With the onset of social media sharing pictures of your children as they grow up has never been easier.  Photo’s are great ways to capture a moment in time.  Typically as I grew up photo’s were more a historic record, a way to reminisce fondly on the past or even for others to remember you on death.

Tracking our lives

Today with tools like Facebook, Instagram and myriad of other social media applications we can share our happiness (and sad moments) instantly with thousands, even millions of others.   Photo’s are easy to take and in the digital world relatively disposable.  You can take hundreds of shots, pick the best and delete the others – all just in minutes.  Not so with film cameras.

For me, the biggest impact of this change in the way pictures are both taken and viewed relative to children moving through the various phases of their lives – baby, toddler, adolescent and so on.   My wife and I feel a part of the joy as we see our grandchild grow up in pictures and videos, almost daily.

Of course, being at arms length is great most of the time, but there is no substitution for real face-to-face time and we do have that opportunity as well although far less frequently (phew!).

Spread the News

The ease which you can memorialize an event and share it not only provides the opportunity to share joys and sorrows with others, but it’s a great way to spread the news – marriages, births, deaths.

I am not a huge selfie fan nor addicted to social media (twitter, instagram, facebook) but I certainly recognize the benefits.