Trash or Treasure? How do you decide?

For some time I've been struggling with how to deal with all of the pictures, documents, letters, etc. that my mother and I have accumulated over the years. We have both downsized into apartments so space is at a premium. Trying to determine what should be scanned is an issue I've put off for a number of years, thus almost nothing has been scanned, but nothing has been tossed yet either. My mother hesitates to throw away a single picture, even the out-of-focus ones! Me, I don't have a problem with that but some of the other "not so good" pictures are more difficult to toss.

Last Sunday, I posted A Blast from the Past about the letters that my mother saved that my brothers and I wrote to her while we were in the Navy. I appreciate the comments that were posted and the fact that several people found the first two letters interesting. One of the people who left a comment was Sally Jacobs, The Practical Archivist. If you haven't visited her blog, you really should as it is loaded with great tips on storing your documents, photos, and other memorabilia.

Then yesterday, Randy Seaver posted What to Keep, What to Pitch with a link to an article by Cindy Larson in the Fort Wayne, Indiana News-Sentinel. The article "What to keep, what to throw away?" quotes Curt Witcher, director of the Allen County Public Library genealogy collection, as well as Harriet Schechter, an author, organizer and time-management expert. To give credit where credit is due, the link to the article in Randy's post came from Megan Smolenyak at Megan's Roots World. Thanks go out to both of you!

There were several links in the News-Sentinel article:

• The Frugal Life has a number of articles on Clutter and Organizing. One I especially liked was Treasured Keepsakes or Clutter? A Look at Memorabilia by Christine Sutton.


• I didn't check out much at Soulful Living, which is an "online magazine, devoted to personal and spiritual growth" but the News-Sentinel article linked to Shedding Sentimental Clutter by Harriet Schechter and it is worth reading the full article.

It's going to take some time, but this project is near the top of my list of things to do this year.