Welcome to the final (at least for now!) installment of my photo organizing process with a look at where my photos are now. Just another reminder of where I began...
And where I ended up... (If you want to go back and read, you can find Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3 at the links.)
Almost all the photos that aren't already in a scrapbook are in these 4 file drawers. I brought the drawers from my office, where they were kept under a counter and not easily accessible, to a shelf in my class kit room, where I plan to keep it. I plan to put labels in the holders on the front. (Beside it are the photos in boxes I'll describe below. They'll be gone this spring when I see people that I'm sharing them with.)
I used these two 2 drawer steel file drawers to store the photos by categories. These are the drawers if you are interested: Steel 4x6" file drawers. There are no more photo albums with photos in them except this one on the top with before and after home remodeling photos in it, which are staying in there for now. Beside that are a few 5x7" photos that don't fit in the drawers.
A look in each drawer shows how I ended up organizing the photos. I made the dividers by cutting white cardstock to 6" x 4 3/4" and used a tab from another divider to trace the tab to cut out with scissors. I cut several at a time, so it wasn't too difficult to do.
In this first drawer you can see how I've grouped family photos... Because so many photos are already scrapbooked by events through the years, I thought that grouping by people would be a good way to separate them and make it easier to find a photo that someone might be looking for.
This drawer has photos from various vacations...
More divisions here...
And more vacations here... (Many of these already have scrapbooks, too. The sections with more photos haven't been scrapbooked yet.)
Here are a few other places where I have some photos... in this wooden box I keep the 3x3" photos that I've had printed over the years by Foxprints - mostly from Instagram posts. They have been divided like this since I've had them printed so I didn't do anything with these. I keep this little box on my desk.
The next two boxes are one for Brandon (on the left) and one for Jeremy (on the right.) I made more dividers for these photos and arranged them by years. I'll have them go through the boxes and decide what they want to keep and then I'll keep what I want. (Many of these are doubles of what are already in scrapbooks.) I never did baby or toddler scrapbooks for either boy, so there are lots of those photos that are very special to me.
Next, in the box on the left are Christmas photos divided by year going back to when I was a little girl. I have a Christmas scrapbook that starts in about 1982, but these are some from before that and after about 2004. I'll keep those separate until I do something with them. The box on the right holds photos that I have to give to family members to go through.
One little drawer holds the old photos of me when I was little and are divided by year in baggies. I still need to go through and reorganize these, and I'd love to put them in an album of some kind. It's manageable though in this little drawer.
I put all the portrait photos in an envelope and still need to go through those because there are too many copies of some of them.
I've thrown away tons of photos (and even a couple scrapbooks of things that I didn't need to keep anymore) - photos that were blurry, lots of doubles of photos (I used to always get doubles when my photos were printed), and photos of things and places that no one cares about anymore.
I've come a long way from this... no more drawers filled with photos totally unorganized, no more photo albums with photos all mixed together, no more photo storage boxes crammed full of photos... now if I want to find a specific photo, I can easily do it. I'll live with this system for now and see how it works. It's been really fun to look back at our life and see all the good times with our little family and with extended family.
I've loved hearing from all who have been inspired to tackle your own photos by my process. It was a big, hard job, but it feels so good to have it done! Let me know if you have any questions!
Very impressive! This was one of my goals during the pandemic but I did not make a lot of progress! I will have to keep tackling it no matter how long it takes! What a good feeling of accomplishment you must have!,
I have a number of unfinished scrapbooks that I’d also like to complete!
Posted by: Estelle | March 23, 2021 at 02:23 PM
I think this all ended up in such a good way. Seeing the majority of it sorted, labeled and stored in an organized manner must make you feel so good. You’ve done such a wonderful job. It is impressive.
Posted by: Deb Jones | March 23, 2021 at 09:57 PM