Jennifer Woodbury

9 Years

Nine years ago today, at the ripe old age of 19, after a whole three months of dating followed by a four and a half month engagement, I married this handsome guy.

A few weeks ago Matt and I spent the night reminiscing about the whirlwind that was 1999. Yes, it was the year of boy bands, Britney Spears...and Matt & Jenn. We had so much fun remembering those days that I thought it would be fun to surprise Matt on our anniversary by gathering memories from the four people who knew us best back then.

I expected that these memories would make me laugh (Matt and I played dominoes?), and I figured there would be at least one embarrassing tidbit in there somewhere (was I really that obsessed with my hair?), but I wasn't expecting to be brought close to tears (in a good way) more than once while reading their words.

I hope Matt enjoys reliving these memories as much as I did...

The first people I contacted were Mandy and Lindsey, two of my best friends from college. We all lived on the same floor in the dorms during our freshman year, and were roommates in an off-campus condo during our sophomore year, which was the year I met, dated, got engaged to, and married Matt. So yes, these two definitely had front row seats.

Next is Matt's sister Ashley. Matt and Ashley have always had an extremely close bond. When Matt and I started dating, Ashley was serving a mission in Miami so I didn't get the chance to meet her right away. She came home shortly after we got engaged, and to be honest I was petrified of that first meeting. Matt had told me that before she left on her mission, she had told him that he "better not fall in love" while she was gone. Oops. But, I should have known there was nothing to worry about. As soon as we met, we became fast friends. I don't remember any awkwardness at all, and Matt and I spent much of that summer before we got married hanging out with Ashley.

 

Last up is McRay, one of Matt's best friends and roommate in college. I was a little nervous about e-mailing McRay. I figured the girls would at least humor me in going along with my request, but I thought a guy would think I was totally nuts, or at the very least just totally lame. But to my surprise, he e-mailed me back the most amazing note. And he didn't even call me crazy once!

Happy anniversary Matt! I love you. It's been an amazing nine years, just like I knew it would be the day we got married.

We Start Training our Yankee Fans Young Around Here

I took this last week while Matt and Ella were watching "Daddy's baseball" together. I can't decide which I think is funnier: Derek Janoga (aka Derek Jeter) or Jason Banambi (aka Jason Giambi). Sorry, the video is dark. A certain three-year old refused to let me turn on any lights.

Little Yankee Fan from Jennifer Woodbury on Vimeo.

And another one, just because it's cute. And because it's Monday.

Best Friends from Jennifer Woodbury on Vimeo.

A Hairy Situation

When I look at this picture, all I want to do is break out the scissors. Now obviously, I think Claire is the one of the most adorable babies ever to grace the planet. But the typical back of the head bald spot aside, it looks like she is already well on her way to a rockin' baby mullet in the back, and check out the flyaway hairs on the sides. I don't know the official rule on when it's acceptable to cut a baby girl's hair for the first time, but I'm pretty sure it is older than 4 1/2 months. I didn't cut Ella's hair until she was 18 months old, but she also didn't have crazy hair at this age (seen here with my mom in September 2005):

She did have a sweet mohawk in the front, but that's a story for another day.

The problem is, I think Claire is too little to take to a barber, which means I would have to do the honors myself. And I just don't want Claire to have to endure the trauma of bad hair from an amateur haircut:

I am sure my parents meant well, but the blunt cut bangs and the awkward layering around the ears? Yikes. As I was looking at these pictures from my childhood with Matt, he asked if my mom was the one who cut my hair. I wasn't sure. And then I came across this picture, which explains so much:

Thanks a lot Dad.

So help me out here. To cut, or not to cut? Which is worse, a natural baby mullet or a botched mom (or dad) cut? And am I breaking some sacred mommy code by even thinking of going near my baby girl's hair with a pair of scissors this young?

Discuss.

At Least We Got Good Seats

Matt and I hardly ever go out just the two of us. It's not that we don't want to (although both of us do have slight homebody tendencies), or that we feel uncomfortable leaving our kids with babysitters. Truthfully, we are just lazy. Too lazy to find somebody we trust to babysit, and even if we do happen to find someone, we're usually too lazy to actually call them up to schedule them. So, when grandparents come to town, Matt and I get very excited at the prospect of actually leaving the house together kid-free and we tend to go on dating binges.

My mom is in town right now, which means we are currently in the middle of one of those binges. Last Friday night, we went to see the new Batman movie. Aside from taking Ella to see Horton Hears a Who, we haven't been to a movie since last December. Since this was only the third weekend of The Dark Knight's release, and it's been making ridiculous amounts of money, we were worried that the show would either be sold out or that we wouldn't get good seats. So we made sure to get to the theater early, picking up a sandwich to eat while we waited in the theater instead of eating dinner in a restaurant like a normal couple would.

We got there 45 minutes before show time, and while Matt stood in line to buy a drink, I quickly walked to our theater to save our seats. I walked in, and as I scanned the sea of chairs discovered that I was the only person in the entire theater. Just me, myself and I. When Matt walked in a few minutes later and found me sitting alone, with my feet kicked up on the chair in front of me, casually reading the magazine I had stashed in my bag (and did I mention that I was all alone?), he doubled over in laughter. And that was when the full realization of our lameness hit me, and I too started laughing until tears were streaming down my face.

And the first thing that came to mind after I regained my composure was how mad I was that I didn't have my camera to take a picture of us, alone in the massive theater.

Yeah, we don't get out much.