Restoring Old Photo Albums into Pocket Page Scrapbooks (Part Three)

Hello, welcome to part three of the series Restoring Old Photo Albums into Pocket Page Scrapbooks. If you've missed either part of this series you can find them here Part One & Part Two.

When we left off at part two we had a pile of photos that had come out of the old albums and were ready to be put into brand new pocket page protectors.

I wish that I would have counted the number of hours that it took for this entire project. I know it hugely exceeded the time frame I had initially planned.

I am, however, so happy that I took this project on and I really appreciate all the help that I got to finish it. A recently I made the trek to visit my grandparents and show them the albums. I should have taken a video of my grandpa's reaction. He was thrilled. I spent a couple of hours sitting at the table with him. We listened to stories he had to tell about the photos that we had put into the albums. I wrote a lot of them down. I can't wait to spend more time with him going through the albums.

Here are a few of the finished pocket page spreads:

 These pages were done with the We R Memory Keepers Farmers Market journaling cards. This is the perfect collection if you're doing a vintage or heritage project. The colors are perfect for vintage photos. I love that they're made with a soft color palette so that vintage black and white photos stand out.

This page was made using the We R Memory Keepers Captured line. I used these cards for the colored photos. I loved how the bold colors complimented the photos that were taken in the 70's and 80's. 

You'll notice a lot of blank journaling cards. I will fill those out when I can visit more with my grandparents. I'll write their stories on those blank cards.

I don't know how to express to you how amazing the We R Memory Keepers Albums are. They are worth every penny. They're absolutely beautiful and their quality is unmatched. These are the only albums I will be buying in the future. 

When we were finishing up with this project I made a list of things we learned while doing this project.

What we learned:

• Each photo needs to have a name (first and last) and a date. Nowadays it's especially important for digital files. Name your files with the person's name who is in the photo. We found many photos that had just a first name and so so many that didn't have a date. I don't put a first and last name on every page I create but I do keep them in albums by person (I have an album for each member of my family).

• Don't write on the photos! Don't write on the front (or the back) of the photo. The ink will most likely bleed and become unreadable. If you really need the information permanently attached to the photo write or type the information on an archival quality label and then adhere the label to the back of the photo.

• Don't permanently adhere irreplaceable photos. We used hundreds of photos on this project. I wanted to make sure that the photo could be taken out and then replaced if needed. I also wanted to make sure that if there was any information or handwriting on the back of the photos that it could be seen if needed.

• Use archival quality products as much as possible. Nowadays most products are archival quality. You'll see a lot of them that say "acid free" those are the products you want to use. The old "magnetic" albums from the 80's are the ones that have glue that are made with acid. That's what was ruining my photos. You do need to be careful with some of the embellishments that are popular today.  Wood veneer and cork are not archival quality and shouldn't ever touch your photos.
• Write your stories down! Write your own stories down, even if there are not photos to go with the stories. My grandparents told so many stories that didn't have photos. The memories were sparked by a photo they saw in the albums.

Thank you for following along with this series. I hope that somewhere along the way you're inspired to take care of some of your old photos.
 
Here is a list of supplies I used for this project:
We R Memory Keepers Farmers Market
We R Memory Keepers Captured 
We R Memory Keepers Albums  
We R Memory Keepers Photo Sleeves
Photo, Slide, and Negative Scanner

Waxed Dental Floss 
Project Life Journaling Pens

We R Memory Keepers Journaling Cards 

Self Adhesive Photo Corners
band-aids

Let's Talk Tuesday: Documenting Childhood Memories

I grew up as a child in the 80's and 90's. I love my mom dearly but she wasn't much of a photo taker. I do have photos from my childhood but not many and some of them don't coincide with childhood memories that I want to document. 

Fast forward to today...if you were to walk into my home today you would find bookshelf, after bookshelf, after bookshelf filled to capacity with books, mostly children's books. My daughter was estimating the other day that we have somewhere between 500-550 books in our house. A lot of these books I have purchased at thrift stores. We probably spend $5.00-$10.00 a week at the thrift store buying children's books. I love digging through the piles of old books and finding books that I remember reading as a child. Those are the books that I always buy. While spending time going through my grandparents photos for the "restoring old albums into pocket page scrapbooks" I've been asking myself a lot of questions about my memory keeping. 

• Am I documenting the stories that my kids will remember and that they will want to read when they are grown? 
• Are the memories that I'm documenting the ones that they will be excited to share with their children? 
• Am I taking photos of the events that they will want to remember? 

 I realized that there are memories from my childhood that I want to record even though there aren't photos to go with these memories. One of those memories is of being read to as a child. My mom is the queen of reading. She's the one who has given me and my kids the book reading (and collecting) obsession. 
I decided that even though I don't have photos of me being read to as a child I could take some photos of the books that I remember being read to me to document this memory. I grabbed a few of the books that I collected at thrift stores and got to work. I took photos of these books, printed them, wrote my journaling, and created this scrapbook page:

 I used the October Afternoon Public Library collection. I may have purchased the entire line...duplicates on some things. So, be prepared to see a lot of projects with this collection.

 I love the sticker titled "my favorite story" I knew I wanted it on this page but I was struggling to find a spot for it where it didn't get lost in the other elements of the page so I created a base for it using pieces of label stickers.

The journaling on this project reads:

Some of my very favorite memories as a child are accompanied by a book or a story. I love finding and buying books to read to my kids that my mom read to me when I was little. My most favorite are “No More Elephants” and “Don’t Forget the Oatmeal.” I’ve found many of them at thrift stores.  I also remember being told stories by my Grandma (Bair) when I would take a nap at her house. She almost always told me the story of the 3 Billy Goats Gruff. I love that such sweet memories are attached to stories that I can keep sharing.

This week I hope you will think about and hopefully document some of your childhood memories. Even if you don't have photos or can't take any photos. Get those memories written down!

Tomorrow the 3rd and final part in the series "Restoring Old Photo Albums into Pocket Page Scrapbooks" will be live. Make sure you stop by and check it out.

Have a great Tuesday!