Jackie Lyals, Author at Save Your Photos

Sep 09 2016

Taking Pictures of Kids: Understanding The 7 Ages of Childhood

Professional photographer, author and educator Ann K. Monteith explains the 7 Ages of Childhood and how we can capture those years in precious photographs.

As a professional photographer, the single most repeated lament that I have heard from clients over the years—even in the era of easy-to-use amateur cameras—is “I wish I had more portraits of my child growing up.”

The 7 Ages of Childhood

Mindful of this issue, over 50 years ago Professional Photographers of America (PPA) developed a program to help parents recognize the most important milestones that should be professionally photographed to insure that a child’s development is documented as he or she grows from a tiny infant through young adulthood. Called “The 7 Ages of Childhood,” PPA revitalized the program in the mid-1990s, and today many professionals still use these guidelines. These guidelines were createded with the help of child-development specialists who took into consideration the physical, psychological and emotional changes that occur during childhood.

The message of this PPA program is clear: “Someday the child you hold now will want to tell your grandchild what it was like when he or she was growing up. Imagine how wonderful it would be to have a beautiful album of priceless images of that childhood, created by a sensitive professional who knows how to interpret and preserve these precious moments.”

“The 7 Ages of Childhood” has served me well in my business and also in reminding me to create more than my usual family snapshots to capture the key milestones of Lucas, my only grandson, who was born in 2001. As a proud grandmother, I’ve chosen his portraits to present the various “Ages” along with the program’s description of each developmental stage.

Newborn through First Year — Baby’s First Year

At no time in your child’s life will physical changes occur so rapidly. In what seems like the blink of an eye, a tiny, helpless bundle is transformed into an active, robust and inquisitive youngster. Once the baby arrives, it’s wise to contact your photographer right away to plan these important sessions, as those changes already are happening!

Unlike the rest of the individual-session “7 Ages,” PPA suggests that infants be photographed at least 3 times during the first year. My choice was newborn, 6 months, and shortly after 12 months, when Lucas could walk and sit unassisted.

My dear friend and exceptional artist, Helen Yancy, turned my favorite newborn session image into a timeless watercolor portrait through the use of Corel Painter. Helen lives and works in Plymouth, MI.

For the 6-month session, I decided to include my daughter, Julie, in the portrait to allow me to have more freedom in creating a variety of poses to capture Lucas’s emerging baby personality.

I waited until Lucas was almost 14-months old to finish his “first-year” sessions. I wanted to make sure that he was completely confident as a walker and had begun to react to my camera-room silliness in order to assure a happy expression.

When I look back on these three portrait sessions, they truly confirm why it’s important to take the time to capture these priceless days of change.

2-Years Old — Tiny Traveler

Here one minute and gone the next! Around the second birthday a major milestone is achieved. Your toddler now responds to reason, humor, and action. Totally unpredictable. . . loveable, shy, rowdy, or reserved . . . but always adorable and always on the move!

3-Years Old — Little Discoverer

Most 3-year olds have discovered how to entertain themselves. Their world is filled with portrait opportunities that capture the mystery and fantasy that are so much a part of these joyful days of discovery and make-believe that fade so soon.

4- to 5-Years Old — Eager Searcher

The 4th and 5th years are among the cutest, most engaging ages for little boys and girls . . . the ability to speak and reason grow stronger every day. Searching for their place in the world, they have already developed personal interests, likes and dislikes. Their individuality of character and action should be portrayed before the baby teeth are lost and replaced by permanent ones . . . forever altering the endearing look of early childhood.

6- to 8-Years Old — Young Learner

7_lucas_expressions — Between the ages of 6 and 8, the snaggly-tooth period ends and permanent teeth emerge to change facial contours. A developing mind reveals a more mature, inquiring look. Now off to school and making their way in the world . . . there is so much to learn! Portraits made at this age help to confirm a child’s positive self image.

