Sloan Creative

Stories matter.

Yes, it’s fun to hear old family stories, but in amongst the fun you’ll also find values and life perspectives that can help you find peaceful, productive paths through life.

Or, by taking the time to tell (or capture) a story, you reinforce the value that family really does matter.

I help capture stories (yours, your parent’s or grandparent’s) via comfortable conversation.

Starting points:

• Old photographs
• Childhood memories
• Memories of important people and events in life and in history

We capture stories by:

• Interviewing in-person or over the phone. Audio or video recordings available
• Weekly interviews over time to capture more stories, more deeply (especially good for the elderly)
• Transcription
• Editing
• Writing: to turn a conversation into a story or book that really engages readers
• Adding context with historical and cultural setting
• Adding detail with period, genealogical, and cultural research
• Portraits of your family members in their own setting, at their hobby, work, or with friends
• Traveling back to home towns (anywhere) and old stomping grounds to capture memories on-site.

Publication in:

• Hard cover or trade paperback books
• e-book- PDF files
• Multimedia web site with text, images, audio, and video
• Audio files on CD or web
• DVD

Hourly rate: $50

For a simple 1 hour interview by phone burned to a CD, roughly 2 hours or $100

I will always provide you with an estimate of the time required to capture and deliver what you desire. As we work together to capture your family’s stories, we will discuss, in advance, any changes to the estimate.

Clear, on-going communication keeps everyone working toward the same goal: capturing your family’s stories for the benefit of future generations.

Who I am:

After studying history at UCLA, I entered the business world. Now that I’ve left my business career behind (phew!), I can spend more time on what I love; helping people capture their family’s stories.

I am lucky, my grandfather wrote me a 60 page story of his amazing life. His uncles wrote another 180 pages of family history that dates back to the 1300’s. We have a family crest given by Holy Roman Emperor Sigismund in 1421, cavalry charges, sword fights, African explorers, royalty, and revolutions.

I’ve been working on capturing my family’s history for years now and I realize that my business experience, historical background, and commitment to family history might be of help to others. So here I am!

Luckily, my work over the years gave me great experience with putting folks at ease in conversation, photography, web and print design, writing, and editing as well as video production.

Where we work:

Western Washington, Bainbridge Island.

If you have a budget for travel, I enjoy traveling to help bring your story to life.

Click here to see my recent thoughts on family history