn't wavered, even to this day. Unfortunately we didn't recreate it this year, but this is a reminder if we're ever by that fountain, to replicate it to add more meaning to this location and these moments. I love "then & now" moments.

It can feel overwhelming to think of reviving every meaningful moment. I find that I'm more excited about reviving moments when there is added meaning in the present. Reviving moments one at a time makes it a more manageable process.

AGO Exhibition: I Am Here

It’s a song

Nothing’s wrong

Everything is clear

I am here.

(I Am Here by David Wall)*

I'm happy I learned that the exhibition I Am Here: Home Movies and Everyday Masterpieces was at the AGO, less than a week before it was leaving. I missed the original (and subsequent) announcements.

This exhibition speaks so much to my love of memories and documenting our lives. This is how the AGO presented the exhibition:

The exhibition was divided by theme. I took a photo of each title sign and put them in this collage.
The themes included Our House, We Are Family, Food Glorious Food, Fight The Power, Dance To The Music, My Favourite Things, On The Street Where You Live, Life Is A Highway, Everyday People, and Panorama.

In the middle of the Home and Family areas, was a collection of lost albums that really had me thinking about how photo albums have changed over the years. For almost a century, people have told their life stories with photo albums. How will the next generation tell their life stories?

The exhibition included many home movies including "baby's breakfast" which may be the first home movie ever recorded by Louis Lumière in 1895. This reminded me of seeing another Louis Lumière film of workers leaving a factory at a previous exhibition. 

I Am Here also showed how home movies have changed since its inception with a special focus on protests captured on our smart phones in the past decade. This part of the exhibition was very insightful and thought-provoking.

I was inspired by the "Mixtape Diaries" by Glynnis Grant-Henderson. I create yearly playlists of the songs I love each year. I have often blogged about them, but I loved the journals that Glynnis created. My husband has made over 200 mixtapes (back in the cassette days). It would be amazing to have some thoughts to transport us back to what he was thinking when he made them.

Another exhibit that had me thinking was one of Andy Warhol's 600 memory boxes. It contained 595 objects that the gallery described as falling into the category of the everyday like Christmas cards, newspaper clippings, doodles and tax forms. As fascinating as it was to see a glimpse of an art icon; it's a reminder to me that as much as I love memories and memorabilia; less is more meaningful and I prefer curating my memories.

I love connected moments, so I especially appreciated this graphic showing the timeline from cave paintings to Tik Tok.

The exhibition ended with a collection of vignettes representing themes of "home-movieness". The 26 themes were titled alphabetically and included a song, I Am Here by David Wall that really resonated with me. You can see a few examples of the themes and here I Am Here in this video posted by the AGO. You can also read more about the Panorama compilation by clicking here.

I saw this exhibition at the perfect time, as I am focusing on Revive From Archive and organizing memories like art galleries curate exhibitions.

*Lyrics as I hear them. Apologies if there's a mistake

Save Your Photos Month

Seeing September 1st as a type of "New Year", I was going through some notes I wrote last year. First to see how far I've come and second to review my goals and vision.

In my notes, I saw Phyllis Smith's name. While speaking with Brenda Jasmin who was teaching Positivi-Tea courses I was attending, she told me that her sister-in-law had a similar interest to mine. 

I googled her and the timing couldn't have been better. Her company is Memories In Focus and she posted two days ago:  "It's Save Your Photos Month!" Click the link to read her post.

Save Your Photos Month is a service offered by The Photo Managers. They offer free courses to help people preserve their photos, videos and documents. I have signed up for a few courses that interest me. If you're interested in seeing what is offered, click here to sign up.

Memories in Focus offer various services to organize and preserve photos. They are offering a free introduction to the Picture My Life Workshop on September 8th. It was originally scheduled for August 25th but lucky for me, it was pushed back. It seems like it was meant to be. Check out Memories in Focus' Facebook Page if you're interested.

