Weekend Pics from Parenting in the Loop

Weekend Pics from Parenting in the Loop

Weekend

Spices of Life

 

I am really into decluttering. But I find it a totally frustrating experience at best. Devoting any of my precious hard earned time on any given Saturday or Sunday is definitely not something I relish.

Do you feel the same way?

OR…

Are you already super organized?

OR

Are you a weekend warrior and love projects like these?

I loved this post in the New York Times. Both of these women and their approaches appeal to me. So I am already stuck, when it comes to organizing my kitchen space.

 

Two Cooks, Two Kitchens, Two Organizing Plans

Do different cooks need different approaches to organizing the kitchen?Weekend Project

I wasn’t the only one who was feeling the need for a kitchen makeover. Margaux Laskey, my partner in the Kids Cook column, was having similar thoughts. Although we’re both working parents who love to cook, we’re in different places in our lives: She’s the mother of a baby and a preschooler, while my kids are older (9, 10, 11 and 14). Her kitchen is small, mine is the big country version. Did we also need different approaches to a kitchen clean-out?

On one hand I don’t think I could stand to have everything out of my cabinets and exposed so it would be hard for me to choose the first plan. On the other hand I like the outcome even if it took almost 10 days to achieve.

The second approach is more appealing because there seems to be a more immediate gratification in having one part of my kitchen organized even if it is just the spice cabinet.

Neither one of these is a weekend project for me.

Over the years I have tried decluttering and one of the things I simplified was my wardrobe. That was about 15 years ago and at this point it is in severe need of a revisit.

Our house has been the home at any given time for 4 generations of our family and we have only lived here for 20 or so years. There are many things that evoke memories of times and people gone by. It is not so easy to “dispose” of these memory charged things. It feels like I am actually throwing away my past even though I know that it not true.

I love the fact that I can take photos of the things before I give them away and those photos can be store readily stored on my computer literally forever. I know my mother would not want me to be a slave to saving her things unless it was something that brought me true joy when I wore it or looked at it. I have to keep this in mind.

I can truly tell you I will not be decluttering this weekend since I prefer to procrastinate.

What will you be doing?

 

Storytelling through Photos

Stories and Photos

Rainbow Cake-Birthday Photos

 

Ever since I can remember, photographs have been a source of joy for me.

I am now a grandmother and every time, I come across a box of photos that are stored away, I know that there will a ton of vignettes running through my brain like an old movie reel from the 50’s.

As a young girl, a camera was never far away from my hand. Kodak Brownie cameras were very popular when I was a child and my father made sure that I had one. He was always taking snapshots in Black and White and we were always facing the sun which made us squint something fierce in those days. Flash was not used often by my dad, but my second Brownie camera had a flash attached to it that used bulbs that would explode into a melted hot mess after a flash photo. They were inconvenient and somewhat expensive.

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Film was another story. You never knew whether your photo was a keeper until you developed it at the drugstore, it took a few days for that process. Kodak did most of the developing in those days, and it was up to them to decide whether to print a photo or not depending upon its quality. If it printed, you got charged, if not you received a negative to decide if in fact you still wanted to print it or not. Saving negatives became a chore, but you did it because if your wanted duplicates you needed the negative to get them.

With all of the rigmarole of photo taking came another rigmarole of storing and sharing photos. Albums were tedious, but kept us busy on a snowy weekend along with the corner stickers that held the photos in place and keeping the stories of the photos updated and chronological. I loved it when the clear page albums came along and then the ones that were archival quality made it possible to store photos without losing their quality.

A beautiful Anniversary dessert!

A beautiful Anniversary dessert!

The life of the family photographer was tedious but very rewarding and the stories that went along with the photos could keep me enveloped for hours at a time, in past vacations, family gatherings, and visits with relatives that were no longer around.  I relished and cherished these moments.

Along with the photographic times I have changed and absolutely love the fact that I can snap a photo anytime. It is as easy as breathing and as natural for me at this point in my life. A camera be it my phone or my DSLR is always at my side!

"From Our House to Your House!"

“From Our House to Your House!”

Thank goodness, I no longer have to go to the drugstore to develop my pictures. I download them to my computer and sometimes I make copies for my walls but most times not. I have CD’s full of photos along with digital cards, that I save as back ups and my photos are backed up to Carbonite to avoid a loss that would be tragic. Sometimes I feel that losing a picture is like losing a part of my history…it is something to grieve if you lose your precious photos.

Photos stir memories and memories are so important. Photos tell stories and stories are so important too.

Recently, Shutterfly contacted me to share this sad news about photos, memories and millennials.

Millennial Memories at Risk

Millennials are most at risk for losing memories, taking more photos than any other generation. Though millennials snap more than 100 photos each month on average, they’re unlikely to have looked at an old photo in the past month.

 

“Photos can be effective memory cues, but they only work if you revisit them. Shutterfly’s research shows that people are taking huge amounts of photos but our revisiting behavior isn’t scaling with our snapping behavior,” said Dr. Linda Henkel, a professor and cognitive psychologist at Fairfield University. “My earlier research showed that the act of taking photos actually makes us remember the moment less if we don’t take another glance at the picture. To truly keep a memory alive, revisiting the photo is as important as taking it.”

Both of these findings made me sick. I literally stopped and reread them to make sure I understood these findings correctly.

ice cream cone

If this information is true, it makes me sad that with all our technology and photo taking we are losing the ability to keep our memories alive if we don’t look at the photos we take after we snap them.

To keep our memories alive we must revisit our photos.

Does that mean, that we should not be always snapping but we should take a break and be present fully, without a camera?

I think so!

So there is a balance to maintain here.

I am still going to take pictures as it is something that I love. But each picture will have more importance to me. It will have a memory and a story.

That is my resolution for this year 2015…photo taking this year will be more discerning for me.

In that effort, I will need some help and I think I will turn to Shutterfly to help me with this goal.

“Storytelling and shared connections are part of Shutterfly’s DNA and giving consumers simple and intuitive ways to access, share, and celebrate their memories is the guiding principle in everything we do. Our goal is for the technology to make it easier to archive and share photos so that users can spend more time telling their stories.”

 

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I am grateful to Shutterfly for bringing this information to my attention. I am committed to memory making and sharing as well as storytelling on my blog where I try to use my own photos whenever I can.

I have chosen a few of my favorite food photos that tell stories for me of Christmas, birthdays, anniversaries, summer ice cream, and farm stand glory!

Please join me in the year of making memories and storytelling. You do not have to be a writer to tell a story when you have  great photos.

Thank you Shutterfly!

this post was not sponsored or compensated in any way

via Shutterfly Research Reveals Americans Are Taking More Photos but Failing to Share Memories (NASDAQ:SFLY).

Throw Back Thursday…Memories

 

 

 

Memories from my childhood…what about you?Barbie just a Memory

 

 

Do you know the name of this doll?

What dolls do you remember?

 

Fond Memories:Barbie circa 1950'sI love throw back Thursdays…for me it is fun to see how far or not so far people go back…

My memories are from a different time when there was no internet in fact there was barely television!