How to Minimize and Enjoy Memory and Photo Storage

In our new age of taking tons of photos, memorabilia and photo storage can be a problem.

I’ve been documenting the process of cleaning out my storage room, in preparation for yet another Army move. In the process, I am finding a LOT of photos and memorabilia.

Sometimes the memorabilia can be the hardest piece of the storage puzzle to find a good place for. Plus, there’s always the dilemma of what to keep and what not to keep. Aye yie yie, right?

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What good does it do anyone to save all that sweet memory stuff in a way that isn’t accessible for enjoying?

You almost never go digging around boxes in your storage room.

Sooooooo, last week I took a break from cleaning out storage to manage the memory boxes. There were three memory boxes in storage room number one:

-Box 1: This box had a tape recorder, t-shirt from Alan’s high school football team, and VHS tapes.

These are the hardest of all the boxes. I should really chunk the tape recorder, but I can’t bring myself to do it. Why???? I kept one t-shirt and some Iraq souvenirs that aren’t display-worthy in the box. I already have several Iraq souvenirs on display in my living room.

The VHS tapes have a very clear solution I recently learned about:

Have you heard about Legacy Boxes? This place, and others like them, will convert VHS tapes to digital files for you to save. It’s not cheap, but I do think it’s worth it, so this is my new plan for the VHS tapes, and we have quite a few. After all, we grew up in the 80s and 90s. (They also do VHS-C tapes, casette tapes, and film reels.)

Getting rid of tapes no one can use anyway frees up so much space.

-Box 2: photos, certificates, art work, programs, etc.

First, I take all the photographs and put them in regular photo albums. (I ordered the photo albums here and here.) Make sure to get some that fit any size photos, not just 4×6 ones.

Then I take the cards, programs, art works, etc, and place those in a scrapbook.

Important note about scrapbooks:

The 90’s are over. You don’t have to make it a beautiful masterpiece full of stickers. A plain scrapbook filled with your memories is good enough. If you’re anything like me, feeling like you have to make a precious memory style scrapbook is just going to keep you from getting it done.

Tons of copies of extra photos: You can send these to family, or make a small file or box of just these.

Moving photos and memorabilia from boxes to albums still takes up about the same amount of space. I will admit that. However, now all of this stuff is more accessible. I can turn the pages and enjoy these things and share them with my children, you know, when I can convince them to sit down and look at them with me.

-Box 3: Letters written to Alan when he was in Iraq or Afghanistan

This may be a unique one to military families, but we have a ton of old letters. These aren’t emails even. They are real snail mail letters to and from deployments to war. When all boxed up, these can take up a surprising amount of space and Rubbermaid bins. It has taken me years to get them all transferred into three ring binders, but I like them so much better this way.

Letters in binders are more accessible, and they can be stored in a shelf in any room. You can even take cute cards and a few of the envelopes and save them in sheet protectors in the binder.

For this, you do need a good three-hole-puncher. Many letters were written on stationary not meant for binders.

Anything I can do to transfer storage OUT of boxes feels like a huge win!

My goal is to be down to only one box when I’m done.

If you want to follow along with more storage clean out and prepping for selling a house and moving, follow my YouTube channel here. You can also find more storage room tips here.