As part of my September New Year, my plan was to elaborate in my last two posts:

Memories Bliss Point and They Are More Beautiful If There Are Few.

Although I can fairly easily find any photo that I want to find, my photo library is still quite overwhelming to look at. A few days ago, I was speaking with my husband about our photo collections and what would happen to them once we were gone. Past generations had a box of photos or an album to hand down to their children. Will our children bother looking on our computers for photos? What will they do when they have 100,000 photos to sift through?

My plan for September was to start a new collection of photos I didn't want lost amid the clutter. How perfect to now have more motivation by finding Memories in Focus and Save Your Photos Month for inspiration.

They Are More Beautiful If They Are Few

In my last post, I wrote about collecting more and more photos and memories during the months leading to our eldest leaving home for university and during a trip to Quebec for his last March Break. 

Luckily, we managed to have another family trip that summer driving along Lake Huron and Georgian Bay. I tried to remember every detail of this "last" trip together. I collected rocks from every beach we went to. I took photos of the rocks and separated them so that I could remember wich ones were from where. 

The rocks remind me of a special time. One of my favourite photos is the photo I took of my husband taking a photo of our kids skipping rock. Of course, his photo is a better photograph, but I love the moment that I captured.

The rocks were a memento of our time on the beach but not every beach we stopped at was special on this day. The one that 'took our breath away' in relation to the rocks was Big Bay; "The Stone Skipping capital of Canada.

But like I would later read,

"One cannot collect all the beautiful shells on the beach. One can collect only a few, and they are more beautiful if they are few. " Anne Morrow Lindbergh

Or in my case that day, one cannot collect all the beautiful rocks on the beach.

I would also add that although a few are beautiful, the collection as a whole on the beach are most beautiful.

I still haven't done anything with my rock collection. They are in a beautiful box but not being enjoyed or remembered.

Before learning this recent lesson, I continued to collect more and more memories. I took lots of photos and collected more and more mementos.

Last year, I started the Revive55 Project with the goal of preserving all these moments I had been collecting. How could I better remember and enjoy all these memories? During my project though, I read this shell quote and took an uncluttering course which changed my opinion.

While writing about collecting shells in Gift From The Sea, Anne Morrow Lindberg reflects:

"I couldn't even walk head up looking out to sea, for fear of missing something precious at my feet. The collector walks with blinders on; he sees nothing but the prize."

"In fact, the acquisitive instinct is incompatible with true appreciation of beauty." 

"For it is only framed in space that beauty blooms."

I may not need a box full of rocks to remember this holiday, but one (or a few) special ones from this beach. 

Even our kids were looking at their feet and found precious rocks, like this heart-shaped one because they know I love hearts. This rock "framed in space" in my daughter's hands is the most special.

As beautiful as the lake or the sky is, I do have to admit that the rocks are the precious part of this beach.

Although I have read this idea of less is more in various places, and appreciate its message; I still struggle with getting rid of things. During my Revive55 Project, I did select the most precious from some of my possessions. I have gotten rid of some of the least special but there is still more decluttering and deleting to be done.

To help, I have accepted that I need an 'in-between' phase. I am putting more in storage to see what I miss and want to better appreciate and what I am ready to let go of, even if I still like them. That's the challenge with decluttering mementos. We kept them because they mattered but as the years and moments accumulate, our space isn't big enough to keep the growing collection. Perhaps as time passes, our memory of the item will diminish so it will be easier to let go.

As I see my precious keepsakes surrounded by space rather than cluttered with others, it gives me more motivation to continue to make more space.

Time is the Most Unforgiving of Fires

I wrote a blog post in 2008 after reading A Thousand Splendid Suns. You can read that original post by clicking here.

