A Life Lesson

Next is a real life story, shared by a Heritage Maker. Read to the bottom for a solution.

Don't delay . . . scan those precious pictures (like this one)!

I wanted to share a story that just happened to me today. I have to share itnow while it is still fresh on my mind. I got a scanner yesterday (from my Heritage co-consultant) and had invited a friend to come over and scan her pictures, so I set up the scanner in my downstairs kitchen. There's a nice big counter top and so I thought this would be a great place to set her up while I cooked dinner upstairs.

When she was finished scanning and had left, I couldn't decide whether to finish my own scanning or to wait until today.

I was tired and almost decided to just go to bed and read for a while even though it was only eight. But then I thought to myself, "I never know what tomorrow might bring, maybe I won't have time to get to them. Maybe I'll be even more tired tomorrow night.

Just get them done, it's only one box."

So I sat down, got them all scanned and then cleaned up and took the scanner back to Traci.

Today I got home from work and went to the basement to get some hamburger from the freezer for dinner. Just as I got to the bottom of the stairs I heard water dripping onto the counter in my downstairs kitchen.

There sat my box of photos, water dripping into them and they were soaked. The whole box was ruined.

My ceilings were full of water. The water had gotten in between the drywall and the paint forming what looked like water balloons with holes in the bottom. The culprit was a toilet upstairs. It had picked an opportune time to break during the day while no one was home and leak all over. The bathroom upstairs was swimming in a pool of water and leaking through the ceiling.

What a mess!! I am really disheartened about the work that it will take to get this all fixed, but I didn't have to be broken hearted about my pictures.

It is still hard to look at them, all soaked and stuck together, I can't bring myself to throw them away.

But it all could have been so much worse.

Wouldn't I have been so much more upset if I had decided to wait to scan my pictures until today. It would have been a much more tragic story if all those pictures were not backed up on my hard drive. Safe and waiting for the ages.

Now they are ready to put into Heritage Makers Storybooks. How sweet of an ending is that?

Sooo. don't delay!!!

Scan those pictures, back them up.

Upload them to yourHeritage Makers account and then to cd's or external hard drive.

Keep them safe.

This is one of those life lessons.

Don't have your own tragic story, learn from mine, get those pictures scanned!!

Take care, Deb

Coming soon! I have purchased a scanner that will do 30 photos a minute and we will now offer scanning services that will have bulk pricing as low as .19 cents each. Learn from Deb's life lesson, get your photos scanned so you never have to worry about them again.

We will take bookings as soon as the scanner arrives. STAY TUNED!

Barb Ashcroft

http://www.recallwhen.com/

It is all about the JOURNEY

Life Story Classes:

This past week I completed teaching a four week Life Story Class for Seniors. It was magical! I felt so privileged to know these individual's stories. To see their excitement as they were able to place the photos and text about their lives in printed bound form was amazing.

When the books return from the publisher, many are sent off already, we will be having a dinner together; "Celebrating being Published Authors" and sharing about their books to each other.

Our course had a fee of $70.00 which included the introductory template to design with 21 pages.

Having these recorded for future generations is priceless, but that is not all.

I recently was directed to a website service in Vancouver that specializes in telling people's memoirs. I thought you'd enjoy the comparisons.

The most complete and largest Heritage Makers coffee table Heritage book (100 pages) I have ever created priced out at $141.00 usd plus taxes and shipping. It was an amazing process and the end result was incredible. I probably invested 200+ hours but it was a personal journey and was worth every minute.

The memoir company shares:
We specialize in projects for families and businesses, with prices starting at $125,000 for individual and family biographies and $200,000 for corporate histories. We also work with many of our clients on a long-term basis as "outsourced storytellers" where we are constantly gathering their new stories and delivering them back in creative and valuable ways.

Yes, they do interview you and your family.
Yes, they scan your photos and documents.

They write the story, they edit the story, they do the layout and they bind the books.

For me the enjoyment came in THE JOURNEY so I'm glad I did it myself, traveled across the prairies and scanned the family photo albums with my cousins and aunts, interviewed them myself, and re-established relationships with family.
ps I also saved the $124,859.00.
Yes, It is ALL GOOD!

