With the advent of camera phones and digital cameras, there are less printed photos to showcase and store. However, many of us still have printed photographs we like to share with loved ones. Perhaps those old photo albums are falling apart, or you have some photos that you’ve been meaning to hang up, but they have long since been intermixed with others, here are some tips to help you sort through and prioritize your photos:
1. Gather all your photos together, whether they are loose or in albums. This will help you see how many photos you have. Perhaps you may not want to keep all of them.
2. Sort by decade. According to Deb Cabral, Certified Photo Organizer (CPO), sorting by decades is best if your photos are not marked with dates. You can usually determine the decade by the photo type and the people in the photo. To become more definitive with the dates may become overwhelming.
3. Sort by category. For each decade, sort by categories specific to you and your life. You may have categories such as: school, vacations, sports, etc. Use paper or index cards to mark each of these categories as you lay them out. You may want to go further with
sub-categories, for example: soccer, football, baseball, etc. under sports.
4. Prioritize your photos. After you have them sorted by category, you will see the amount you have in each category and this is a good time to pick out the best ones, the ones you want to display in frames or albums. Throw away any duplicates - It’ll be okay!
5. Display your top priority photos. Some you may want to frame, but most you will probably want to put in a picture album so that they can be easily viewed and enjoyed. Pocket photo albums are a nice option and if you want to, placing a nice journaling box in a pocket every so often gives you a place to write about your photos. Scrapbooks are another good option for displaying your photos. You do not have to add extra decorations if you don’t want to. Getting the photos in the scrapbook and having room to write about them where possible is a wonderful memory book for you and your loved ones to enjoy!