It was inspired by a quote in the book:

(to give some perspective, the passage describes how Laila feels after her first love Tarik tells her that he and his family are moving away)

"In the coming days and weeks, Laila would scramble frantically to commit it all to memory, what happened next. Like an art lover running out of a burning museum, she would grab whatever she could—a look, a whisper, a moan—to salvage from perishing, to preserve. But time is the most unforgiving of fires, and she couldn’t, in the end, save it all. "

I think that the author really describes it perfectly: "like an art lover running out of a burning museum"; "time is the most unforgiving of fires".

It's interesting to reflect on how I felt over a decade ago:

"Memories: something very close to my heart. I have realized that so many of my memories are forgotten. Perhaps that is why I take so many photos, to help me remember. I sometimes think that I’m too busy taking photos rather than really experiencing the moments so I have tried to curtail my photo-taking."

Interestingly, a month after that post, we bought a Digital SLR and our photo-taking increased exponentially. A couple of years later, I would get my first iPhone and then I had a camera with me wherever I went.

In one way, I love that so much of my life was documented with photographs, but like I would reflect then I didn't keep up with the journaling in photo albums.

"I am often told that I have such a good memory about my kids... but I kept a great journal during those times (and journaled in my photo albums). When I look through my photo albums from my childhood and university years (when I didn’t [journal]), I’m amazed how much I forgot."

With the increase in digital photos, I stopped printing photos and putting them in albums for many years. The great thing though is that although I may have been in the minority who was journaling in albums 10-20 years ago, most of us have been "journaling" in the last decade by posting on social media.

We have preserved many memories on Facebook so why not enjoy them? As the quote says, "time is the most unforgiving of fires". I sometimes see old posts and think "I had forgotten that!" By seeing the post, we are reminded of these moments that were important enough to share at the time.

Sometimes you will receive notifications from Facebook of memories from this day, but you can see them yourself every day by going to Facebook.com/memories when you are signed in to your account.

TimeHop is an app that you can connect to Facebook, Instagram and Twitter to see your posts from on this day. You can also link your photos so every day you can go to this app to see your memories from "on this day".

If you want to see memories from a day other than today, you can quickly go to a specific month and year on Facebook. When you're on your profile page, go to your activity log. Click on filter to choose your posts (rather than all activity) then choose the year and date.

While making my photobooks, I take screen captures of my posts or copy/paste the words to add journaling to my pages. You can also make photobooks on your phone from Facebook posts if you prefer to look through your memories in a book.

We remember our memories better when we relive them. 

A photo is not always worth a thousand words. We can ensure our memories don't fade by adding journaling to our photos to remind us of details that aren't obvious from the photo.

One last point, do you have your photos ready to be rescued in case of disaster whether that is a burning house, flood or technical crash of your computer or phone? As great as it is to have memories saved on Facebook, understand that the quality of the photos is diminished and you don't know how long that website will exist.

Scanning Photos and Negatives

Do you have negatives or photos that you say you will have reprinted or scanned "some day"? I have for over 25 years.

When I picked up my Honeymoon photos, I wanted to keep them in order so I wrote a number on the back of them. This was before I knew to use a photo safe pencil/pen. As I stacked them, the ink from the pen made a mark on the next photo.

If the ink marks are in the sky, they can be cropped out, but if they're in a main part of the photo like in the wave below or in someone's face, it's more of a problem.

Since then, I have wanted to get reprints of the photos and make a honeymoon photo album but I never did. As I have quoted before, "something that can be done at any time is often done at no time".

For years, I had "lost" the negatives. I couldn't find them in the box of negatives I had at my house. When we were visiting my in-laws, I recognized a box in the closet and remembered that I had stored my first box of negatives there.

It's a tip I had heard, to keep your photos and negatives in a separate place. It's equivalent to the reason we back up our photos today. Ideally, your back-up drive should be in another location or on the cloud. If anything happens to the originals in your home, you always have your back-ups.

When I started my Revive55 Project last summer, reprinting these photos and making a photo album was one of the things I wanted to get accomplished. Our anniversary is this month, and this was my plan but with non-essential businesses closed, I can't take in my negatives to be reprinted.

