My parents travel to Florida to visit my great-grandmother, Margaret Elizabeth, my namesake. My mother is pregnant with me. My father sets up his camera on one side of the pool, puts the self-timer on, and rushes around to the other side to jump into the frame.
“Photographs and memories
Christmas cards you sent to me
All that I have are these
To remember you” – Jim Croce
My parents have A LOT of photos. Albums, bins, bags, envelopes – you name it, they’ve got photos in it. This past year, I decided to digitize them all so my parents, brother, sister, and I could all enjoy them. I started by just taking a couple of albums at a time from their house and scanning every photo. Once I graduated from albums, I started on bags. I am still not done yet, but I’ve probably scanned about 4000 photos.
The more photos I scanned, the more excited and passionate about the project I got. I talked about it with people, a lot. I surprised family and friends with random photos of themselves from the 70s and 80s. People began reaching out to me about scanning their photos and about designing albums for them. And thus, a new Margaret Belanger Photography service was born! Now, in addition to helping you create photographic family histories, I can help you preserve the pieces you already have. Digitizing your print photos not only backs them up, but it allows you to share them easily with family and friends. Then you can make a decision about what to do with all your physical prints – albums take up A LOT of space. A lot of you probably *want* to scan your photos but it seems like too big of a project. Do you walk by those disorganized bins and albums and scowl at them? I want to help you. Let me take this off your plate. If you’re interested in learning more, reach out to me via my contact page, or email me directly at hello@margaretbelanger.com. I am so excited to be your family archivist!
Here are a few more of my scanned family photos:
After my grandmother passed away, my aunt and I scanned all of her photos. She had six children and 19 grandchildren, so scanning the photos and sharing them with everyone was a wonderful way to make sure everyone had access to them. If we hadn’t done that, I would never have a copy of this photo of her and my grandfather.
My grandparents sit outside with five of their 6 children piled around them. My dad is the youngest, sitting on my grandfather’s lap.
On my parents’ wedding day, they posed with all of their nieces and nephews on my mom’s side. Fifteen dressed-up children stand between them, most of them miraculously looking at the camera.
My parents’ honeymoon took them on a road trip of the Northeast and into Canada.
“Kodachrome
They give us those nice bright colors
They give us the greens of summers
Makes you think all the world’s a sunny day, oh yeah
I got a Nikon camera
I love to take a photograph
So mama, don’t take my Kodachrome away” – Paul Simon
