Thursday THROWDOWN: Photo Backup!

It's time for another THROWDOWN THURSDAY!

Okay, WidneyWoman cracked on the last throwdown (and after all that smack talk, too!) and while The Fairy Blogmother says she kicked butt...I have yet to see the evidence. Okay, she was getting ready for her little baby's 4th birthday party...so I guess we can cut her some slack. But, now, it is time for a brand new THROWDOWN!

Operation PHOTO BACKUP!!

If you are anything like me you have literally hundreds and hundreds of photos on your computer. You may even have hundreds on your smart-phone. There may even be a few hundred more on an old computer. Well, take it from me, you do not want to wait until something all of a sudden goes wrong and you lose all those precious photos. And it isn't enough to just back them up to one place. This is what happened to me. I ran out of room on the old computer for storing photos. The computer would not let me download one single photo more. So, we finally went out and did what we should have done ages ago and we got an external hard drive. I backed up all the photos onto the hard drive and then...deleted them off the computer. Then I went to use that hard drive to back up some more photos off the laptop. Of course, little Jamie James came running over to see me while I was doing this and ran right into the cord and sent the hard drive flying. The clunking noise it started to make after that was not a good sign. We took it to the computer store and they were not able to save any of the information on the drive. They said we could send it out to a "specialist" but there was no guarantee he would be able to get the photos and, if he could, it would cost about $700.

:-0

We did save the old hard drive from that (really old) computer before we had a new one put in, so we were able to get a "shell" put around it and turn it into an external hard drive. But, still, there is a very important gap of about 1 and a half years, now, for which we have no photos.

I just don't even think about this too much because I will have a mini-emotional break-down if I do.

So, to make a long story a bit shorter...
let that be a lesson to all you kids out there. BACK-UP your precious photos to not one, but at least two places. Now. Really.

An external hard drive is good...but as we have learned...accidents happen. Make sure you have all your photos somewhere else as well. Put them on some DVD's and/or back them up to an online photo storage site. It is even better if you can have your photos stored in two different locations (your home and not your home..just in case).

This is a big job, I know, but it is an important one.




And, if you need any help with some FANTASTIC photo storage and organization ideas. Ideas that will allow you to quickly retrieve all your photos and use them in scrapbooking projects...well, then, I cannot recommend the book, "Photo Freedom" by Stacy Julian enough. After reading her book I had a whole new way of looking at my organization strategy (or the one I thought in my head that I would probably use if, you know, I had been organized. At all. Which I wasn't).

Better STILL, maybe you can join me in the class that Stacy Julian teaches online! I was lucky enough to win a spot in her class (I still can't believe it, or get over it, Eeeee!!!!), but there is still time for you to sign up. The class starts on February 4th. Head on over HERE to read all about it.

And, I'll be back next Thursday to let you know how I've done with my Photo Backup!
If you are getting your photos organized, as well, please head back here next Thursday to let me know how you did....and how you did it!

Okay...
Punk?