That's not a big problem because I also wanted to digitize the photos. I wasn't sure whether I would get the photo lab to digitize them or if I would do it myself. Years ago, we bought a scanner - maybe it was purchased at the same time as the Elgato Video Capture we bought for our 20th anniversary. Click here to read my post about digitizing home videos.

I have used the scanner to preserve photos and negatives in the past but never got to my honeymoon negatives.

I got the scanner out this week and was disheartened to see that it was no longer compatible with the updated OS on my Mac. Our older iMac was updated as well. I started searching for a new scanner. I consoled myself with the thought that maybe a new one will be more efficient and better quality.

This is what my scanner looks like. The first photo shows the negative film holder installed in the lid of the scanner. The lid closes and the negative gets scanned. The second photo shows the white cover that is used to cover the black holder when you want to scan photos or documents.

The third photo shows the other side of the negative film holder where you load the negative as can be seen in the fourth photo. You lift the top that holds the negative down when closed.

                          

It's not the simplest process which is why I thought that over the years, something better would be on the market.

The reviews did not reassure me. I found the negative holder awkward on my scanner but the new ones were labelled as flimsy. The better quality scanners were over $1200. I was almost convinced to purchase a medium priced one for $275 that I had read and heard was a great scanner since starting my Revive55 Project. I felt though, that it was wasted money because I didn't think it would be any better than the one I already had. Bummer.

I then found online software that we could buy that would make it work again. It was a cheaper solution but was it a trustworthy solution?

When I was quarantined in April, I had tried to use my old MacBook (circa 2008) but couldn't get it to work. I used a refurbished Linus laptop instead. My scanner wasn't compatible with the laptop so I got the MacBook out again and got it to work.

I downloaded the scanner software, and it WORKED!!! I was SO happy and relieved. I'm so happy that we still had it. We hadn't used the MacBook in years and when it was in the process of crashing, I managed to export the valuable photos, music and documents from it before it completely crashed and we needed to wipe it.

I was happy to scan the negatives. Some of the printed photos are markedly improved just by scanning the negative. Going back to that first photo I showed with the ink marks:

Original photo printed (1990's)

Scanned from negative film (2020)

Scanned from negative film (2020)
edited to straighten the horizon line, correct yellowish tinge
and lighten shadows possibly due to age of negative

By scanning the negative, the sun is visible and there are parts of the photo that was cropped on the initial photo. In this case, seeing the extra chair doesn't add value but sometimes a critical part is missing. The negative is not 4x6 so when a photo is printed, it cuts off part of the photo. If you have printed photos online, you will see this when you choose whether you want to crop a little on either side or more on one side.

As technology changes, I am being reminded that we should preserve things while we still can. I had old negatives from a disc camera that became obsolete. I'm not sure if I kept them or not, but I googled and learned that I may be able to scan them with my scanner.

I will now scan as many negatives and photos as I can before technology changes again and I'll have to spend more or lose my memories preserved in these images.

My Photo Album Collection

Counting down to the end of My Revive55 Project is helping me accomplish more. I think the following quote by Gretchen Rubin is very relevant to memory projects: "something that can be done at any time is often done at no time".

Do you think that you'll organize your photos some day? That you'll document your stories? That you'll organize or declutter your mementos? I wanted to stop procrastinating which is why I started my Revive55 Project. By having a deadline and sharing my progress, I am accomplishing a lot but I still don't think I can do everything I wanted to do without spending every waking moment on the project. 

I think that is also a very valid point to recognize. I will not do everything I wanted to do.

In recognizing that, I have to prioritize. What adds the most value? What do I love the most? What shortcuts can be taken? How will I do this in the future so that I don't fall behind again?

These are some of the questions I am hoping to answer before my project ends.

How will I preserve and enjoy my photos in the future? Here's what my collection looks like at the moment and how I got to this point.

