The tree is down, the leftovers are gone, and your phone holds six hundred new pictures. Most will never be seen again. If you are wondering what to do with holiday photos besides scrolling past them on the way to a recipe, this guide is sorted by how much time you actually have.
Ten minutes, an hour or a whole afternoon. Every option ends with the photos somewhere people can see them.
What to do with holiday photos, step one: the cull
Nothing works until the pile is smaller. Do three fast passes, no agonizing.
- Pass one, delete. Blinks, blurs, the twelve near-identical shots of the cookie tray. Gone.
- Pass two, heart. Mark anything that makes you smile. Do not overthink it.
- Pass three, star the best. From the hearted ones, pick your top twenty. One per moment: the pajamas, the tree, the burnt pie, Grandpa asleep in the chair.
Put those twenty in their own album. Everything below works from that album. The rest stay on the phone, safe and unbothered.
Struggling to choose? Ask the kids. They pick fast and without sentiment, and they always find the photo where Uncle Mike has frosting on his nose.
If you have ten minutes
Small moves still count. These get photos in front of people today.
- Make a shared album. Invite everyone who was there. Ask them to add their best five. You will get angles you never saw.
- Send one photo to someone who missed it. A single picture of the kids at the table means a lot to a great-aunt across the country.
- Change your lock screen. Pick the funniest shot. You will smile at it forty times a day.
- Write captions now. Add a few words to the top twenty while names and jokes are fresh. Future you will be grateful.
If you have an hour
Print a stack for the fridge
Order prints of your top twenty from your phone. Stick a few on the fridge and tuck the rest in a drawer. Swap them out through the winter. Paper photos get looked at in a way phone photos simply do not.
Turn them into a game
Holiday photos are full of faces, which makes them great for a matching game. Every pair is someone you just spent the holidays with. Matchy Matchy Memory prints your real photos as a memory game, from $19.99. You upload from your phone, and you see your first card before you pay. Play it at the next family dinner and watch everyone relive the burnt pie.
Make a two minute slideshow
Most phones build one automatically from an album. Pick a song the family sang badly, trim it to two minutes, and play it on the TV at the next get-together. Short is the secret. Nobody wants the full forty-minute cut.
Start a calendar
Twelve photos, one per page. Grandparents hang it in the kitchen and meet the holidays again every few weeks. Save the best photo for the last page so the year ends on a high note.
If you have an afternoon
Make it a family project on a cold day. Kids love working with photos of themselves.
- A scrapbook page each. Every kid gets one page, a glue stick and five prints. Add ticket stubs, wrapping scraps and a drawing.
- A photo ornament for next season. Glue a small print into a clear ornament or onto a wooden circle. Write the year on the back with a marker.
- A thank you card set. Fold cardstock, glue a photo of each gift giver on the front, and let kids write the notes.
- A box for next season. Put a few prints in with the decorations. Unpacking them next winter is a lovely surprise.
For a playful twist on the game idea, Matchy Matchy Magic re-draws your photos in 3D Film, Watercolor or Anime, from $29.99. Kids get a kick out of seeing their cousins as Anime heroes.
Match the photos to the people
The same twenty photos land differently with different people. Think about who would love which version.
- Grandparents. Prints they can hold, a calendar for the kitchen, or a game to play when the grandkids visit. Many grandparents never open a shared album link, so paper wins here.
- Siblings and cousins. The shared album, plus the most embarrassing photo, sent privately for maximum effect.
- The kids. Their own scrapbook page, or a deck of cards with their faces on it. Kids tend to play longer when the cards show people they know.
- The host. One framed print of the whole table, sent with a thank you note.
Splitting it this way also takes the pressure off. Nobody needs every photo. Each person needs the few that mean the most to them.
Keep next season's photos from piling up
A few habits make next season much easier. None of them take longer than refilling the eggnog.
- Take fewer, closer shots. Three good photos of a face beat thirty of the whole room.
- Name a photographer. Give the job to one teenager for the day. Everyone else puts the phone down.
- Sort on the drive home. If you are a passenger, cull while the memories are fresh.
- Set a date with the album. One evening the week after, tea and twenty minutes. Make it a small ritual.
Make your holiday photos into a game
Open your top twenty album. Choose real photos or re-drawn ones. Choose 12, 24 or 48 cards. Check your first card before you pay, and the holidays become something the family can play all winter long.
Start with Matchy Matchy Memory for your real photos, or Matchy Matchy Magic to see the family re-drawn. Questions? Write to us at hello@matchygame.com.