Jennifer Woodbury

2012 Photos | Week 25 | Jun 17-23

This week started off with Father's Day. Ella and Claire were so excited to make Matt breakfast in bed (Lucy was just excited to say "Hap' Fodder's Day" to everybody all day long).

Matt is not a huge breakfast eater, but it worked out perfectly because a bowl of berries turned out to be exactly at the girls' breakfast-making skill level.

I had Ella and Claire draw these portraits of Matt, and on the back I attached a questionnaire that each of them answered. I love how they turned out. I got the idea along with the free downloads to go along with it here (I pretty much love everything she does).

Ella's portrait & questionnaire.

Claire's portrait and questionnaire.

We have been spending so much time in the backyard so far this summer (including lots of picnic lunches/dinner out on this blanket) and I am loving it. I've found that if I just come and sit outside with them, even if I read a book or even lie down and take a quick cat nap, they will play for hours out here.

Ella and Claire went to tennis camp for three days this week. At first Claire told me she didn't want to play tennis, but all it took was hearing two little words - "tennis skirt" - and she had found her new favorite sport.

I was a little worried about Claire since she was the youngest person at camp, but the girls had so much fun together. I love what good friends these two are despite being almost complete opposites, as evidenced so clearly by Claire in all pink and Ella in all blue. The other day Ella even told me that she felt like her and Claire were twins.

We kicked off the first official day of summer with blazing heat and our first pool day of the season. We spent almost nine hours at the pool over two days and on top of that Lucy missed her nap both days, so she was pretty much a disaster by the end of the week. But at least we stayed cool!

We joined a new swim club this summer, and Ella is loving the water slide at the big pool. She even convinced me to try it out.

Claire prefers to hang out in the kiddie pool.

Popsicles in the backyard after dinner are becoming a summer tradition.

We are still trying to maintain some semblance of normal routine here during the summer. When Lucy does get in a nap, it's almost always preceded with a reading of at least one of the Llama, Lllama books (Lucy calls them "Mama Mama" books).

2012 Photos | Week 24 | Jun 10-16

When I bought Claire this Hello Kitty doodle book, I had no idea how seriously she would take it. She spends hours coloring in it every day, carefully completing each page in order. She has also enlisted (or more like demanded) help from me and Matt. Neither of us can appear idle for even a second or she will insist that we help her color.

"Wash-a feet, Mommy?" Lucy insists on having her feet washed off in the kitchen sink whenever she comes in from playing outside.

After being canceled twice due to bad weather, Ella finally had her field day during the last week of school.

Her class was the first grade tug of war champion, beating both other classes handily.

It was hard for Ella to say goodbye to first grade this week. Here she is with her wonderful teacher Miss N. Ella wrote her a letter after school got out that read: "Dear Miss Neilsen, I miss you very much. I wish you could always be my teacher. Bye bye. Love, Ella"

Ella on the last day of school. Her first day of school picture is here for comparison.

Claire and I painted this poster for Ella and had it hanging on the door when she got off the bus on her last day. I painted the letters; Claire did everything else!

On Saturday we drove north to Mystic, something we seem to do about once a year. This time we visited the aquarium, where the girls said they liked the penguins best of all.

I personally enjoyed trying to spot frogs in the marsh and listening to Lucy say "ribbit"...

... but I was especially mesmerized by the beluga whales. I could have watched them all day long. Our aquarium visit coincided nicely with the string of ocean-themed animal rescue movies we have been watching for movie night recently: Dolphin Tale, Free Willy, and Big Miracle.

Of course, the true motivating factor for making the drive was to stop for some lobster. As usual, the potato chips were the main attraction for the girls (seen here with the same potato chip bag in 2009).

I love how all three girls are crouching down in this photo we took before heading home. Whenever somebody kneels down to take a picture with Lucy, she always kneels down too. It makes me smile.

2012 Photos | Week 23 | Jun 3-9

Sunday night game night.

Claire on her last day of preschool for the year. As much as she loved school she is also a little homebody, and now she wakes up every morning happily exclaiming: "I don't have to go anywhere today!"

Lucy loves to show off her outfits to anybody who will give her the time of day (I honestly have no idea where she gets this from). On this particular day I overheard the following conversation between Lucy and Claire that cracked me up:

Lucy: Wook at me!
Claire: Ooh la la!
Lucy: Wook at me!
Claire: Ooh la la!
Lucy: Wook at me!
Claire: Ooh la la!
Lucy: Wook at me!
Claire: I SAID OOH LA LA!!

First grade field trip to the beach for a coastal exploration program put on by the local aquarium. Afterwards, families were invited to join the first graders for an end of year picnic lunch. Lucy refused to step foot on the sand as usual, except for when she spotted an unattended box of doughnut holes lying on a towel several yards away. I guess I know what to bring to the beach with me this summer.