This isn't all my albums. I actually have three of each colour on the bottom shelf completed. The bottom shelf are my Creative Memories albums and average 30 pages per album. The Blurb photobooks are on the right side of the top shelf with the year on the spine. Each of those books average 220 pages. One of my concerns that prompted me to start photobooks was the amount of space the albums would require with the increase amount of digital photos. One photo book is equivalent in shelf space to 6-7 Creative Memories albums.

When I started to scrapbook with Creative Memories, my first child was 10 months old. Starting my albums at his birth was a great starting point. Scrapbooking was my hobby and I made time for it. During the time of film photography, we didn't have as many photos to put in albums. It wasn't too difficult to keep up if it was something that we enjoyed.

Before starting to scrapbook, most of my photos were already in regular photo albums. Learning that those albums were damaging my photos, I started to transfer them to photo-safe Creative Memories albums.

I stopped scrapbooking my chronological family albums in 2008 when my passion and hobby became blogging. I didn't actually mean to stop, I just kept procrastinating and saying I'd catch up some day. As the days passed, the task became more and more overwhelming so I procrastinated more.

When I started my Revive55 Project last year, I had photos in albums from my birth to before my wedding. Because I wanted to make "special" albums for my wedding, showers and honeymoon, I procrastinated doing them. I purchased the albums and they've been sitting there empty.

I wanted them to be perfect and I suffered from perfection paralysis. I skipped those and had my photos from after the honeymoon in albums up to a few years before we had our first child. I never completely got caught up to my son's birth.

When I started to focus on my photos again a couple of years ago, I completed four photobooks for the years 2010, 2011, 2012 and 2014.

So my gaps were for a few weeks around my wedding and honeymoon, 3 years before my son's birth, part of 2008, 2009, 2013 and 2015 to present. I also have to admit that I have a few gaps in my completed albums as well, like my sister's wedding that I had perfection paralysis and was overwhelmed with the number of photos. It wasn't my wedding, but I had enough photos to fill an album. How many pages do I allocate to her wedding? Which photos do I omit?

I also have extra photos over the years that I would love to add. In my first scrapbook, I included two pages for our trip to England. Two pages!! How does a trip only have two pages? The previous two pages were a business reward trip to St. Thomas. The cost of the album was limiting what I put in that first album. 

I can't add pages to that album without it affecting all the albums that come afterwards. If I add pages, I have to remove the last ones and add those to the next album and it creates a cycle of adding and removing.

What I hope to do with the extra photos is to include them in an England album of trips over the years. I could also do a Caribbean album of our various tropical holidays. Those are someday projects. 

I am currently focusing on closing the gaps in the chronological albums.  I'm very happy to have completed 2008 in my photo albums this week.  I also recently finished my 2013 photobook.

When I was making photobooks for my siblings when they turned a special age, they shared their childhood photos with me. Many of them I didn't have because our Mom would share the photos between us and not have four copies printed. Since starting my Revive55 Project,  I added the new-found photos to my childhood album and in so doing, expanded from one album to three. I also added mementos like report cards, ribbons, certificates and newspaper clippings. My first album is from birth until Grade 8 and my second is my high school years. The third is my university days. I am so happy that I managed to get that done during my Revive55 project.

My next focus is to print my 2009 photos and put them in Creative Memories albums. With my anniversary in May, I will focus on my wedding and honeymoon photos during that month. I will then continue chronologically to finish our photos before we had children.

Once this is done, I will consider my photos preserved from my birth until 2014. Creative Memories albums from my birth to 2009 and Blurb photo books from 2010 to 2014.

I then need to decide what to do from 2015 to 2019. Is it realistic to get caught up with those before the end of the project?

I don't want to keep falling behind and with the number of photos I'm adding to my collection, I need to find a new way of preserving and enjoying my photos. 

At the moment, I am thinking of continuing to make chronological photobooks but also having specialty albums (scrapbooks) or photobooks for trips and special themes. My husband has begun to make videos that include video clips, photos and journaling. He also makes digital albums that we watch on our TV either my mirroring our computer screen or through Apple TV.

