What are you saving?

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piper Posted: 03-09-2012 10:27 AM

For my kids I have been saving all of their 1st cards - first birthday, first easter, first this and that

I have been saving artwork like crazy -

Since my oldest is only 3.5 that is pretty much all I have artwork and cards so far

anyway.... my mom was painting her bedroom and found all of our old stuff in the back of her closet - art work, report cards, letters to her, my girl scout membership card,  birthday cards, etc and gave me a huge bag of stuff - I went thru it and laughed and smiled and then I threw it all away..... I mean, why do I care about my 3rd grade report card?????

Which leads to me think what should I realistically be saving for my kids - I have learned to throw away a ton of artwork from my DS - I mean he does several a day!  But cards??  Should I just throw them away now? Why save them??  Will my DS really give a crap that I saved them?  LOL

Obviously I will save "some" things - like his first letter he made "D" for daddy  or the first picture he drew of me =)   But other than that I am thinking I need to pair down and maybe set aside 1 rubbermaid container per kid that will be used for the next 18 years.... and when its full, its full....

what are your thoughts?  What do you save?

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gemzies49 replied on 03-09-2012 10:58 AM

You got me thinking!  DS is only 2 1/2, so far I've saved his first fingerpainting!  I also have a baby book for each kiddo to record milestones and put important pictures in.  I'm keeping their going home outfits, their first pair of shoes, one important baby blanket for each of them, their baptism outfit...

DH got one of those flip camcorders for his birthday, so I've been trying to make a recording of each kid to remember smiles, conversations with DS, etc.  I think that those little 30 sec - 1 min. clips of their childhood will be great memories when they are older.

My mom didn't save anything really, a few things here and there.  DH's mom on the other hand, saved EVERYTHING.  There are boxes upon boxes upon boxes of things in her attic.  She saved ALL of DH's matchbox cars (we're talking hundreds of them, not just his favorites) and I swear she has every piece of schoolwork he ever produced.  It's ridiculous and I am dreading the day that she tries to pawn it all off on us...

I'm really curious what other people are saving!

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ngm replied on 03-09-2012 3:02 PM

I'm not much of a saver.  I have a baby book, and some of her first birthday stuff, hair from her first haircut and that's about it.  I'll save some letters to Santa when she starts writing them herself, and probably her report cards, but I don't really save cards (I mean they usually just say "Happy birthday, love . xxx".  I don't save artwork as, yeah, she does loads of it.  I let DD put it up on the wall in the basement/playroom, but I won't be saving it forever.

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jbizzy replied on 03-09-2012 9:28 PM

For dd's shower I had guests draw/paint on onsies for her.  I've saved all of them (with the exception of a couple that fell victim to blow outs). 

My mom and aunt have also knitted her beautiful things, saving those.  And saved her 1st Christmas outfit. 

Saved the wrist/foot band and memorable from her birth (footprints), but added those to a scrapbook album.

Did not save any birthday cards.  I use some in scrap books though. 

And as I have a side buisiness as a photographer, I have about 1000 photos of her! lol... those are all on a disc/discs though.  Eventually I will do *something* with them I'm sure.

I will definately save any kind of holiday item she makes.  Haven't gotten to the art work and school work stuff though yet, so not quite sure!  But being that DH and I are both artists, I can't imagine I'll be tossing any artwork.  For sure I'll be saving report cards I bet.

Better buy some plastic bins in bulk I guess.

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aprilFool1208 replied on 03-10-2012 7:34 AM

I have a pretty big scrapbook for DS's first year and in the back I kept some of his best art from daycare.  I don't keep cards, though.  I plan to just play it by ear, but will start bins for the kids soon. One thing I def want to save is their favorite stuffed animal(s). I have mine from my childhood, and now DS plays with it.

My mom saved a LOT from my childhood - piano recital programs, report cards, certificates, awards, etc.  It's nice to have it, but I haven't gone through all of it (it's in a portable, plastic filing cabinet type thing, which is nice).  My FAVORITE thing about the report cards she saved, is that she only saved the ones that had something funny on it from the teacher -- say, how I got all "+"s on every category except that I talk too much.  She also saved some letters that my grandmother had written me herself - she's Japanese and doesn't write in English often, so I have two letters that she hand-wrote that are absolutely beyond special.  My mom gave us all a 50-gallon (BIG!) tupperware bin when we were in high school to pack full of whatever we wanted to save.  I go through mine whenever we move and decide what I still want to take or if I want to pack in some new stuff that doesn't need to be out on display anymore.

