Photoshop, retouching an old photo.

So I found this old photo of my parents. I think it was taken at the airport, just before my Mum flew home to Scotland after not having been home for more than 15 years.
I was about 4 at the time.

A few years later, they split. Someone cut the photo apart!
But years go by, and someone regrets the decision. Its scanned back together and reprinted.
The quality is terrible!

I decided to choose this photo to retouch, as I feel it tells a story about our family history. About the journeys we have taken.

Firstly, I cropped into the copy I wanted. I used the eye dropper tool to select the colour of the background and blurred out not only the cut line, but all the noise from the background.

This area has been tricky. I have tried spot healing, healing brush, and now the clone stamp. Which has done the best job, I just need to need to give it a more natural appearance.
(The spot healing brush did the trick.)

A preview of one layer. You can see where I have painted the background, then erased where I didn't want it.
I'm sure there would have been a fancier way of getting the same result. One day I'm sure I'll find it!

And here we are! If my relative who wanted the photo back together could see this, I know that she would be happy. Happy to have the photo fixed, happy that I'm doing something I love.