I just wanted to write an update now as I am getting closer to closing the gaps in my photo projects. By reviewing and writing updates, I sometimes get aha moments when I get new ideas so hopefully something will click to help with my photo collection.

Keep Up THEN Catch Up

Do you have photo organizing resolutions for 2020 or the 2020's?

I resolved to keep up to date with my photos. When I moved to digital photography over a decade ago, I fell behind keeping them organized and into albums. The more I fell behind, the more I procrastinated to catch up. It becomes overwhelming to see the number of photos grow and grow.

Like the saying goes, it's easier to keep up than to catch up. Many people use this saying when referring to housework, tasks or emails but it's also perfect for photo organization.

It's what I used to teach in my scrapbooking classes in the 2000's:

Keep up with the current photos 

and THEN catch up with older ones.

Although I am not up to date with my photos from the 2010's, I'm starting fresh in the 2020's. I'm focusing on keeping up and then I'll catch up.

Here are some tips for keeping up:

• Rate or rank the best photos (eg. on iPhone click the heart icon)
• Separate very top photos from the rest by creating a folder or album (top 1%)
• Delete blurry, unflattering and duplicate photos
• Choose a time and/or place (and add it to your calendar or to do list):
• daily, weekly or monthly (as often as possible is best)
• at your computer, on your phone
• while travelling, waiting in line or for an appointment
• with morning coffee or evening drink
• replace a meaningless task with photo organizing. For example if you check social media or the news more often than you would like, open your photos application instead.
• If your program allows, add keywords or tags (like Family, Friends, Mexico, Birthday, etc.)
• Crop and/or edit your best photos if needed
• Share on social media or photo sharing site like Flickr, Picasa, Google, Amazon
• Print photos you want to enlarge and frame or include in photo albums
• Import photos into photobook

I'll be going into more detail on keeping up and catching up tips and workflow ideas in the future.

Bookmark the landing page on Revive55 Project for Keep Up Then Catch Up to check back for updates.

Where Are Your Photos?

Photos can play an important role in helping us remember special and everyday moments.

When I used to teach photo album-making classes as a Creative Memories Consultant, one of my first questions was "where are your photos?". The answers I received before digital photos were a lot simpler than they are today.

I would love to know where your photos are. If you want to share, please copy and paste the following questions and send me your answers at suzanne@revive55project.com.

In case you're interested, I'll include my answers at the bottom of this post in case you want to see them before or after you answer yourself.

1. Where are your physical photos?
a) In photo albums
b) Organized in boxes, folders
c) Disorganized in boxes, folders
d) Other: ___________________

2. Are you happy with the state of your physical photos?
a) Yes
b) No
c) No but it’s not a priority so I’m okay with it.

3. Where are your original digital photos (not back up photos)?
a) In an organization program like Photoshop Organizer, Lightroom, Apple Photos, Picasa, etc.
b) In dated folders on my computer
c) On my phone
d) On an external hard drive, USB/flash drives, SD cards
e) In the cloud
f) Other: ______________________

4. Are you happy with the state of your digital photos?
a) Yes
b) No
c) No but it’s not a priority so I’m okay with it.

5. Do you delete or throw away photos?
a) Yes - blurry and unflattering ones
b) Yes - all except the very best
c) Yes - somewhere in between
d) No

6. Can you tell the difference between your best photos and the clutter?
a) Yes - I only keep the best
b) Yes - I rank, heart or star the best ones
c) Yes - I have the best ones in separate folders or albums
d) No - the best are mixed in with the rest

7. How many photos do you have?
a) On your phone: _________
b) On your computer: __________
c) On external drives (originals not backed up): ___________
d) In cloud (originals not backed up): __________
e) I don’t know
f) How can I tell?
g) The number doesn’t matter to me

