Why You Should Print Out All of Those Photos

Raise your hand if you have photos on your digital camera and smart phone that have been there for who knows how long. Why are they still sitting on your camera? You should really print them out and here's why.

Everyone fancies themselves a photographer these days because cameras are so affordable and they're everywhere. But, how often do you take all of these pictures and then let them sit on your camera or memory card?

Printing out photos and keeping them on display can remind you of all the good times. Sometimes, when you're in the middle of what you are going to refer to down the road as "the good old days", you don't realize you're living it, but photos help you remember. I like to keep photos in every room of my house. It just reminds me of a happy family and some of the best times of my life.

My mother had envelope after envelope of photos in the china closet outside the dining room in my childhood house and once or twice a year, mom would go through all of the pictures and put them in albums all nice, neat and labeled. Then they would go back in the closet, but the closet would also be nice, neat and tidy. Her claim was that photos help cut clutter, and she was right! Now that physical photo albums are sort of going by the wayside, there is a digital way to cull and store your photos. Shutterfly will take your photos and make a nice, hardcover book out of your photos. They're beautiful and make a great decoration and coffee table conversation piece.

Sometimes your recollection of details, days, and events get fuzzy over the years and it's so easy to forget things. It's not just for birthday parties, Christmas, baptisms and the like. Take pictures of every day real life. I did a project where I took a photo of myself every day starting with my 30th birthday. I took one picture of myself at roughly the same time every day and wrote down one or two sentences about what happened that day or what I was going to that day. If you want to document your child's school years and take a picture of them every day before they get on the bus, or your baby's first year of life, Project365 can help you out. That's a website that can take your yearlong photo journal and keep it online for you so you can send your family and friends the link to see.

How Do You Capture and Store Your Memories?