Papers And Pictures

Papers and pictures need special care and once lost, are difficult if not impossible to replace. For this reason, I feel compelled to devote an entire post to cover this subject. 

I have lost many important papers over my lifetime due to not being organized. Many of these documents could be replaced, such as birth certificates, social security cards and marriage certificates. However, this caused me a great deal of stress and I had to pay for them to be replaced. Some papers are lost for good because they were not recorded instruments and merely letters of agreement. Some things I wanted to keep and are gone because I errantly threw them away or lost them somehow. I can give you a list of the many papers that I lost due to disorganization, but I think you get the idea. 

Pictures are usually irreplaceable. At least the older ones anyway. You know, those, which were not downloaded to a computer and are not on some flash drive somewhere. Pictures are often all we have of a memory, except what is in our minds. Who doesn’t like looking through old photographs and reminiscing? 

The secret to making sure that you do not lose pictures and papers is to keep them in a place where you know where they are and, if possible in the case of pictures, in some sort of album. If you have always wanted to make a scrapbook and have a bunch of loose pictures laying around all over the place, gather them up and put them in boxes that are labeled and store them for future use. You can purchase boxes that are made for this purpose or just use some re-purposed shoeboxes. Make sure that the boxes are clearly labeled and that the pictures are all stored in a dry, dark place. 

One item that may help you organize both pictures and papers is a portable filing cabinet. You can purchase these at any office supply store and get folders as well as file separators to help you organize everything. This way, at least you know where everything is and you can get to it when you need it. 

Many of my pictures are in photo albums, but I still have many loose pictures that I mean to put in photo albums. But although I keep putting this project off, I still have the photos organized by the approximate years, vacation settings or holiday settings in a file box. I have another file box for pictures that were handed down to me from others. They are easy to get to because they are all stored in one place and organized. 

If you have a digital camera and take pictures to download to your computer, it is a good idea to get a flash drive that you can label for the pictures. You can also have these printed at your local do it yourself print facility. Walmart, Staples, Kinkos, the list is huge of how many places you can go to have this done. You should organize your pictures so that you have them as a keepsake of a moment in time that you cannot recreate. 

If you take videos of your children or family, you also want to make sure that they are clearly labeled so that they are not accidentally tossed out. 

A note to those who may not know; VHS, undeveloped film and audio tapes, even if properly stored and not bothered will still degrade over time, so print the camera film and copy everything to digital media formats.

Be sure to properly care for and store photos, videos and important papers in a safe place where you can have easy access to them and be able to retrieve them when you want them. At the time you get back a bunch of pictures, you will most likely look at them and put them on a counter where they will eventually move to a drawer and then possibly lost. You may not think of them at the time, but someday, you will want to see those photos to remember that event. 

There are numerous ways to get organized when it comes to documents and photos. The best way is to use a waterproof file case where you can have everything at your fingertips whenever you need it. It can take you a while to sort through your papers and pictures to organize them, but it will be time well spent.

If you would like further help with getting organized, check out this:
Organization: The Top 100 Best Ways To Organize Your Life

Power Question:

Is now the right time for you to make a commitment to achieve the goals that you want to achieve?