8. Do you feel like you can easily find a photo from a specific event when you want to?
a) Yes in seconds/minutes (in an album or computer)
b) Yes in under an hour (in an album or computer)
c) Sometimes
d) I wouldn’t know where to start to look
e) Other: ___________________

9. Could you recover your photo collection in case of:
a) House damage (fire, water, damage, etc.)
       i) Yes photos are on the cloud/online
       ii) Yes negatives, hard drive, files are stored elsewhere
       iii) No
b) Computer crashes and is not fixable
       i) Yes photos are copied on cloud, web, hard drive, USB or SD cards
       ii) Yes photos are also on phone
       iii) Yes lower quality copies are on Facebook
       iv) No
c) Phone or tablet is lost or broken
       i) Yes photos are backed up elsewhere
       ii) No

10. What do you love most about your photo organization?
_______________________________________________
_______________________________________________
_______________________________________________


11. What do you hope to improve about your photo organization?
_______________________________________________
_______________________________________________
_______________________________________________

12. Who is in charge of your photos?
a) You
b) You and your partner share the same collection
c) You and your partner have separate collections

Although my digital photos are sort of organized, I feel that my system needs improving and be more time efficient. I feel that there is a better way to organize, curate and maintain our photos in the digital age.

Ten years ago, I posted this on social media:

I love my enthusiasm and hope that I would declutter our photos. For the past ten years, I have been feeling the weight as more and more photos were added to our collection.

Don't get me wrong. I looooove our photos and videos. I am very happy I have them.

For years, I kept thinking that my focus should be on decluttering. I spent hours deleting thousands of photos but then thousands more were added and the original number of photos I tried to decrease is surpassed again. I would get discouraged and at times give up trying.

As I see that message from 10 years ago, I recognize that I don't want to feel this way for the next 10 years. I also recognize that I should focus my time on the photos I love (a joy) not on the photos I don't want (a chore).

I think that the way of the past isn't the way of the future.

At the moment, I feel like I need to let go of my past collection. I don't want to spend the time required to delete unnecessary photos. I have used PhotoSweeper to find duplicates but even that application is time consuming to ensure I keep the edited version or the better version of the original or HDR one.

I want to let go of past mistakes and create a new way of capturing memories with photos. That's what I will focus my time on.

I would love to get feedback on where your photos are to see if most people are happy with the way things are or are looking for a better way like I am.

Thank you for reading and your feedback.

Suzanne

Here are my answers:

1. My physical photos are in photo albums and mostly organized in photo boxes.
2. I'm fairly happy with the state of my physical photos. I have a couple of years worth of printed photos that still need to be added to photo albums.
3. My digital photos are in multiple organization programs, in dated folders on my computer, on my phone, on an external hard drive, USB drives and in the cloud. Sounds overwhelming!
4. I'm not completely happy with the state of my digital photos.
5. I have deleted thousands of photos but keep most.
6. I try to rank or heart my best photos but there are lots that are not.
7. On my phone I have 46455 photos/videos (same as iCloud and Apple photos that are linked).
   In Photoshop 69929 (pre-May 2014) and in Lightroom 61908.
8. I can easily find a photo if I have an idea of the date or it's organized in a themed folder eg. a place, a person or activity.
9. My negatives and photo albums are in my house (I have had negatives elsewhere at times but they're back here). I have scanned a lot of my childhood physical photos but there are still tons that I would lose. My computer and back up drive are in our house so if something happened to them physically, I would only have icloud, Flickr and Lightroom app photos. 
10. I love that my photos are organized by theme (places, people, activities, etc.); that a lot of photos are ranked or marked with a heart; and that they are backed up.
11. I hope to better protect in case of disaster; I hope to find a less time consuming way to organize and curate my collection and I hope to be prepared for change in technology. For example, what happens to my Photoshop collection organization (with rankings, albums, tags, etc.) when the application is no longer compatible with newer computers. I think it's no longer available for purchase and possibly no longer supported. 
12. My husband and I share a collection and I have a separate collection.