Reaching A Decision

I may have posted these pictures before, but you need to see them again, because they are a part of my decision making process.

Maybe it is the color, cut, and paste thing in me that is a left over from years teaching in an elementary school. Kids always liked art. I'm thinking the kid in me likes it as well.

Daughter I-Needa got me headed to organizing my photos and putting them into photo safe albums a few years ago. She became a Creative Memories Consultant. Her own full time duties as a teacher left her with very little free time, so she decided that she would have to give up her ideas of being a consultant.

She did manage to steer her mother (Me) on the path of organizing and preserving those precious picture treasurers. My treasurers were thrown into a drawer without as much as a date on them. Pitiful, really. Worse than pitiful. They were too valuable to throw away, but how do you really enjoy something that is tossed into a drawer. Once in awhile I'd dig the drawer out, put it on the floor, and sit there sifting through the pictures thinking that I really should organize them.

One day I decided that enough was enough. I pulled the drawer out and began putting pictures into piles according to topic. I separated I-Needa's pictures from Right Back's pictures. Then I needed to sort those two piles into ages from youngest to oldest. I managed to do that and put them into an album. Of course, I managed to write some cute things under the pictures and turn it into a lovely story of each of the kids as they grew into adults.

Since retiring from teaching, I've managed to go on three lovely trips, and each time I've put the pictures into a Creative Memories album and journaled so that I'd be able to relive and enjoy those trips for years to come.

The top picture is the table in my dining room when friend Mary wanted me to help her put together an album of her mother's 90th birthday party. This was her first album, and she was certain she just couldn't do it. I invited her over with the promise of helping her. I assisted a little at first, but she soon caught on and found her own style. She went after it and completed the album herself. She had a wonderful time.

Mary gave the album to her mother and found it hard to even express how much it meant to her mother.

This next picture is one of my friend P.R. when she came to make an album of her dad.
She brought a TON of pictures and just headed for my living room floor to start putting things into piles. She stayed three days and finished the album. We also found some time to play and look around town at the quaint shops.

Actually, P.R. is coming to my house again soon as has found additional pictures to add to her album. She is coming here as it is a good excuse to visit and just have a spot to work. Perhaps I should have looked at the photos I took the last time she was here. Perhaps I should call her and tell her that I'm busy. Just kidding, P.R.!

I've talked to many people who are in the same place I was before I decided to do something about saving all those photos so they could be enjoyed and passed on. They all say the same thing: 'I really need to do something about that!'

So.... where do you suppose I'm going with all this? I've been seriously thinking about becoming a consultant. It is something I never thought I'd do, but here I am almost ready to do it. My whole house could look like it does in the photos above. Lovely, really.