A year ago, in November, my parents, sisters and I experienced a terrible tragedy. During the fires that wrecked havoc all over San Diego County my parents home was devoured by the wretched flames. They lost absolutely everything, only having minutes to get out before the house was engulfed in flames.

One of my sisters was staying at a friends that evening and the other sister had just moved to Chicago taking only a suitcase with hopes of sending for her things when she was settled in her new domain.

Pictures, one of the few things that are irreplaceable, were now dust in the wind. All memories were just that…memories. I am the only one that still has a baby book because most of my belongings were with me in my home, but I too lost most of my childhood photos. All of my yearbooks were at my parents home. My mother was in the process of separating our photos, so each of us could have the ones we were in.

I felt really bad for my sister that had moved to Chicago because she did not have a single picture of herself as a child, so for Christmas last year I went through the few photos that I had in my baby book and scanned the ones that had my sister in them. Then, I downloaded the easy-to-use software from My Publisher and made my sister a photo book out of the pictures I uploaded. I was able to choose from 250 different page layouts and was able to add dates and descriptions.

It was super easy to use My Publisher and when my sister opened the package on Christmas Day, the book brought tears to her eyes. She loved the book and in return, it made me feel good that it was something she would cherish forever.

Written by: Courtney Lawless

Detroit Mommies Expert Contributor
Courtney is the traveling mom! She has 3 girls and is the founder of Detroit Mommies and currently lives in Florida. You can follow her on Twitter @courtneyRVL.