Barb Ashcroft

Knitting families together with personal storybooks

Oprah appreciates our products

OH MY !!!!!!!!!!

I just returned from our annual Heritage Makers Reunion (our word for Convention since we have such a community experience) and the conference opened with a taped recording of a PERSONAL voice message left by no other than Oprah Winfrey to a personal publishing consultant with Heritage Makers.

The photo above is the cover of the book sent to her regarding the loss of her beautiful dog Gracie.

Check out our website for a soon to be added taping of that call.

Check out the new clean look of our Heritage Makers website with a 300+ template gallery.

Stay tuned for more fun,

Barb

Digital Diva

Honoring those of all ages

I am so excited. I get to present this marvelous tribute book to a special man onstage in Dallas, TX this weekend. This is a preview of the title page (red outline is cut off when printed). What a marvelous way to say, "Happy Birthday to someone reaching 80".


I have been privileged to hear from some of my clients who have created books for their kids who are graduating. I managed a sneak peak by offering to proof their books for them.


Wow! you guys rock. Your kids are going to be so excited.


If you have any special events like graduation email me for this month's publishing specials for you to checkout.

Keep on Celebrating those ones in your life.
It truly is a Marvelous Mission!

Barb
Your Digital Diva
www.RecallWhen.com

Baseball Fever continues

Would you like to feature that family baseball star?

Don't have photos for an entire book?

Then by all means create a wall poster.

This template I designed is for an 18x24 inch poster.

What a great way for the 'star' to recall his special moments.

Personalized with his name, his photos, his team name and his own roster #.

What a great gift for the relatives that live far away.

I have created the template & will transfer for free into my client's accounts. That way they can use our wonderful 'swapping photo feature' and simply swap out or replace the photos with those of your own dear one. They don't have to worry about designing, just personalizing.

All the text can be simply revised to have your pertinent info in its place.

What do you need to do?

1) Go to www.RecallWhen.com

2) Set up your free account

3) Phone or email me with your account number so I can transfer the project to you.

4) Start uploading your favourite baseball photos into a photo album created on this free Heritage Maker account. I'd create an album called Baseball 2008 as you can have as many photo albums as you need and this is a perfect & efficient time to start sorting all your photos.

5) Ask me for your free 20 minute demo either in person or online so you can get your project done ASAP. In fact I've made this so simple it should take all of 20-30 minutes to complete once you've uploaded your photos.

Let's make some magic! Right now till the end of May...Special Price Discounts!

Barb, Digital Diva

Your Storybooking Coach

www.RecallWhen.com or wechangelives@shaw.ca or 604-271-5434

Baseball Fever

Ok my apologies first off. At the risk of sounding like a real ditz I have not posted for AGES as we moved and I misplaced all my log in, blog name etc. Detective Barb found it now! Yeah!

I am newly recommitted to posting at the very least, twice a week to keep you all in the loop.

We're having such amazing fun...I don't want you to miss out on ANYTHING!

BASEBALL FEVER! We can now design personalized playing cards.This photo is a template I created for TRADING CARDS for my grandson's baseball team. All the players can be added with their own names and favourite things they like about baseball. HOW MUCH FUN IS THIS!!!

I also did a set of "Seniors Memory Cards" for my oldest brother who turns 65 next month.

My two brothers and their wives accompanied Ron & I on a trip to Palm Springs last month.

We all got married 40 years ago within 8 months of each other and decided to celebrate this milestone together. So I had lots of fun photo images to place on the cards to make this personalized version of Old Maid. I can hardly wait to see his expression when he gets the package. They come in a neat plastic container. How's that for a creative way to ward off dementia?

If you want to create your own simply contact me at wechangelives@shaw.ca or phone 604-271-5434 (my new phone number since our move) and I'll get you set up with your own free account.

You can check out our website for all kinds of new products at www.RecallWhen.com

Till next time,

ta ta,

Barb Ashcroft

Your Storybook Coach

Don't let your babies grow up to be JPEGS!

Make something extra special with all those photos.