9- to 12-Years Old — Budding Explorer

From the ages of 9 to 12, the child is preparing to enter the teenage years . . . when physical, emotional, and attitude changes occur. The little person you have known so well is about to become a more complex and less-dependent young person. Peer acceptance is now important, and portraits can capture the child’s sense of style and expanding horizons.

13- to 15-Years Old — Young Teen

Ages 13 through 15 are the early teenage years. A kind of dress rehearsal for adulthood, these years begin to erase the memories of childhood. The boy is almost a man . . . in his interests, his attitudes, and thinking. They are often carefree years, yet ones that anticipate the challenges of adulthood on the horizon. The young woman has begun to blossom into womanhood. Still a lifetime of growing and learning ahead . . . but never again a child.

The image of Lucas flying his kite at the Delaware shore was made when he was 13. He just turned 15 this spring, and reviewing the images for this post reminds me that I should do another portrait of Lucas before it’s time for his high school senior portraits, which will be here much sooner than his family members would like. How grateful we all are to have this record of his journey through childhood. They are happy memories for us today and I hope that someday he will enjoy them with his own family: That would make me a very happy great-grammy!

Have you captured all 7 ages of childhood with the children in your family?

We also invite you to visit our sister blog The Photo Organizers for more tips and in-depth knowledge from some of the top photo organizing industry professionals. To find a photo organizer near you, visit the Association of Personal Photo Organizers.

Ann Monteith is a professional photographer, author, and educator from Annville, PA and is the past president of Professional Photographers of America. She and her husband, Jim have owned and operated four different studio businesses. Presently they are directors of Monteith’s Countryhouse Studios in Annville, PA, and also see clients at their vacation home and studio in Deep Creek Lake, MD. In 2009 they opened Persnickety Pet Portraits as a “warm fuzzy division of Countryhouse Studios.”

Sep 08 2016

Get Your Printed Photos Organized!

Follow these five step from Sheila DeHart of Tidy Up Organizing to get your printed photos organized.

I’m pretty sure many of you face this same dilemma. My kids are in their 20s, so that means the majority of their childhood was captured using a film camera. Gasp! I was the mom at Disneyworld with the fanny-pack full of rolls of film. And it was almost unheard of to not get double or triple prints if the store was offering it for free! So now what? You have tons of printed photos stored in the basement or attic. Maybe yours are nicely organized in shoe boxes or maybe they are tossed haphazardly in large plastic totes.

Either way, there is a better solution out there!

Let’s start by getting set up in the perfect conditions for getting these printed photos organized in 5 easy steps:

Step 1: Set Up Your Work Space

You’ll need a worktable with great lighting. This table could be your dining room table or a folding table set up just for this project. Just don’t use the kitchen table, you are going to want to spread out and work on this when you have free time. Don’t think you are going to pack this up just to serve dinner to your family!

We are going to start by sorting through the photos. However you currently have them stored is fine, just take a bunch out and start going through them.

Step 2: Toss Your Photos

Here is the “rule of thumb” when it comes to sorting photos. Keep the ones that are interesting, in focus, mean something to you, have good composition or tell a story. Toss the ones that are blurry, out of focus, unflattering, too much scenery or you just don’t recognize anyone in the photo.

For example, I have tons of pictures of my kid’s school parties. I only keep the ones my kids are in. The pictures of the other cute kids at the party won’t mean anything to anyone in my family in 20 years, so they go in the trash.

You will be surprised at how many photos you are going to toss.

Step 3: Sort It Out

Another decision you will have to make is how you want them sorted. Chronological order is the most pleasing to me. Maybe you are the type of person that would like them sorted by event, then the way to do that would be to make categories such as holidays, birthdays, vacations, family times, sports, etc. Within each of these categories, you could put them in chronological order too.

5 steps to organize your printed photos #saveyourphotos Click To Tweet

Step 4: Time to Scan

Once you have completed the task of sorting the photos, the next step is to get them scanned. You can check out the Association of Personal Photo Organizers (APPO) for a professional photo organizer near you who can help you with this. Scanning the photos and then putting the digital images on a disc or flash drive and also storing those images in a cloud storage is the safest place for your families cherished memories.

