Friday, July 31, 2009

Family History--Preserving My Personal Legacy

This has become a bit of a series on Preserving a Legacy. I hadn't really planned to approach it that way, but I will go with it. Thank you for all of your sweet comments on my writing, it means the world to me!

After looking back at all of the beautiful memorabilia from grandma's house I decided to sort through a couple of tote-fulls of my own personal history. I realized that I am hanging on to a lot of old stuff and some of it isn't very well protected. I spent a few hours sorting through pictures and categorizing them: 'Little Nellie' 'High School' 'College' 'Family' 'Now'. I have a long way to go to get everything where I want it. I can see why moms are so overwhelmed with the 'I'm SOOO behind' attitude. I guess I should start at the beginning.

My first project is my baby book.



This book-in-a-box was stored in our smoke-friendly home where it got yellowed in the cabinet above the refrigerator.





Ugh. I have some work to do.

I need to preserve this stuff. My mother's handwriting about being a new mom is so priceless to me:






Some of the pages have become damaged:



I have a green 3-ring album that will work for now. I would like to shop around for a pink one. My goal is to remove the sweet pages of the book and put them in document sleeves for safe-keeping.


I also want to preserve the other ephemera, cards and letters in my baby book in this 3-ring album. Some of the things I saved from grandma's house will definitely go in here.


Un-sewn patches from Brownies fit perfectly in a trading card sleeve.


I won't be doing a scrapbook with all the patterned papers and stickers and stamps. I want to keep this very simple.


I also want to make it easy on my loved ones who might have to sort through this stuff one day for me. Like my grandma, I can't bear to throw anything away...but hopefully I can be a little more organized!

3 comments:

Leslie said...

What an undertaking you have set for yourself. Love the baby book, my 24 year old has the same one, only from a smoke free environment as I lost both parents to lung cancer so NO ONE in my home smokes or should I say smokes in my home. Looks like you have a good beginning.

Kelley Eubanks said...

This is great! I don't think I had a baby book. My mother wasn't and still isn't the sentimental type. I don't know where I got it from. I hope one day my son... or his wife.. will appreciate all of the work that goes into it and be so glad to have the things I have kept. They will need a whole room dedicated just to it but maybe I can eliminate some stuff as the years go by! I am going to need another house just for my pictures, etc... if I don't do something soon! :)

Sarah said...

This is just such a wonderful project and I wish I had some of this stuff from my childhood! Those Brownie patches sooo cool! Keep at it Nellie..it is great.