My niece recently had a birthday. She’s now 7. A few weeks ago there was a small celebration that involved photo booths, fashion shows, cupcakes, unicorns, all things LOL, a ridiculous amount of noise, and me somehow getting trampled by a bunch of giggling kids.

So, that was fun.

So once I got out of the trample pile, I was able to get back to the task of taking photos and watching my family try to navigate this level of energy with a birthday girl who doesn’t do well with loud noises. One friend decided it would be funny to have a food fight, so naturally I laughed and hoped it would happen for photo sake. But instead she just got frosting on her nose and giggled about that.

Eventually we went outside, they ran around, and had these handful of sweet moments that I’m glad my camera was there to witness/capture. These are the kinds of images that need to get printed. The snapshots of life and celebrations that you can look back at for years. I know they will want to remember who was there, how they looked (those missing teeth!), but also that very awesome jean jacket with those fantastic patches.

Photos! Or it didn’t happen. Right?

(Not really, I know. But PHOTOS so you can remember what happened :D )

So, this is not just a post about the niece having a birthday party, but a reminder to capture these moments in life (or hire a professional to do that so you can enjoy and be present) and the final piece of getting your photos printed! It’s important. For many reasons. But only having your life stories in photos on disks and hard drives and phones is not enough.

Trust me.