A Time of Change

At the beginning of each year, I am amazed at how quickly the previous year has passed away. I reflect on my family and am amazed at each of their accomplishments over the previous year and it helps me to look at what I've been able to do myself.  My business is growing and I have learned so much and I've met and talked to some amazing people. I love being able to share families enjoying each others company as we capture their family portraits. I have learned so much and know this year will provide many opportunities to continue to learn and grow. It's so easy to become stagnant if we aren't growing and stretching ourselves in whatever venture or goal we decide to pursue.

I've also been able to restore pictures for people and bring their treasured memories back for them. We all have a heritage and being able to preserve that heritage will help us know who we really are. I've been searching some of my own family history stories in search of specific stories to share with my daughter to help her learn about some of her pioneer heritage. It never ceases to amaze me at the strength these people had when they were willing to give up all that they had in search for a better life. Going into unknown areas, not sure what to expect, and arriving and having to build their life from scratch. They worked hard and committed to doing what they needed to so they could live their dreams. Some really struggled and didn't have much as far as worldly possessions, but through their stories, I can read about the love they had for their family. I know of oral stories being told about family members living in rough situations but cherish those times because they were able to laugh together as a family. Treasure the times you have together and write down your memories.

A very dear friend of mine lost her mother this past year and all she wanted of her belongings were her pictures. She wants to preserve and save her family history. She has taken on the task of going through and identifying pictures and reaching out to other family members to help her. I've been asked to help her digitize her collection. It is going to be a big project cataloging her mother's life, but what a precious gift she will leave her posterity. No task is ever too big, you just have to do it one step at a time.

So where do you start? Start keeping a journal, record memories of growing up, talk to any extended family still living and record their stories. Take pictures and record who is in the pictures. One of the biggest family tragedies is having family pictures and not being able to identify who is in the picture. You will want to store your history in a safe place. A free site is familysearch.org and you can upload pictures, documents, audio files and stories.

Now is a good time to update your family pictures. Contact me at cheri@cherisphotos.com and we can schedule your family session or I can answer questions about getting started with your family history.

Only picture...

I had the privilege of meeting a woman who has faced many challenges in her life. She realizes she is a stronger person because of the trials in her life and she is doing her best to make lemonade out of lemons. She doesn't have many mementos of her growing up years, in fact, she only has 1 picture of when she was a child. Here's the original, it was scratched, faded, stained and she didn't remember who the other child in the picture was and so she wanted her removed.

Being able to help people preserve their history is what it's all about. I love helping them save their photos.

4 generations

We all want to save those special memories we have so we can remember the experience in our lives. As we grow older, we experience more and things that we said we would never forget are moved to the back of our brain and it becomes harder to recall them. Capturing memories through pictures helps us to relieve those moments, and also bring back the emotions of the moment. We live in a society now where everything is recorded, selfies have become the norm. But in the film era, pictures were taken more sparingly and printed to hang on walls or to keep in albums that we looked at as often as possible. Family stories were shared with younger children as grandparents explained the pictures and children learned about their own histories. Not every family has the opportunity to have multiple generations pictures, but those that do cherish the pictures.  The picture was taken in 1963 and included great-grandma, grandma, mom and daughter as a means of including a visit of extended family.

While in pretty good shape, they wanted to be able to make a larger print. So I cleaned it up and was able to make prints in 8x10s. There is one other 4 generation picture that was taken a few years later and it was the last one because the great-grandma passed away in 1972.

The grandma passed away in 1989 and  the mom is now the grandma and the baby is now mom to 4 amazing children. The best the family can do is 3 generation pictures but those pictures are cherished as much as these 4 generation pictures. I love hearing the stories behind the pictures and hearing about families experiences, but I have to admit that I know so much about these pictures because I was the little baby in the pictures.

I'm just finishing up a project that has taken more hours than I want to count. I am helping a family digitize their family photos with some which go back to the early 1900's. Some of the family members are looking at the pictures and trying to identify and label the people. Time is of the essence because there are only 1 or 2 people surviving who might be able to identify some of the older pictures. Some pictures were labeled with names, dates and locations; but many were only labeled with the date or not labeled at all. I am hoping that we can identify the people in the pictures so we can recreate the portions of their life captured on film.