I love it when the art portfolios come home at the end of the school year. Here are a few of my favorites from Ella's work:

Top: whale. Bottom: turtle. I was so drawn to these colorful animal paintings inspired by the book Living Color by Steve Jenkins. 

Left: self-portrait. Right: school bus.

And in order to be an equal opportunity parent, here are a few of Claire's latest art pieces as well:

In case you can't tell, she's going through a flower period.

When Lucy wants to be covered by her blanket, she will ask you to "zip it." I'm not sure where this term originated, but my best guess is that is has something to do with the zippered sleep sacks she has worn to bed every night ever since she was a few months old. She is very specific in the way she likes to be covered: the blanket must cover her legs and feet and be tucked under her arms just so. Also, the fuzzy side must be facing outward. Sometimes I have to "zip it" several times before I get it right.

Project Life: Vacation Mode

School's almost out for us (Ella has just 3.5 days of first grade left) and it seems like everybody has summer break on the brain, so I figured this was a good time to share my Project Life pages from our spring break vacation back in April.

Week 15 started with Easter and ended with the first two days of our trip:

The left side focused almost exclusively on Easter. I really didn't want to add an extra insert for my Easter pictures, so as you can see I used these photo templates to fit 8 photos in the space of two 4x6 slots. The grid on the left focused on Easter baskets, and the one on the right focused on the egg hunt:

The right side of my layout focused on travel preparations (the packing photo in the top left) and the first full day of our trip:

I did add a couple of extra inserts this week: a 6x12 page protector that holds six 4x6 photos, and a standard 8.5x11 page protector with a piece of writing that Ella brought home from school about how excited she was for our vacation. You will see that on one of the extra photos below I included a QR code:

If you take your smartphone and scan the code, it will automatically take you to this video, which directly correlates to the photo:

I originally saw this idea here (go to 7:53 in the video to see the part I am talking about) and thought it was a brilliant way to easily include videos into a Project Life album. I am so excited about this concept; my only concern is how long the QR codes I generated (at this website) will last. I'm not sure if QR codes in general were intended for an indefinite life span. But really, I'm just happy to have something to do with the videos that normally just languish in a folder on my hard drive. And if for some reason several years down the road those codes don't work anymore, I'll just cross that bridge when I get there. Better to use a great solution now than to wait for a "perfect" solution that may never exist.

Week 16 contains the remainder of our vacation:

I don't mind the fact that our trip is broken up between two weeks. I actually think it sort of helps to curb photo overload within one particular week, although I did still include three extra inserts in Week 16: (1) a 6x12 insert that includes the text from this blog post, (2) another 6x12 page protector for 4x6 photos, and (3) one of the Project Life Design G photo pocket pages.

On the back of the 6x12 insert is this photo collage I created using a template by Cathy Zielske. This is such a great way to include a bunch of extra shots:

Here is a closer view of the right side of Week 16. Ella's birthday fell on the last day of our trip, so I included a little bit about that as well.

In the photo below I tried out using a ghosted background in order to include text directly onto my picture. I'm always looking for creative ways to incorporate extra text in my Project Life pages and I really like how this turned out.

Now that I've shared these layouts, I'm ready for another vacation. Anyone else?

Products used:

InLinkz.com

2012 Photos | Week 22 | May 27 - Jun 2

Most of my photos this week were from Lucy's birthday celebration, but here are a few additional photos from the rest of the week.

First, a couple of pictures from the bedtime routine:

Lucy fresh out of the tub.

Blow drying Claire's hair. (I blow dry the girls' hair after every bath... even in the middle of summer in a house with no central air. I'm not sure if this is normal or not.)

We introduced the girls to artichokes for the first time this week. 1 out of 3 liked them. I consider that a success.

On Wednesday, Lucy's actual birthday, we went out for ice cream. In honor of the occasion, we actually bought Lucy her own cup. Usually she just shares with Mom or Dad.

Just Claire being cute.

And finally, a favorite iPhone photo from the week of Claire and Lucy at the playground. It should be noted that Claire took the initiative to pick out Lucy's outfit for the day and got her dressed all by herself. Color me impressed.

Why Two-Year-Olds are Awesome

On Memorial Day, our little family of five celebrated Lucy's 2nd birthday, and the whole event was a reminder to me about why I love this age.

You see, two-year-olds will be impressed with the puppy cupcakes you spent hours making the day before. The instructions are here if you are so inclined. (Oh yes, I got my Martha Stewart on. Just don't tell her I used boxed cake mix and pre-made frosting.)

Two-year-olds can be stubborn and uncooperative, but they are so cute it's hard to really care.

