What to do with all those school papers

My daughter always brought home "what seemed like tons" of school papers and artwork. I would always think, "Wow, this is really good - I have to keep this one." In just a couple of months after the start of just one school year, there would be a large pile of school work. The neat, orderly piles quickly spread into a big irritating mess that I would shove into drawers, boxes and closets. As the first few years flew by, it was evident that I could not keep all of her work.

So what do I do with all these papers? Do I keep them? Do I throw them out? How do I narrow down which ones to keep and which ones to toss? Am I a bad parent if I get rid of them? Oh - what should I do? I'd struggled with these questions, and I know you probably have too

First, let me remind you that you can not keep it all. Secondly, let me tell you that you should not feel guilty putting most of it into the recycle bin. Thirdly, you can keep the memories without actually keeping the papers.

"How?", you may ask. All you need is a camera and a photo album, scrapbook or a writable CD.

Photos Keep Memories Real

Dig out all of those A+ papers, masterpiece works of art, shoebox dioramas, name tags, report cards, and hard-earned awards etc. Then start photographing!

How large you make the photos and how you arrange them are up to you.

1 - If you are crafty and enjoy scrapbooking, this is a fun and attractive way to compile all of that great work. The photo in the introduction is the cover of one of the scrapbooks that I made to remember my daughter's school years. I scattered photos of her work throughout the book, along with photos of her and her friends, and school activities. See photos of my scrapbook pages later in this lens.

You don't necessarily have to limit yourself to using photos of the school work. You can incorporate the actual piece of work into your scrapbook pages.

2 - If you are not into scrapbooking, you can easily take the photos and put them right into a photo album. It's that easy. No cutting, measuring, gluing, writing or trying to think of new and creative ideas for the next page.

3 - If you are not into scrapbooks or photo albums, you can place all of the photos onto a CD. By doing this you can take photos of everything and have them on file in your computer.

Saving Memories

There are so many ways you can arrange photos of your child's schoolwork and artwork.

The photo above shows a sample page from my scrapbook where I just placed photos of my daughter's work side by side. If you prefer, you can even keep the original piece of work and put them into the scrapbook.

The photo to the right shows school work and awards put into the scrapbook.

As I mentioned earlier, you can make the photos as large or as small as you would like. Since I wanted to keep a lot of my daughter's work, I often made the photos smaller (but large enough to read) and scattered them throughout the pages of the scrapbook. If you are planning on doing a scrapbook for each year, you may choose to use larger photos or even use the original paperwork.

I loved making my daughter's scrapbook because I could be as creative as my imagination would allow me to be.

The photo above is just a section on a page of the scrapbook that I made for my daughter (Sarah). For this photo, I actually scattered and arranged some of her artwork, her preschool diploma, and other papers on the floor and snapped away. I loved this look.

You can also take individual pictures of different items and cut them out / trim them. Then arrange them and overlap them directly onto the scrapbook page. You can be a little more creative that way, if you don't mind the extra work.

For many of the photos, I even typed up a little explanation of the significance of the work and pasted it to the photo. Of course, you can also do this for a simple photo album.

TRUST ME - It is OK to put all of the originals in the recycle bin, because now you have the photos to remind you of your little one's school years. It is all too much to keep. Let's face it - years from now, are you really going to sit and manually go through 12 years worth of faded, discolored and wrinkled papers? OK - you might, but there will be an awful lot to go through, and most of it won't hold up too well in a hot/cold attic or basement.

Which would you prefer? To snuggle into a comfy chair with a nice cup of hot chocolate while you flip through the pages of a wonderful book in which you travel down memory lane and enjoy photos of all aspects of your child's life - or to sit on a cold and uncomfortable floor surrounded by boxes and unorganized messes of papers to sort through?

If you need some ideas, take a browse through a few sample pages and sections of pages from Sarah's scrapbook.

Take your choice of how you want to capture those precious moments of your child's growing years. There are so many different choices, ranging from blank scrapbooks in which you can create whatever you want - to scrapbooks which have basic layouts and even provide your embellishments.

And there is also the choice of using a standard photo album, a memory stick, or computerized scrapbooks.

It is all up to you - let your creativity flow.

There are so many different background papers to choose from. I love using the specialty papers, because I can always find ones that fit great with my theme. It adds character to your pages.

And don't forget your embellishments. These little decorative stickers, etc, add to your creativity and really dress up your pages. There are so many different themes to choose from. The possibilities are endless.

And don't forget tape and glue to keep your photos in place.

So, you want to go the scrapbook route. These links focus on scrapbooking. They give you ideas for page layouts and themes for your memory book.

Remember, you can always incorporate photos of your child's school work.

Downloads and programs to assist you with digital scrapbooking. I haven't tried any of these, but they look promising. My Norton Security has scanned them to be safe sites.

I would love to know what you do with all of your child's school work. Do you keep it or toss it. Do you scrapbook?