How do you organize your cruise memories?

I have every Patter from every cruise I've taken and as I pass 30 cruises and one plastic bin and a move on the horizon, I'd like to hear ideas others have for keeping souvenirs, photos and memories of their cruises. I might get an idea or two on minimizing the space I devote to this.

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i just put together a photo book (thru Shutterfly) with the best photos and commentary on everything. I used to keep the patters and everything like that but no longer. Nice 12x12 photo book that others like to look thru as well, does not take up a lot of space, it comes out looking very professional

We have a scanner and anything we wish to preserve we scan and put it on the computer with the pictures form that vacation in its folder.

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I scan anything I want to save onto my hard drive, do a back up and throw away all the clutter.

23 cruises and I just moved.

We, too, have all our daily's and have them boxed. Over the years, we have been bringing home less souvenirs but still have thousands of digital photographs for our memories. Mostly because of our impending retirement we have stopped buying pretty much everything except refrigerator magnets as they are easy to keep. Space will become an issue so I have given away most of the things I have accumulated over the years.

I am in the beginning stages of writing my travel journals which will include many photos. That should minimize the space issues for me and may entertain family and friends as well as my wife and I able to reminisce.

I've only done one cruise so far. We still have some of the Patters, but definitely not all of them. Took all of our best photos and favorite trinkets to make a scrapbook. It's a good way to relive your vacation a year or two later, and once the book is done it's a great coffee table/conversation piece.

I'm in the process of purging, I had kept way too much stuff. Years ago I stopped buying almost everything except keychains, they are found everywhere , are cheap and small. I have a huge basket with 600+ in them that I dig thru to remind me of places I've been.

I keep all of my cruise key cards in a business card holder and look thru them occasionally. I only keep the daily Princess patter from the first day as it usually has all the officers names, itinerary and shows listed. The rest is tossed but I remember all the good times I've had when sailing

As a retired family/wedding/portraiture photographer, I love picture albums. I make a photo album of all of our cruises as well as vacations. They sit on top of my desk hutch; don't know what to do for our next cruise, (2018) as I've run out of room on my hutch. In each album are all the photos, dailies, menus, room keys, letters from the cruise line, etc. Yeah, you may agree with my wife, I'm a nut. But, I love going back 14 - 15 years and look at all the memories.

As a retired family/wedding/portraiture photographer, I love picture albums. I make a photo album of all of our cruises as well as vacations. They sit on top of my desk hutch; don't know what to do for our next cruise, (2018) as I've run out of room on my hutch. In each album are all the photos, dailies, menus, room keys, letters from the cruise line, etc. Yeah, you may agree with my wife, I'm a nut. But, I love going back 14 - 15 years and look at all the memories.

I just went through my box and it was truly a walk down memory lane. So many good times and memories. But I did throw out all the spa ads and gym info, the shopping notifications, etc. I like the idea of just keeping the first day patter and my cruise cards and photos. There are also some letters received during the various cruises- just interesting momentos.

I love the scanning ideas but don't have a lot of time to do that right now. I'll have to look into my options there.

Thank you all for your input.

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I use Mixbook for a photo album. It's usually our only real souvenir of our trips. I add extra blank pages at the end of the book for our cruise cards, trivia sheets, tickets to places we went, etc. It's made looking back for reference very easy.

I put all the Patters in a folder with a date on the outside for each cruise and keep it separate.

I create a scrapbook after each cruise. We have about 15 now and I store them in a large plastic bin. I choose the best photos from each port (or those taken on the ship) and add a daily journal/report, together with any cuttings from the patter that were relevant to what we did that day.

When we're too frail to travel, these scrapbooks will enable us to relive beautiful memories.

I see cruising a a 3- part experience - the planning stage/ the cruise / the closure and recording. My scrapbook is the perfect tool for the latter.

My husband creates a video/slideshow DVD with a music background, which gives us the 'live' version of our memories.

We choose souvenirs to decorate our home (wood carvings, paintings, artwork, etc) and limit these to 1 major item per cruise.

Of course everything is also stored on a external hard drive.

It was interesting to read other people's ideas. Thanks to the OP.

I create a scrapbook after each cruise. We have about 15 now and I store them in a large plastic bin. I choose the best photos from each port (or those taken on the ship) and add a daily journal/report, together with any cuttings from the patter that were relevant to what we did that day.

 

When we're too frail to travel, these scrapbooks will enable us to relive beautiful memories.

 

I see cruising a a 3- part experience - the planning stage/ the cruise / the closure and recording. My scrapbook is the perfect tool for the latter.

 

 

 

My husband creates a video/slideshow DVD with a music background, which gives us the 'live' version of our memories.

 

 

 

We choose souvenirs to decorate our home (wood carvings, paintings, artwork, etc) and limit these to 1 major item per cruise.

 

 

 

Of course everything is also stored on a external hard drive.

 

 

 

It was interesting to read other people's ideas. Thanks to the OP.

Kinkacruiser,

I agree about the 3 part experience.