The bin is a good idea -- DH's family is made up of a lot of pack-rats ;)  They save almost everything.  And when DH and I got married, we had to go through all of DH's stuff that was at his mom's every time we went to visit.  Sigh.  Don't save everything ;)  My DH is pretty sentimental, though, and has a hard time throwing much out :)

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tortuga replied on 03-13-2012 5:44 PM

I was a pretty bad pack rat when it came to sentimental things.  I used to have such a terrible time tossing anything my kids made.  But then I started to realize that I would eventually die in an avalanche of arts and crafts if I didn't start tossing things. 

First step was set aside a box for that kind of thing.  The first year I did it, I saved *everything* in that box.  Then at the end of the year, I went through the box and decided what to keep and what to toss.   It was much easier to toss my DDs attempts at writing the letter A when I had about 100 pieces of paper in front of me of her letter practice.  Then in following years, my second DD started contributing her own stuff and I really started to realize how bad it could get with the accumulation.  The last annual clean out took me FOUR HOURS and I was determined to never do that again.   So now I realize in advance what kind of stuff I will want to keep and what I will eventually toss and just cut to the chase and toss it immediately.   My box is getting a lot less stuff in it.  Here are some of the rules;

1.  Anything without a name on it gets tossed.  What's the point if I don't know who made it?

2.  Any schoolwork that is not more than 75% my kid doing creative stuff gets tossed.  No tests, no homework, except for free writing assignments and artwork.  There is mercifully more stuff to toss and less to keep as they progress in school.  The only problem with this is jumping the gun.  I literally open my daughter's take home folder, look at the contents for a second on their way to the recycling.  But once I accidentally recycled a test I was supposed to sign and return -- whoops!

3.  Anything 3-dimensional has to be completely amazing and unique to stick around.  I just don't have the space for that. 

4.  Anything that documents my kids size at the time (e.g. things with hand or fingerprints) stays, so long as it has a name on it.

I can't think of any more off the top of my head, but you get the idea.  I wish I could be one of those moms who take a picture and tosses the artwork too, but for me, part of the magic of it is knowing that my little DCs hands made that however long ago.

Finally, I have started encouraging my 4 and 6-year old to do their own tossing.  I am sometimes surprised at the things they consider disposable, but if they don't think it is all that, then it goes (unless it violates rule #4). 

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zwizh413 replied on 03-16-2012 9:59 PM

One thing you could do is either scan or take pictures of any paper items you want to "keep" like report cards, art work, letters, etc. Then, save them in a folder on your computer. That way, you still have the memories without having to actually keep the items.

DH's mom was another crazy saver, and she just recently gave us all the stuff from his childhood. Every report card, every mention of him in the local newspaper (they lived in a tiny town), every program from every play he was ever in, every copy of every school picture from preschool through high school. And that's just the normal stuff! I opened up one little box and found EVERY baby tooth he'd ever lost, as well as the wisdom teeth he had removed when he was 18. Disgusting! She also kept his bandages from when he broke his jaw, and a cast from when his twin brother broke his arm. So nasty. We definitely will not be keeping stuff like that!

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bec11942 replied on 03-23-2012 6:07 PM

lol....this made me laugh.  my mom saved one rubbermaid box for me and one for my sister.  it had the usual crap in it...report cards etc...one thing she saved was my smurf collection and my charm necklaces (teehee anyone remember those from the 80's?)  that was pretty cool.  most of it was junk.

now my husband ::::sigh::: ok in my MIL's defense my husband used to be a pitcher for the toronto blue jays.  however there are boxes and boxes of his baseball cards....cutouts from the paper.  growing up on staten island he was in the local paper all the time.  although one of my favorites is his little league pics and there's on of him and carmine from CSI NY...lol.

last year my hubby too got the flip for me so i try to catch little 30 second clips of him doing funny stuff.  and i always have a camera in hand.  all those silly faces and looks of glee i want to catch.  i know when he's a moody teenager i'll be looking back at those!

as for the cards....you could save them for now and when your kiddos learn to cut with scissors and make crafts you can recycle them.  my mom did that.  we were always cutting up old christmas cards and holiday cards and glueing them to paper.