Moving to Assisted Living? How to Digitize Family Memories First

04/30/2025

You never realize how much a house holds until it's time to pack it up. The hallway closet, the back of the guest room drawer... everywhere you turn, there’s something tucked away. A photo from a family trip. A VHS tape of a birthday party. A letter from someone who's no longer here. If you’re helping a loved one move to assisted living or you are moving yourself, you already know this is no ordinary move. It’s an internal battle of what to take and what to leave behind, and how to make peace with both. That’s why digitizing family memories can be such a meaningful step before the move. It not only protects them from damage or loss but also makes it easier to revisit and share those moments anytime, anywhere.

So, before you go about packing, let’s talk about preserving the things that matter most - the right way.

Why digitize family memories before moving to an assisted living facility

According to the United States Census Bureau, the average American moves about 11.7 times in their lifetime. Now, anyone who's ever gone through even one of those moves knows that it’s no easy feat.

Older adults have it a hundred times harder, though physically, given their age, health conditions, limited mobility, and emotions. Especially when the move involves downsizing to an assisted living facility, that's when they have another hiccup to add to the equation: saying goodbye to the home where birthdays were celebrated, holidays were hosted, and grandkids took their first steps. But also, saying goodbye to decades of memories stored in boxes, drawers, and photo albums.

Parting ways with the house (the physical space) is inevitable. But who said parting with the memorabilia was? Modern technology has made it possible to digitize family memories. That way, you get to honor them without having to hold onto the physical copies. What's more, digitizing these items makes them easier to access and share. It even relieves the burden of storage when space is limited.

What to digitize before the move

That begs the question: What should you digitize to begin with?

The short answer? Anything that carries meaning or memory.

Start with the basics.
For example:

___ Printed photos

___ Photo albums

___ VHS tapes

___ DVDs

If you come across old film reels or negatives, those are great candidates, too. The same goes for handwritten letters, postcards, journals, and even children’s artwork that’s been saved over the years.

Some items may be more fragile due to age (e.g., Polaroids, older paper that’s yellowed or torn). Our advice is not to postpone turning them into a digital format because the sooner you do it, the less damage they will endure.

Pro tip: If you can, involve your loved ones in the process.
Sitting down together to decide what to digitize can become a pleasant walk down memory lane.
Who knows? You might even hear stories you've never heard before - and that's a memory worth capturing on its own.

How to digitize family memories: Options and Tools

Once you know what to digitize, the next step is figuring out how. The good news is, you’ve got your fair share of options, regardless of whether you want to keep things simple or go all in.

Let’s start with the DIY route.

You can use a scanning app on your phone - Google's PhotoScan, CamScanner, etc. - to digitize printed photos. If you’re tech-savvy, that is. For letters and documents, a regular flatbed scanner works just fine. Just make sure you’re scanning at a high enough resolution (300 dpi or more) to keep the quality sharp.

Things get a bit trickier when it comes to videotapes or film reels, though. You need special equipment to convert formats like VHS to digital, which can be a hassle - not to mention, it’s time-consuming. In these cases, it might make more sense to use a professional digitization service instead. And Capture is the choice. They are equipped to handle fragile formats the right way to give you the ultimate peace of mind. What's more, they will double-check to make sure everything is backed up properly and will often organize the files for you.

No matter which route you take, group files by decade, family member, or event. It’ll save you time down the road and make sharing those memories a whole lot easier. All in all, memory digitalization still has the emotional value of keeping those memories accessible without the burden of storing physical copies.

Sharing and storing digitized memories

After digitizing everything, it's time to decide where to store the files and how to keep them accessible to loved ones.

The easiest way is to upload everything‎ to a cloud‎ storage platform (e.g.,‎ iCloud, Google Photos,‎ Dropbox, OneDrive).‎
Here, you can create shared folders that your family‎ members can use to access the memories‎ whenever they want.‎

To take it a step further, you can create a‎ digital scrapbook or a‎ slideshow.
These can be played at family‎ events or saved to a digital photo frame for your loved one to enjoy in‎ their new space.

For extra peace of mind, always keep a backup, for example, in the form of an external hard drive or a second cloud account.
Having your memories saved in multiple places ensures they stay protected no matter what.

Make it a family project

Remember that tip about involving your loved ones in deciding what to digitize before moving to an assisted living facility? Well, why not make the entire process a shared project? Invite your kids, grandkids, or siblings to help digitize family memories. This will lighten the workload, for sure. But it will also open the door to storytelling, laughter, and connection. You can even assign roles. One person can scan photos, another can organize folders, and someone else can take notes on the stories being told. Before you know it, you’ll have built something meaningful together: a digital time capsule your family will treasure for years to come.

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Thank You to Our Guest Writer:

Lena Morris

Author Bio:

Lena Morris is a writer, tech enthusiast, and lifelong lover of all things vintage.
When she’s not writing, you’ll find her hunting for antique treasures or figuring out
how to get a VCR to work (again).

Image Credit:

https://www.pexels.com/photo/old-phots-in-a-brown-box-3234896/

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