Memories and Keepsakes Organizing

In addition to decluttering and purging the house, I have decided that it is high time to figure out the photos and keepsakes. I have from 2003 to present to figure out. I really want to focus on this area before the end of the school year. My daughter is in senior kindergarten and,
if you have school-age children, you can appreciate the incredible amount of art and paperwork that comes home from the school – and she’s only alternate days in school! Next year she will be in grade 1 and my son will start junior kindergarten full day every day. If I don’t get control of things now and get a system in place I fear I may be lost under their artwork.

The Plan:

• So far I have organized the kids art, birthday cards, etc. by year and stored them in freezer bags in one large tote, sorted chronologically (of course!).
• Last night I purchased picture frames and am putting the family photos into frames with the plan to hang them (the where is taking some consideration). We take beautiful family photos from Wal-Mart or Sears but then what is the point if they are kept in their envelopes from the store where nobody can see them?
• I also purchased some blank art books and some nice scrapbook paper. I plan to make each child a simple keepsake book of their birthday cards, art, etc. This way they will be able to look through it whenever they want and it will be a special memory book kept in their rooms instead of a tote in the corner of the basement. It’s not going to be fancy – just a glue stick (or scrapbook stickies, haven’t decided yet). I don’t want to spend a lot of time on this. My focus is more to get it organized, in one place, and to have it be something they can “use”.
• Don’t even get me started on the digital photos to sort, organize and print. Ideally I will print them by year, in bound books so that I don’t have to worry about individual photos falling out and getting lost or misplaced. I do have that one year (2006) where I printed something like 500 photos to look at too. 

Baby steps. One step at a time. For now the focus is the framing of family photos and hanging them up as well as the keepsake books to reduce the “stuff” in the totes.

Here are a few links that have inspired me on how to keep the children’s keepsakes and how to organize their future artwork.
Delightful Order “Organizing Children’s School Papers“
Reluctant Entertainer “Kid Memory Binder“
iHeart Organizing “School Paperwork Storage“

How do you organize your family photos and your children’s keepsakes?