memories to hold

Honestly, i understand. I understand the digital craze and how just about everything in the photography world seems to have moved to an electronic version. Digital files. Digital sharing. Digital proofs. I haven’t had a client NOT purchase digital images in years. and I understand, if it was my family I would want a digital copy of everything too. BUT (and this is a big but..) I can’t help but still ache for all of my clients to have prints. canvases. albums. actual hard copies of their photos. copies they can hold in their hand and flip through with their fingers.

One of my favorite things in the world is to just sit for hours surrounded by old family photos, I think every time I go to my grandparents house I end up covering their table with all of their old photos wanting to hear stories of who these people are, what these events were, why they were significant. What are my kids going to say when its their turn? Are they going to have photos to look through or are they just going to have to dig up an old hard drive that may or may not still be working? I’ve never EVER heard of anyone excited to hold their grandparents wedding DISC in their hands, but their grandparents wedding ALBUM? now thats a different story. Photos are precious, thats why so many of us invest in them, but what are we doing with them once they’ve been taken? Just sharing them on facebook? Thats great for NOW, but what about in 10 years? The digital world is moving and shifting like crazy and I can only imagine the photo sharing methods they will have in 10 years, but I believe there is something special about being able to hold your photos. and what about all of those photos or instagrams you take with your phone when you get a new one or that one crashes? one of my favorite photographers DrewB just did an awesome post on places to print your instagrams for any of you wondering the best place to print those.

For those of you who aren’t able to invest in professional prints from your photographer, I always recommend mpix.com as a great quality, inexpensive print lab. I used them all the time before I started working with my professional lab, and I promise they are the best quality for the price. You can easily design albums with them, which would be a quick way to print all of your random snapshots and images that you love from the year and keep them all in one place. I always say that I hope each one of my wedding clients walks away with a gorgeous keepsake album with all of their absolute favorite images, a couple canvases they can see on a daily basis, and then I hope they print a small copy of every single image from their day and put them in a flip book album! There are so many fun images from your day that won’t necessarily make it into the main album, but we don’t want those images to get lost in the shuffle, now do we?! ;)

Whether it comes in the form of professional albums, flip books, or just boxes full of prints (not quite the method i recommend, but still) please, dear friends, give your children and grandchildren memories to hold.

Right now I have all of my old prints organized in these photo storage boxes. They are separated and labeled by time/event, and are going into an album since I don’t have any digital copies of these images! All of these were taken pre digital camera :)
and just for fun, here are a few of my most favorite images in the world. I can’t express how thankful I am to have these prints and that my mom and grandma took time to develop their film and keep these prints! okay seriously, how stinkin CUTE was my baby brother?! That picture on the top left corner of him and Buzz Lightyear is one of my absolute favorite images of him over the past 17 years :) aaaaand yes, I know what you’re thinking.. nothing has changed. I still look ridiculous when I attempt to play the guitar, my fingers can’t quite figure out how the piano works, and I still get a big goofy grin on my face when my arms are full of babies :) 
Happy Wednesday!!