What would you do with photographs?

Oh sorry I see Moltenlasagne has already suggested this.

When my Mum died we had dozens of albums to go through. My siblings and I took out ones of us and our children and we went through the rest.
We discarded holiday scenes with noone in / chopped off heads etc. There were a lot of chopped off heads bless her.
The rest we stored in one of these, each section holds 100 photos. So we still have lots of pictures but they are organised and far more manageable to store than the mountain of albums.
Photo storage

Throw them out!
She'll never know.
I hate useless clutter

Had the same problem when my DM passed. Hundreds, and I mean hundreds, of photos. I went through every single one (had more time on my hands then!) and sent ones to her friends, and various family members who were IN the photos. The generic scenery ones I had to throw away. I kept a lot - of me and my siblings etc. I whittled it all down to one suitcase which is on top of my wardrobe and will be MY DCs problem ! But a PP is right - these were my DMs memories, not mine. I guess the same could be said of my huge hoard of photos when my DC have to decide what to do with them. And the suitcase !!

I had to do this after Mum died. Not mountains of photos, but plenty.

First I sorted them into ones with people I recognised and ones without, and chucked all the ‘without’ ones. (This included a quantity of tiny B&W ones with a human the size of a matchstick head who could have been absolutely anyone, blurry faded ones etc).

Then I sorted them into piles of individuals vs groups.

Individuals into individual people. Kept a few for each person, chucked the rest.

By now I was on a roll and able to be ruthless with the group ones.

Finally went back and wrote the name of the people in the photo/event/location/date as far as I knew on the back of each one.

Threw away loads. It felt good. Haven’t looked at them since mind.

This is such a lovely idea - I think I will suggest this for my MIL.

The videos of her talking me through her old family photos - absolutely priceless. Definitely recommend that.

I fired up my phone to record video, then got my Mum to go through the album of old family photos and talk me through who was who etc. So the camera shows the photo with a voiceover from her.

I have a Chromecast attached to my TV, and when it's not playing stuff it shows photos from my Google Photos albums - which includes an album of digitised slides from 50-60 years ago.

I would argue that putting photos in a Google Photos album or even a big external hard drive or usb stick is a good compromise - typically grandchildren etc develop an interest in their forebears when they get older, so just because they don't care now doesn't mean they won't enjoy seeing them later. And digital is so much more compact !

Your hour a week of cleaning should not trump your mums right to put what she wants in her own surroundings.

I was going to offer my gran's to the local record office... I'll see what they say. We have a lot of photos and boxes of slides which illustrate a certain period of history. If they aren't interested, I'll probably take them to the tip but it feels wrong. It also feels wrong to make them my children's responsibility to dispose of.

I agree with filtering and keeping the best ones. Maybe one per holiday if the quantity is overwhelming. Scan or photograph them, and keep the originals. From a family history perspective please please write on the back who the people are then the year or your best guess at a year. It's so frustrating to come across a picture and have no idea who the people are, or what wedding/birthday party it was taken at. And obviously write "Bill and Jan 1984, York" or whatever, rather than "mum and dad on holiday".

Genealogists love nothing more than to come across an album of photographs. Good luck with your sorting.

I binned most, kept about ten that I liked and recognised.

My mum had a lot of very old family photos of both her and her mothers childhoods. Some even older photos. Before she died, she put them into an album and wrote underneath each photo who was in it. If she had not done this, I would not know that I have a photograph of my maternal great grandmother at aged 14, for example. Or a photo of my great grandparents wedding day. If possible, I would take the old photos to your mum and ask her who the people are, put them in an actual, physical album and write underneath each picture who is featured in the photo. Maybe even what your mums knows about it. You may well find that you develop an interest in your ancestors later on in life or perhaps another family member will. These are precious family photographs.

You could do the same with some of the more recent ones but it’s more likely that you’ll know yourself who features in them so you could probably make the album up yourself.

