Retirement Party

Yesterday, my group at work had a retirement party for one of our colleagues. She worked at the hospital for 31 years and was ready to call it quits. It was a wonderful get together, something that people don't do as often as they should.

The Gifts

I suggested that a great gift for her would be a scrapbook. I made the suggestion knowing full well that I would have to make it. At least I had a co-conspirator who took almost all of the pictures. We were right: the scrapbook was a hit.

A scrapbook for someone's retirement is a wonderful idea. We didn't have access to photos from her work life prior to her employment in our unit, but we made a snapshot of work now, when she completed her career. I used a great book as my guideline: Scrapbooking Made Easy. This book gave me ideas for all the page layouts and embellishments. In fact, I copied many of the pages outright.

Most scrapbooking sites and books focus on: weddings, births, family heritage, graduation, vacations, or milestones of growing up. I didn't find many suggestions about retirement and work life, so I improvised.

Here are some other tips if you are thinking of making a retirement scrapbook:

• Title page: with title, a quote or phrase that is meaningful to the situation, and a nice picture of her with one or two favorite coworkers.
• Search for retirement quotes on Google.
• Dedication page: a few sentences of dedication written by a trusted colleague who can write from the heart. Also include names of those who helped make the scrapbook.
• Table of contents: which outlines how the book is organized.
• I organized this book by topics: our unit, the units we work closely with (and have close working relationship with), other coworkers (such as former colleagues), and extracurricular activities.
• A section for each item in the TOC.
• An ending page
• Appendix pages: the recipient can place a few more pictures or mementos on these pages. Another good idea is to attach vellum envelopes or sleeves to a page or two, into which the recipient can tuck retirement cards.
• Use a scrapbook kit or a coordinated line of products for a cohesive look. You can buy these at Joann, Archiver's, Michaels or any other major craft/scrapbooking store.
• Don't skimp on the text. Tell a story.
• Label photos with people's names. That becomes priceless as time goes by.
• Find an outgoing person to take the pictures (if that's not you).
• Use online photo printing. I used Costco's: you upload the photos, order the prints, and go to the store to pick them up the next day. I would guess other photo services do this, too.

If you don't know how to scrapbook, many craft stores have free classes. You really don't need to be super crafty or creative to create attractive pages. It helps, but as long as you can cut a straight line, glue neatly, apply stickers, follow a page layout template, and either write neatly or print out text on your computer, you will succeed. And, there are tools available to help you with these things!

Warning

If you want to do a good job, this will take a lot of time: maybe 1-2 hours per page. My book had 20 pages. I started working on it in January. Yes it's laborious. But it's so personal, so special. If you think it will be well-received and if you really like the recipient, of course you should do it. Go for it! Work in teams if you have to!

Somehow I also got the responsibility for buying the other gift with the remaining money. I went to Things Remembered and found a pretty necklace. I got it engraved with her initial on the front and the date and occasion on the back.

The Dinner

We went to a chain restaurant that had a private room we could use. We had about 30 people there. This allowed us to be a little rowdy and noisy. Everyone ordered off the menu. Everyone paid for themselves - they were kind enough to allow us to have separate checks. We took good care of the serving staff who had to put up with a group of 30 women!

The Toast

And, because I am a bit sentimental, I prepared the following toast for our guest of honor:

May you always have work for your hands to do.


May your pockets hold always a coin or two.


May the sun shine bright on your windowpane.


May the rainbow be certain to follow each rain.


May the hand of a friend always be near you.


And may God fill your heart with gladness to cheer you.


I found the above blessing on the Internet when I was searching for quotes on retirement for the scrapbook. It was sweet and added a nice heartwarming touch to the evening. People thought I wrote that myself! Oh my, I'm not that creative!

Like I've said before, I'm really good at applying ideas. That I did, with most lovely results.

And, OK, OK, yeah, I liked the attention, too