Step 5: Store and Display

What you do with your printed photos once you have them sorted is entirely up to you. If you want them on display in beautiful albums, this will be so easy to complete now that they are sorted and in chronological order. Another way to store them is in archival storage boxes to keep them safe.

This is your family’s story, how you choose to tell it is up to you. We at APPO are here to help!

Sheila DeHart lives in St. Louis, MO where she runs Tidy Up Organizing, a company that provides residential and photo organizing. She started her business to help people live happier lives by getting organized and out from under clutter. Once she started seeing how many of her clients were not enjoying their photos because they were not properly organized, she decided to become a Certified Photo Organizer. As a hobbyist photographer and Certified Photo Organizer, Sheila understands the value and importance of preserving her clients cherished memories. She is a member of APPO and NAPO.

Get Your Printed Photos Organized | SaveYourPhotos.org

Sep 06 2016

Stop Waiting and Start Saving Your Photos

Learning from personal experience, Lisa Luken of SimpleJoyLiving.com, wants you to commit to saving your photos today.

If you’re like millions of others, you have photos. And lots of them. Prints and slides buried in boxes that you inherited from relatives. Digital images that are hanging out on flash cards, CDs, old computers and hard drives. And maybe you even have some slides and old home videos mixed in there too.

I’m guessing that at some point, you’ve thought about doing something with these precious memories. Maybe you got excited about organizing them initially. Then maybe you started to think about how to do it, which led to thoughts about how overwhelming and time consuming the project would be, so you never got started.

If this sounds like you, let me first reassure you that you are not alone!

And second, I’d like to share with you a personal story…

When I was 15, my family lost our house in a tornado that destroyed most of our town and took the lives of 29 people. The storm came without warning and left me caught in a car riding out the storm in the driveway. In a mere 10 seconds, my life was drastically changed.

The storm passed as quickly as it came. After making my way into what was left of our house and discovering that my sisters and dog were okay (they ran to the basement when the power went out), I was suddenly responsible for figuring out what to do next.

Standing there in the midst of what was left of our home, I caught a glimpse of my mom’s favorite pictures, our baby pictures, still hanging on a wall that remained standing. I immediately knew that we needed to find any pictures we could and take them with us. That is what we would save…

Everything else was just stuff…stuff that could be replaced and that, in the big picture, really didn’t matter. Even at the age of 15, in the midst of a devastating life-changing event, I knew this. And I knew that the pictures were what was worth saving.

Everything else was just stuff that could be replaced & I knew that the pictures were what was worth saving. #saveyourphotos Click To Tweet

Our photos tell the stories of our lives – where we came from, what we’ve experienced and who we’ve ‘done life with.’ They take us back to the good old days. They make us smile and laugh. They teach us about what life was like before us. And possibly most importantly, they are gifts to future generations.

Although I didn’t have the opportunity to prepare in advance for the tornado, you have the ability to do so right now. I strongly encourage you to stop waiting and start saving your photos. I was blessed with the chance to save many of them after, but many people aren’t so lucky.

If you’re one of the many individuals like me that would choose to grab your pictures after saving your people and your pets, I encourage you to organize and preserve your memories now.

Completing your project is possible. Yes, it will take time…but I invite you to consider the time you spend working on this project as a gift to future generations.

What if instead of spending time out shopping for another “thing” for your family members, you instead pulled out “that box” and begin sorting photos? Or what if you spend that time telling and documenting the stories that only you know? This is a gift that only you can give. And it’s far more valuable than any “thing” that can be purchased at a store.

There are numerous resources available to help you start saving your photos. Visit www.saveyourphotos.org and thephotoorganizers.com for ideas and inspiration. Find resources and partners in your community. Make the project fun by planning a photo-sorting family gathering. Or find some friends who also have “that box” buried in their closet and schedule a routine time to work together on your projects. You can do it!

Lisa Luken offers Life Coaching, Professional Home & Photo Organizing and Speaking services. She supports others in creating SIMPLE, finding JOY and LIVING a life they love by working with them to get focused and take action on the parts of their life that are not simple.

