The KEY to staying organized and being able to find things, is to create a "home" for every single thing that you own. If something doesn't have a home, it just gets moved around over and over and can become lost.
Your children's yearly pictures are treasures that you never want to loose! You can also easily forget what picture, belongs to what school year if you don't have these treasures organized. You may think you'll remember but... you won't.
One way to keep track of these precious pictures is to buy a portfolio book as soon as your child is in preschool and just add to this book each year. You of course want to label each picture with the school year. You could even add the year and the name of their teacher. This is Steven, one of my 5 babies. He is actually 23 now and he created this website for me! I love him. :)
These Portfolio books I have, actually hold 48 views and you'll only need 14 for school pictures. You can fill the rest of the pages with their sport pictures or whatever else you choose. Think about what you want to put in it. Make sure it is a set of pictures that has a particular meaning.
I LOVE the Itoya Profolio books. They have a little sleeve where you can add information that wraps around the binding/spine of the book. It displays beautifully.
I think having each child's full name and birthdate is important to have on things like this for historical purposes. I plan on my grandchildren passing these books down to their children. It's cool when you think about it.
I made sure to always order a 5x7 picture of each of my children during their picture day but Itoya Art Profolio's come in many sizes. Choose what size you want and make sure to order the same size picture each year. You could also use a 8 1/2 x11 size to store awards and certificates for you or your children. I just love to have consistency with whatever I'm doing, that way I am able to have that clean and organized look . BUT there are many things out there. Choose what you are going to use and just be consistent. (If you click on the picture or highlighted words, it will take you to Amazon if you would like to buy one to try it out!)
So often we have big plans for things we want to do. You many think you want to do something more involved than this. Maybe you would rather make a scrapbook page each year or to make a digital picture book of your child's entire year. Thats great, but if its not happening choose to keep things simple. This is simple. I like simple.
Happy Organizing!
P.S. I know you're all dying to see what Steven looks like now!
Here he is! Yep. He's still adorable. This is him with my beautiful and sweet daughter-in-law Madie. My family makes me happy.
The End.