When you say "Happy birthday!" to a two-year-old, the two-year-old says it right back to you with unbridled enthusiasm. She's just happy to be celebrating; she doesn't even realize that it's all about her.

Two-year-olds are blissfully oblivious that cupcakes and presents are waiting for them, so they don't whine or complain when you make them take pictures with everybody in the family before the festivities begin.

When the time finally arrives for singing "Happy Birthday" and blowing out candles, the two-year-old will start beaming about being the center of attention. Especially if that two-year-old is a third child.

A two-year-old doesn't care if her mother makes everyone re-enact the singing and candle-blowing because she wants to get the moment on video (see below) and in pictures (and she can't do both with the same camera). In fact, the two-year-old will absolutely love it and will make you light the candles and sing to her over and over again. And you will happily sing and cheer until your vocal chords start to feel sore because it makes her so, so happy. By the way, the two-year-old will get very skilled at blowing out candles.

A two-year-old isn't expecting presents, so when she does open the one gift you have for her, she will be over the moon about it. She will hug that puppy, kiss it on the nose, and drag it around the house by one of its floppy ears for the rest of the day.

Yep, two-year-olds are pretty incredible.

Especially mine.

2012 Photos | Week 21 | May 20-26

I have to go backwards and start this week's photos with an event from the end of the week, because it was an event that basically consumed me for the entire week: Ella's violin graduation recital.

Ella has been taking violin lessons since she was 4 and a half years old, and a couple of months ago she reached the end of Suzuki Book 1. Now, I studied violin using the Suzuki method and I never had to do this, but at Ella's music school (and I suppose at most Suzuki schools?) when a student reaches the end of a book they perform a solo graduation recital. This meant that Ella had to perform every single song in the book straight through (17 pieces in total, starting with Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star and increasing in difficulty to the final piece, Gavotte by F.J. Gossec); a performance almost half an hour long. It's sort of like the Twinkle Graduation she completed two years ago, but on steroids.

When I first heard about this graduation recital, I honestly didn't think Ella could do something like that. I didn't think any barely turned 7-year-old could honestly be expected to do something like that. But I quickly realized that there was no escaping it, and Ella and I got to work preparing. We practiced together harder than we have ever practiced before. I would push her when I didn't think she was working hard enough, and then feel terrible when she would break down in tears telling me she was scared of getting up there and forgetting everything. To say I was stressed would be putting it lightly, and there is no doubt that I passed some of that anxiety on to my innocent first grader.

Last Saturday was the big day, and you know what? She did it. She stumbled a bit on one of the early songs and lost some steam at the end, but she did it. She played for almost 25 minutes straight. Her teacher and I stopped her towards the end and encouraged her to take a little break, but I think she was more annoyed than anything by that. She just wanted to keep playing and get it over with (I can't blame her).

To say I was proud of her accomplishment would be an understatement. I may have put in hours and hours practicing with her, but she's the one who had to get up there on her own and perform. She showed me in that moment that she is capable of doing hard things. Things I didn't really think were possible. It was a humbling lesson for me about not putting limits on what I think my children can achieve. So yes, I'm really proud of this little girl. (And also really, really happy it's over.) And what makes it even better is that I can tell she is really proud of herself too.

One happy girl after her recital.

Ella with her violin teacher, Dr. Andrew. He gives all of his students a cupcake when they graduate.

Ella was also the star student in her class this week. Finally. She has literally been waiting the entire school year for her turn. (She asked me why she always has to be last at everything. I told her that with the last name Woodbury she will probably have to get used to it.) She was so excited to complete this poster, and she also got to bring in a bag with a few special items to share with her class. The items she chose were: one of her karate belts, a stuffed monkey, her toy taxi, a Henry Huggins book, and a picture of her playing the violin.

Now that Lucy is almost two, she thinks she is too grown up to sit in her booster seat at meal times. Heaven help me and my dining room rug.

Homework time.

If you zoom out a little bit, you get a more accurate view of what homework time looks like in our house. One little sister (Claire) doing some sort of craft project on one side, and another little sister (Lucy) driving a car on the table - complete with sound effects - on the other side. Ella's wish for any future house we may have? A bedroom with her very own desk.

Ella and Claire got to pet a lamb at our local nature center's "Spring on the Farm" event over the weekend. Our entire family was mesmerized by the sheep shearing demonstration.

On Saturday we said goodbye to our Volvo and hello to our new GMC Acadia. I loved my XC90 and was sad to have to give it up, but since Volvo refused to make a bigger car despite my wishes, we had to find one elsewhere. I will admit that it's really nice not to have to scrunch all three kids in the backseat anymore. And the fact that we can now accommodate additional passengers without making them crawl through the trunk is just an added bonus.

I think Lucy likes the new car, especially since we finally turned her car seat forward-facing now that her second birthday is just days away.