Lisa has experienced both unintentional and intentional simplifying of her home and life and she knows what it feels like to be overwhelmed with having too much stuff. She also knows what it’s like to find freedom through simplifying and loves sharing her insight and knowledge to guide others on their journey toward a simpler, more fulfilling life.

For ideas, inspiration and to learn more about Lisa’s own personal simplifying journey, visit her website and blog at www.SimpleJoyLiving.com.

Sep 02 2016

Why Should I Organize My Photos?

This is a guest post by Amanda Henley of Memory Momentum.

As photo-organizers we have asked this question of ourselves and we ask our clients. Why DO you want to organize your photos? Do you feel guilty? Are you curious to see what’s in those collections? Are you curious to see what stories are there? Are you longing to revisit those memories or a little hesitant because of the emotional value that may be housed there?

Why do YOU want to organize your photos?

For me, I am fascinated by the stories both about the people and the times they lived in. I love watching how a photo can tell a different story to each viewer. As a photo-organizer, I was rather naturally motivated to organize and preserve my own and past generations’ collections, but I didn’t expect to feel what I did when I began to scan my grandmother’s neatly organized album collection.

When I began to scan her albums, I uncovered stories that moved me – that opened up my mind to the hard-working, war-affected laborious world of the first half of the 19th century. I became inspired to write and reflect about my own time and sit down with my own family and talk about what it must have been like for my Grandma and her family in those times.

I felt so deeply and instantly connected to these people I never knew, these people who I see in the faces of several generations later and I was astounded that my cousin’s child could look like my great-great aunt. Really.

And I instantly missed my Grandma.

I thought, why didn’t I open these albums with her when she was in her nursing home and we at times struggled for conversation outside of my own updates? These were her stories we could have visited together so much more.

I cried as I saw the black and white story unfold into coloured photos and realized that my Grandma wasn’t just my Grandma. She was the Grandma for her whole street, too. She had school photos and newspaper clippings of the neighbourhood children who I had later met at her funeral because she, too, was a Grandma in their lives.

In her photos I not only saw my Grandma, now in my adult years as a mom, I saw a fellow mother who lost her husband too young and moved forward with strength and love for her family.

That love continues to reflect back at everyone who opens these albums and sees how much she loved us because our story has been preserved in the pages she created.

It is these pictures and stories that inspire this mom-writer to focus and make memory-keeping a priority because I know the powerful feeling and instilled confidence that can emerge from the love of someone who cares enough to tell MY story.

So maybe this is a little narcissistic. But I realized it’s not just about preserving the loved one’s past stories: it’s about discovering the love someone had for YOU because you were important enough in his or her world to have your story told. And if no one’s told your story, then be important enough to yourself to tell your own story – it can be incredibly emotional, but powerful experience to reflect and create your story through photos.

Yes I know. We are busy. We are distracted. We are overwhelmed.

But you can still do this because it’s important. I made a very simple plan that I could chip away at so that I would be successful, and I made memory-keeping a valued party of my life and schedule.

Because I want my kids to know MY story.

I want them to know THEIR story.

And I have a story to tell.

I want to share that.

We are a people of stories and there are too many good things to note of what comes out of these photo stories, but WOW does it ever feel great to connect to something bigger than ourselves through these shared photos and stories!

I didn’t just revisit my grandmother and her history. My Grandma became a fellow-mom as I flipped through those album pages and I discovered such a deep sense of gratitude that she took the time to preserve her (and our) story.

Be the connector. Keep it simple so you will begin and you will be successful. And if you’re not sure where to start, you can call a photo organizer for guidance on how to get started here.

But do begin.

Kristi Green & Amanda Henley

We grew up together as best friends in a very small town in Ontario, Canada. A close-knit community, small town roots, and endless extended family memories became our foundation from which we have established many of our values. We ventured through our post-secondary years and launched into the next chapter of our lives – one as a teacher in BC, the other as a Registered Nurse in Ontario. In our new worlds we began to lay down our own new roots, but always remained connected. Becoming mothers solidified our passion for organizing, sharing, preserving and telling our family stories and so we opened our business in 2013 specializing in photo-organizing and helping people discover, preserve, and share their photo stories. We love to have fun, we love to be organized, and we love photo-storytelling! You can reach Kristi and Amanda at Memory Momentum.