You could also digitise as a back up (or upload them somewhere like Facebook) but IME a physical photo or album lasts longer; it doesn’t get lost in a soft/hardware update.

Yes, cine film also nowhere to be found here, too.

After my last parent died, I went through the photos very ruthlessly at first, all ones of scenery on holiday went in the bin. Then I went through ones with people in - if I had no clue who the people were, they were binned. Then I threw out duplicates or nearly identical photos, which left a manageable amount. I will probably scan them and make them into a photo book (I also see no point in having photos on a computer). I have an album of my Mum's from the late 1940s and early 1950s, and she had added captions to the photos. I love that!

While your mum still has the capacity, go through with her the ones of family and write on the back who they are - if you are planning on passing any of this down to children this is very helpful to put names to faces and spot family resemblances etc.

You don't need to go mad, just a couple of grandparents, great grandparents etc.

Keep wedding photos, ( esp whole family ones) a couple of school/ baby photos and then seriously - bin the rest that has no emotional resonance for you.

Your children won't have to do this for you so much as everything is digital now but it is nice for them to have a visual who's who of their family tree.

My mum is in her 70s and is starting to do this now , as I have explained that I'll be sending the whole lot bar one sentimental box to the skip once she's gone. She's quite on board with this and now has regular 'clear outs' of all her belongings.

Good luck OP I think your ideas sound a good compromise. I was lucky in that my DM had sorted family photographs into a semblance of order before she died. My sister has the majority I wasn’t really interested in having them. A few photographs that might have interested me my DM had thrown out! My DH still has hundreds of photographs belonging to his late parents I doubt he will ever go through them. It took us over six months to clear his late parents house they were terrible hoarders. My late grandmother had an Aunt who was on the stage in a vaudeville act in the USA. My grandmother had some sort of argument with her and destroyed all the photos of her performing on stage. I really wish I had seen those.

Of course the most valuable thing to me was the cine film from the 60s. All went AWOL, who knows where.

Please remember that all too soon this will become your children’s problem. So cut down to a representative few of anyone they don’t know, just keeping them from a family tree perspective. I went through hundreds and hundreds my dad had taken. Pretty much the only ones I’ve kept are of people.

I have a box full of rejects that I’ll dump as soon as my mum dies. I put those I’m keeping in archival quality plastic pouches in a loose leaf binder. I’ll be having another cull of those too.

Less is more I think. Fewer, properly labelled ones are easier to manage and to look at.

My mum’s in a care home and I’ve offered to bring in an album but she says no.

Btw I won’t be keeping the wedding album, just a few of the photos.

I triaged first - three boxes - known family, possible family, random animals/ stuff. Super fast go through, no thinking.
Then the known family box I just took out duplicates/ near duplicates and put away.
Possible family I cut down, and if I'd had anyone to ask I would have taken the time to try and find out. But mostly they went.
Random stuff just went in the bin

My mum had loads of albums and we/me had to deal with it when she died. I kept all the people ones, and anything I recognised like my grandparents houses, and binned all her holiday and road trip ones, or recent people I didn't know like pilate friends (kept the old sepia ones of people I didn't know, someone might do a family tree at some point). As pp said, they were her memories not mine. I then scanned them all, put onto USB sticks and gave copies to my three brothers. I managed to get 43 albums into 8 which is still too much really.

I have the same job to do. I agree that its pointless keeping any pictures of people your siblings don't recognise. If they mean nothing to you then you bet your life they won't be valued by your kids. Why add to your kids burden when it's their turn? I feel guilty but that's the harsh reality

Ah yes, I can imagine that would make things harder then. Maybe if you find a selection of photos you could scan them and buy her a digital photo frame? That way she gets a lot of photos but they are properly contained.

Digitised pictures are actually pointless as no-one will leaf through them.

Pick the best ones and make a handful of albums out of those. The very best/most sentimental ones could maybe be blown up and framed to hang on your wall. Ditch the rest.