iPhoto: to use or not to use

I like the appearance of iPhoto, but it looks like a dumb program (not by its own fault). I have over 20GB of pictures, and none of them are titled (just titles like DSC00096). But my photos folder is structured by date and events. So once you open it, you'll see several folders arranged by name, and the names are something like:
2002-10-Formal Dinner
2002-10-Halloween
2002-12-Christmas
2003-01-Los Angeles
2003-02-Birthday
...
2007-02-Birthday
2007-05-Graduation
etc.

So you get the drift. Each folder holds the pictures to an event: it might be a 3-month long vacation, or it might be a 1-night event (like Halloween). THe folders are arranged by name, but because the names are also dated in that manner, the folders also become arranged by date.

When I add these folders to iphoto though, the pictures lose their sense of time. As I scroll up and down, I do see a faded date, but it seems to correspond to nothing (pictures from this summer were showing the date Dec 2004).

Is there a way to categorize my pictures on iphoto like I have done manually?

 

k i figured it out i think. Boy I feel stupid. Just drag and drop the folders to the iphoto's side panel.