Family Heirlooms on My Mother's Birthday

One day in March, Danica got to exploring some of the treasures that my mother has left behind, which, in turn, were mementos from her forebears.

I was elsewhere in the house at the time, but they noticed that my mother's notes had faded over the years. So, Danica typed out the faintest ones. She also took pictures.

The next day, we decided to make a collage of the notes and photos in Photoshop, and this is what she came up with, which I think is pretty doggone impressive.

I decided to wait two months to post this on Danica's Great Grandmother's birthday. She has been gone for 14 years, but her treasures and photo albums frequently remind us of her. Mom would have been 103 today had she lived this long, but she made it to just one month shy of her 88th birthday, so that is not bad at all.

Back to the collage: Danica did it all — typing, photos, and page design. Yes, I was mentoring the layout part by her side, but she was in charge of the mouse and wouldn't have had it any other way. And I wouldn't have wanted it any other way.

She made choices about editing the photos: cropping, sizing and aligning them. She also decided that she wanted a flower background, which I thought was the perfect finishing touch.

I added the note at the bottom right, which you probably can't read, so here it is.

Aside from Danica doing such a great job, it feels so satisfying, somehow, to have five generations represented in this one image. Items were passed on from my great grandparents to my grandparents, and then onto my mother and me, and then the work that went in the collage was done my my granddaughter.

I hope that these items, or at least some of them, eventually go to Shauna and then Danica, and that will be six generations. Will there be more?