Aug 30 2016

Dare to Automate Your Digital Photo Workflow

When it comes to organizing your digital photos, do you have a workflow? A what? Learn from Caroline Guntur of The Swedish Organizer, LLC.

In today’s fast-paced world, it’s easy to get behind on your to-dos, especially keeping up with your digital media. With so many photos coming at you every day from devices, email, and social media, it can be really overwhelming to stay organized, but we all know that neglecting your memories isn’t a good option. You cannot afford to lose your memories. They are too valuable! So how do you stay on top of everything?

You need to delegate.

Imagine, if you will, an elaborate system of rivers, all running to the same great lake. They are rapids and as such, hard to keep up with. If you try to stop them mid-stream, they’ll be hard to control, and may spill over. Now imagine that these streams aren’t actually real rivers, but your digital photo streams.

If you think about it, your digital photo streams are flowing just as quickly, and are just as hard to keep up with… The stats were released just this past month. An estimated 1.2 trillion photos will flood our devices this coming year, according to Mylio. How many photos will end up in your stream? You should know. You are responsible for curating them.

Instead of trying to stop each and every single stream, try redirecting them all to the same great lake, and back them up from there instead. Maybe this isn’t the most eloquent way of describing it, but it’s how I see my digital photo life. I’d rather deal with one spot over several different ones. So how can you achieve this streamlined workflow?

By using funnels.

In my opinion, the best backup strategies consolidate your digital rapids into one steady stream instead of dealing with them individually. Creating automatic backups is one component of this system because it allows you to re-direct your stream where you want them to go. All it takes is the willingness to set it up. It may sound like a lot of work, but just like organizing anything else, it actually ends up saving you a lot of time.

Here are some examples of ways you can simplify your life by automating your digital photo workflow:

Example #1: Redirect all new photos posted on your social media profiles to a cloud storage provider, like Dropbox or Google Drive.

Why not just grab them off your devices? Because the photos that post to your social media accounts aren’t just your own. Your friends and family members post to your account too, and I doubt you’ll want to borrow all of their devices on top of dealing with your own! If you think about it, Facebook itself is a funnel for all the important people in your life. Now take it one step further, and automate it by using an API service, like Zapier or IFTT.

Example #2: Import all the photos from all your devices at the same time, and to the same location.

Why at the same time? Because batching not only save you time, but it ensures that you don’t forget any of your devices. Now take it one step further, and automate it by auto-syncing your photos regularly using a program like Mylio, or to a cloud solution like Forever.

Example #3: Send the photos from your DSLR camera straight to your computer or cloud solution using a wireless SD card.

Remember the old days when you actually had to plug your SD card into your computer? Sure, that’s still a good way to do it, but why not bypass that step entirely? Most Professional Organizers will tell you that the less steps it takes to complete a task, the better, so I challenge you to take it one step further. Automate it with a wireless SD card, for example Eye-fi.

These are just some of the ways you can simplify your workflow by setting up automated rules. Depending on your comfort with technology, budget, likes, and dislikes, you have to find the right solutions for you, but don’t be afraid to think outside of the box. Automation is my best friend, and it can be yours too.

A native of Ystad, Sweden, Caroline Guntur now resides just outside of Chicago, IL, where she runs The Swedish Organizer, LLC, a company that provides customized family history solutions to clients around the world. As a Certified Photo Organizer, Personal Historian, and Professional Genealogist, she enjoys helping others preserve and protect their memories. Caroline runs the blog OrganizingPhotos.net, a site that discusses best practices in organizing, digitizing, and preserving family history, as well as SearchingScandinavia.com, a site dedicated to helping Scandinavian-Americans connect with their heritage. She is a member of APPO, NAPO, APH, APG, and NGS.