We also decorate with cruise purchases except we try to find some very small trinket in each new port. My husband built in shelves that are small in various spots on the house and as I walk through, I am constantly reminded of our travels.

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I have a three ring binder I made into a cruise log. Business card sleeves work for the cruise cards and hopefully the medallions will fit also. Full plastic sleeves keep the log of the cruise, our door label ( so I remember the room number) and the captain's circle welcome back card.

Photos are all kept digitally on a hard drive that is backed up onto a portable drive regularly and kept in a safe place. I have trouble trusting the cloud ;)

We hold our memories in our hearts forever...something no one can ever take away from us.

We hold our memories in our hearts forever...something no one can ever take away from us.

Your memory must be better than mine . We have done enough cruising that it is hard to remember all the where's and when's. Not a bad problem to have though. ;p

Your memory must be better than mine . We have done enough cruising that it is hard to remember all the where's and when's. Not a bad problem to have though. ;p

Good for you. We have something to strive for.

I take any where from 300-1000 photos on every cruise and other vacation trips. I limit these to about 100 max of the best photos (less photos might mean only 36) that I print and keep in photo albums. The remainder are stored on my computer (and on an external hard drive) along with family photos, home and garden, etc.

Then I have my blog where I share a few photos each day (or two) of the trip. That's backed up on my external hard drive as well, so I can go back and read the posts anytime. I recently had to close down my blog but I'm so glad to have the notes from the trips and day-to-day experiences. My memory is like the rest of me....short...so I know I'll be even more pleased to have this info later on.

I don't keep the Patters and rarely bring home any other souvenirs. I do have a scrapbook from my very first all-inclusive but it was a lot of work and I didn't have the patience to do it again. I'm impressed by those who do!

Scan the Patters & dump them.

No one wants all the junk after your dead anyway. We gave up on saving all the stuff years ago, including all the photo albums.

It's easier for the family to erase all the info after we're gone.

Scan the Patters & dump them.

 

No one wants all the junk after your dead anyway. We gave up on saving all the stuff years ago, including all the photo albums.

 

It's easier for the family to erase all the info after we're gone.

I agree that no one wants this stuff when we're gone - at least not my stuff [emoji38]. It's true that the cruise momentos won't mean anything to anyone else.

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Scan the Patters & dump them.

No one wants all the junk after your dead anyway. We gave up on saving all the stuff years ago, including all the photo albums.

It's easier for the family to erase all the info after we're gone.

My DW and I have been cruising twice a year since we were married on the Sapphire in 2005. We have patters and every piece of pillow candy in each envelope. Our kids can just throw out each box. We're not concerned whether or not they what them. They're easily gotten rid of.

I have every Patter from every cruise I've taken and as I pass 30 cruises and one plastic bin and a move on the horizon, I'd like to hear ideas others have for keeping souvenirs, photos and memories of their cruises. I might get an idea or two on minimizing the space I devote to this.

 

 

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digital photos, and a Christmas ornament from each stop. I see them all once a year and know where I have been.

My memories are kept in my head! Don't really need bits and pieces to remember something memorable!

We have a self-feeding scanner to scan patters and other things cruise related and we also use this scanner to scan paid bills, etc. and are pretty much a paperless household. I was determined to get rid of all paper stuff about a year and half ago when I moved--we did not want to move it! We also both love photography and take way too many pictures--thank goodness we have an unlimited smugmug account!! I have been going through and deleting alot of the pictures since they mean less and less as time goes on(scenery of nothing!!) We do have some trinkets and some paintings or things that remind us of our travels in a bookshelf or on the travel wall in our home--I actually like dusting them because every cruise is such a great memory to us--we truly enjoy traveling the world and look forward to many more cruises!!

I used to print a lot of our travel photos and would make a large photo album for each of our cruises. Now I rarely print photos, but keep them on my computer and have my screen saver set to randomly show the photos. Sometimes I find myself just sitting at my desk watching the photos scroll by remembering the fun times.

I also wrote very long trip reports which I would post here on Cruise Critic. Although I liked the idea of giving back some of the information I gained from these boards, I realized that after just a few weeks, the reviews would fade to the back pages and rarely be read again.

My main goal of writing my reviews was to have a record of what we did so a couple of years ago I started a blog which I aptly named "My Souvenir Memories". I really enjoy having a journal of all of our travels in one location and periodically go back and re-read what I've written. I am amazed at how many fun memories would be lost if I didn't take time to write them down. I truly do enjoy having souvenir memories much more than souvenir "stuff" (and my kids will thank me when I die!)

I love sharing my blog (the link is in my signature), but I mainly keep it up for my own enjoyment. NOW...I just need to get busy and start working on our latest cruise posts... :)

We keep the first patter and the cruise summary that gets delivered to your cabin on the last night, entry tickets if they actually name the museum/monument that we've visited or train etc. It all fits in one folder labelled for each cruise. Then it's into a folder holder with the others. I'm always intending to make one of those shutterfly books but just never get around to it.