Home : Family : Children : Remembering, Memories, and Children

Remembering, Memories, and Children

Do you often feel that your children are growing up too fast? Maybe you don’t realize how fast your children are growing up, and that in no time at all you are going to have a teenager who doesn’t want to cuddle any more, and who doesn’t want your opinion any longer.

What you need to do is preserve life now, preserve your child’s memories of their happy family life so that even as they grow older they can look back, remember and laugh!  We are going to discuss a bit about how to make memories, happy lives, and how to capture it all so both you and your children can look back and think about when they were a child!

No matter if your child is six-month-old, six years old or nearing twelve years old, they still need your love, support and continued guidance.  Photographing some nice still pictures so you have a picture that represents what your child looked like at this age is always appropriate, but what you are going to love even more, is photographs and videos of the everyday life – the life that you experience everyday is what will be remembered forever.

Tip One:
Be sneaky!  Before you go in to wake up your children for the day – take their picture while they are snoozing in bed.  This is one natural photo that you as a parent are going to remember the most.  The ‘angel’ look when they are sleeping is one time that you don’t often think twice about until it is too late and your child is too old.

Tip Two:
Make it a point to take a photo, without being stiff about it, at Xmas, Easter, or some other special holiday during the year.  It could be a photo of someone eating breakfast every Easter morning or someone cleaning up after dinner on Thanksgiving every year – but you are making it a tradition to get a photo of a memory, not a posed figure. The theme here is to make sure you are getting some type of fun memory, a tradition, that when your child looks back on, they can say, ‘Oh Yeah!’ and pass that tradition on to their own families some day.

Tip Three:
Focus on individuals and then on the group. For example, you have three children, take individual shots at holidays or gatherings – even vacations, and then get the three children together for a shot. As you get older, as your children get older, you are going to want to share all of your memories and your photos/ videos or tapes with them and doing this is going to allow you more freedom in sharing with each child.

How are you going to prepare all of these goodies for the future?
If you are using photos, make sure you get enough copies now so you don’t have to later for all the children that you are creating special memories, memory books or boxes for.  When my mother decided she wanted to share her childhood memories and her photos of the family with all of use children, she had to have remakes, and some she had to chose who was getting which photos which can be difficult.

Why making memories now is important!
While your children are young, you feel as if life is rushing by and then one day you look at your children and wish that they were small again.  You can’t turn back time and make your child ‘innocent’ or ‘protect’ them any longer but you can look back and cherish the memories and the time that you had together because you took the time to take the photographs or videos when you had the chance.

Pictures that are taken of the children with you are going to be lasting memories that your children can look back on even long after you are gone or just when they need a little more strength to ‘keep going’.  Many of us look back at photos and feel better about ourselves because we all have such interesting and different backgrounds and families. Using our memories, passing memories to our children, and their passing memories to their children – this is all part of being a family and realizing a solid family foundation.

One last thing: even though I want you to make it a habit to photograph and enjoy the special times you have with your children, these photos are going to come in very handy in case your child ever was missing, lost or abducted.  Having recent photographs of the child in a natural setting is very helpful.