Displaying family keepsakes

After my mother died several years ago, I became the keeper of the family pictures. We are all grown now – with grown children – but these photos are from our childhood. I have vowed to scan these in and share them with my siblings for 5 years now but work and life never seem to present the time and energy required. I was cleaning out my closet recently (which in itself is an event) and found my sisters’ christening dresses. There were two identical dresses in the box, which helped to identify which of the five of us these belonged too as the youngest of us are twins.

I immediately stopped working on the closet and starting routing through boxes of family photos hoping to find a picture of the twins in their dresses. As I spread the tiny lace dresses out across my bed admiring the details, I thought it would be cool to frame both dresses with a picture of the girls wearing them. But I reconsidered. These dresses would have to be split up and framed so they could hang it in separate homes. Every time one of my sisters looked at it, she would know that the matching gown was also displayed in the home of her twin. Not that twins need a reminder, even 1800 miles apart, they remain close. And I never found a picture.

As most of my projects, this one didn’t come to fruition immediately, but I did finish. I chose black shadowbox frames. I didn't find the twins' christening pictures. Mom was a single mother of five and I am always impressed and amazed that we have photos. Life with five children had to be challenging. I used several family pictures, scanning them into photoshop and giving them a slight sepia tint. I added some appropriate phrases to make it look like a 3D scrapbook page: ‘Twins – mirrors and opposites’, ‘Chance made us sisters; Hearts made us friends’ and ‘Mmmm, mmmmm, jello’. That last one is an inside joke my sisters still share.

These lovely dresses are no longer hiding in my closet and I made some progress on my vow to share the family pictures. I am showing a picture of one of these, but I made two. My sisters love them.