This project has made me think about my own family pictures and the importance of continuing to document my family history. Over the weekend, we celebrated our son's birthday and I made sure I got a picture of him with his grandparents. I'm trying to make sure I do that with each of the kids now because I don't know how many more opportunities I will have to take those family pictures. As I was going through old pictures with my mom, I found a couple of 4 generation pictures from when I was a child. I plan on restoring them and then printing them and hanging them in my home. What a treasure it is to be able to capture those precious memories. We need to take advantage of those chances when we can.Don't let the moments pass you by.

Restored Christmas Picture

I love Christmas, it's my favorite time of year. I love the music, the decorations, sharing Christmas goodies, and most important sharing goodwill. I love celebrating the birth of my Savior and I'm so grateful for all that He has done for me. So when I was given this Christmas picture, I knew I needed to restore it and help the family preserve their own Christmas memories. For many people, it's the time of year to do family pictures so they can be given as gifts, so here's my gift back to the family. I'm not sure what happened to this before picture, maybe it was stuck in a photo album, but it looked like there were stars all over it.

Here's the finished version. Enjoy your Christmas memories.

New adventure

In life, we never know where our journey is going to take us. If you would have asked me 20 years ago if I would ever start my own business, I would have answered no. But I've learned that hobbies can lead to other ventures. It started with learning more about my family history and seeing pictures of my ancestors.

As a kid, I wasn't interested in hearing the stories but now I regret not taking advantage of the opportunities I had to talk to my grandparents more about their lives. I would have loved to learn more of what made them tick, how they felt about the issues of the day, what was important to them. I can remember spending time with my grandmother, playing games. She taught me so much in her own quiet ways. It hasn't been until recently that I realized the true impact she had on my life. She taught me to try new things, whether it be a new recipe or a new craft, or just something I had never done before. I can remember going to craft shows with her and seeing through her eyes the potential. She was able to look at how something was made and then make it herself, but change it enough to make it her own. I can remember trying new recipes because she saw a recipe in the newspaper that she wanted to try. Green tomato cookies and mayonnaise cake are a couple that I can remember trying. I can't say that I liked them all, and I started to learn pretty quick to ask what was in something before I tried it. But she was so much wiser than I was and she knew if she told me that I wouldn't try it so she made me wait until after I tasted it to tell me what was in it.

She taught me to be competitive and a good sport. She would teach me to play a game, but then once I understood the rules, she played to win. I knew that when I did win the game that I won based on my own merit and not because she let me win. Yes, in the beginning while I was learning, she let me win. But then I was on my own. When extended family would visit, we played several different card games. She grew up on a farm and that's what they did in the evening. We got very competitive and we truly had a good time together, making memories and sharing experiences.We often laughed until we cried.

When I went to college, my grandma made sure that I knew she was behind me 100%. She may not have agreed with my choice of college, I went to BYU and I know she would have preferred me stay in state and go to the University of Washington but she still was there for me.

She taught me that I needed to try new things, to develop my talents. I am so grateful for the quiet ways she influenced me and helped me believe in myself. I hope that she would be proud of my new adventure that I've been embarking on in setting up my own photography and restoration business. Thanks Grandma for believing in me.

Print vs. Digital Files

When was the last time you backed up your pictures? Do you still have files on old floppy disks? Are you able to access those pictures? Technology has advanced and it's so easy to lose files because we can no longer access them. We bought a laptop a few months ago, and it didn't have a cd drive. How much longer will cd's still be around. Printing your pictures is a sure way to be able to view them. My dad loves to write poetry and so I asked him for his thoughts on printing pictures and this is what he came up with.

    Where Did The Typewriter Go?

From manual to electric it was great,

But could not last in this state.

Then came the Commodore 64

And added was the word processor.

From this the computer grew,

And leaving me to wish I knew.

I asked my kids to show me how,

And so I can E-mail now.

Floppy discs and CDs I don't understand

But it's okay 'cause they didn't stand.

Thumb or flash drives I can do,

But cloud storage I cannot do.

I see strange things like megabytes and more

And other things and ways for info to store.

And when things happen a phone is always there

To record for media to pick up and share.

I don't know tweet, twitter or texting,

And Skype and Facebook are vexing.

But it's easy the pictures to store,

And when deleted, it makes you sore.

So to assure they are saved and seen

They must be printed on paper clean,

And labeled with love and care,

For your posterity to hold and share.

A.A.Owens

16 October 2015