Re-Visiting the Past in the Present



past and present

I ran across this cool blog/website the other day that I have had so much fun looking at. It is a series of photographs of photographs. Sound confusing? Well, it’s pretty simple actually. The author of the blog explains it this way, “take a picture of a picture from the past in the present.” Still confused? Go here to check it out.


Here is what I love about this idea. It is binding together both family history, and present day. And, isn’t that what we are all trying to do that love Heritage scrapbooking? Think of how cool it would be to create a scrapbook of photos like this.

Have you ever gone back to a location you’ve seen in an old photograph? I think of a time when my sister and I went to our Mother’s childhood home one time as we were passing through San Antonio, TX where she grew up. We found the house where she lived, and took a picture in front of it. I’ve never seen a picture of her in front of this house, but I’m sure that there is one that exists somewhere. If only I had that in my possession when I went to visit the house in present day. It would be very cool to compare the old with the new, to see how it had changed, and to get a more vivid picture in my mind of what life was like in that house for my Mom as a little girl.


To take it a step further, it would be fun to line up the old photograph with the house in front of you and take a new photograph. It is like looking through a time capsule to the past from the present day. Think of the scrapbook pages you could create around these kinds of photographs!


In the age of digital photography, blogs, and the internet, it may be easier to post these kinds of images on a blog. I have to admit I love seeing the caption written under each photograph taken. It is like each person is speaking to the photo itself. How often have we seen an old photo and wished that we could talk to the people in that photo? Whether it be a family member that has passed, or ourselves younger and innocent, I’m sure we’ve all had an experience like that.


You can make a scrapbook page more meaningful by taking some of these photographs and then speaking to them through your journaling. As you scrapbook these photos of photos, you will most likely come up with some great ideas to “speak” to that photograph, and leave a legacy behind for future generations to see and understand why what is pictured in that old photo is important to you.

Meredith Ethington is the author of this blog. To learn more about Meredith, and her history with Scrapbooking and Genealogy, go here.


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