Jennifer Woodbury

Signs of fall.

Adorable two-year-old mispronunciation of the week: “apple spider” (instead of apple cider).

Love notes from Claire, left for Matt on his nightstand. Claire is constantly at work making little drawings and notes to give away. She usually makes them in multiples of five; one for each member of the family. Her favorite things to draw are rainbows, flowers, houses, people, and she also loves writing our names.

As soon as the temperatures start dropping, I start making soup. My kids love chicken tortilla soup, mostly because of the toppings they get to add themselves. I made it for dinner for the first time this season, and as Ella crushed her tortilla chips into her bowl she exclaimed, “This is why I love being in this family, because we do fun stuff like this.” It may be a sign that she needs to get out more, but I really love her enthusiasm for simple pleasures.

Claire expects fruit snacks every day when Lucy and I pick her up from school (heaven help me if there’s ever a day I forget). Lucy always holds on to them and patiently waits to open hers until Claire gets in the car.

“Mom, I want you to put swirls in my hair.”

Pajamas on a Saturday morning.

Harriman State Park, NY

Ella and her walking stick. “Are we hiking or hunting?” she asked, a true sign that we don’t do a lot of hiking… or hunting for that matter.

Claire, striking her favorite pose, and Ella, annoyed that I am taking a picture and trying really hard not to smile (but failing miserably).

I took a few (very few) other random photos during this week, but mostly I just wanted to share those from our annual apple picking outing. This seems to be how we always kick off the fall season. I absolutely love the excitement of school starting, but after a few days the adrenaline wears off and I struggle to find my way back into the routine of school, schedules, homework, and more rigorous instrument practicing (times two this year). This means that I tend to feel a little “off” throughout much of September. But by the time apple picking season rolls around, I’ve usually settled into my groove and I’m ready to soak up everything about the absolute best time of year to live in New England.

Playing at the Nature Center after school.

New sparkle sneakers.

Paper necklaces made by Claire at school… one for herself and each of her sisters (red for Claire, blue for Ella, yellow for Lucy).

The first half of the week was mostly about finally settling into the rhythm and routine of the school year. Then on Thursday evening, Matt and his four siblings each traveled to St. George, Utah to surprise their dad for his 75th birthday.

Birthday key lime pie.

Beau actually figured out the big secret before they all arrived, but I know he was still really touched to have all of his kids there. As wonderful as it is to be together with all the in-laws and grandchildren, I think it was a pretty special experience to just have the original 7 Woodburys together for a weekend. They spent their time golfing, shopping, eating, and playing a game of Woodbury Family Jeopardy put together by Matt’s brother Todd. It included questions like “What nickname did Thomas & Leslie give to Leslie’s high school boyfriend?” (Trust me, you really don’t want to know the answer.)

The “original” seven (I can’t help but laugh at the Brigham Young photo bomb on the left).

Matt and his siblings, arranged conveniently in birth order even though Matt claims it wasn’t planned.

Meanwhile, while Matt was gone I packed up the girls and headed to New Jersey for a girls’ weekend with my sister-in-law Melissa and her four girls.

Lucy and Abby.

A few iPhone snaps from the weekend (clockwise from left): (1) Lucy was distraught the first night when I went to put her to sleep in the Pack ‘n Play she always sleeps in when we stay in New Jersey. I gave in and let her sleep in her sleeping bag on the floor with her big sisters but told her that if she got up I would put her straight into the crib. You better believe she didn’t move the entire night. I guess she really is growing up (although I’m still not ready to move her out of the crib at home). (2) The girls posing as notable figures in Princeton University history. (3) Holding hands with cousin Alex.

This was the week my girls got to be flower girls in our babysitter Diana’s wedding.

Diana – or “Nina” as Lucy calls her – has been watching my kids for three years, starting back when Ella was still in preschool, Claire was just barely a toddler, and before there even was a Lucy. In fact, she was the one who watched Ella & Claire while Lucy was being born since we didn’t have any family nearby at the time. Diana splits her time between us and two other families, and I thought it was so sweet that she included all of “her kids” in the wedding.

The groom is from India so there was a Hindu ceremony first, which was fascinating since it was so different from my own wedding, or for that matter any wedding I have ever seen before. My favorite part was the baraat, or groom’s procession, during which the groom rides a white mare to the wedding venue. A drummer and dancers are part of the procession and I absolutely loved how joyful and celebratory the whole thing was; so fitting for a wedding!

After the Hindu ceremony was the more traditional ceremony that my girls participated in. I was really nervous about how Lucy would do, but she ended up pretty much stealing the show. She came out last (out of 6 flower girls) with a very determined look on her face, and she made sure that every single petal in her basket made it onto the ground, one by one. Claire of course loves anything involving a pretty dress, but I was surprised at how much Ella enjoyed the whole experience as well (you should have seen the look of horror on her face when she saw what she would have to wear). I think it had a little something to do with feeling like she was the center of attention.

At the reception: (left) the card Ella made for the bride and groom, and (right) watching the first dance. Afterward Ella got a chance to dance with the groom, and she later said that was her favorite part of the whole wedding.

This was also Claire’s first full week of school. She was so excited to finally eat lunch at school with her brand new pink lunchbox.

Last year Claire only went to school three mornings a week, and this year she is going every day (four full days and one half day). I agonized over the decision of whether she was ready for that much school and fully expected her to be exhausted and falling asleep every day during the car ride home that first week, so I was pleasantly surprised to find her happy and still full of energy when I picked her up that first afternoon. Since then she has never once fallen asleep in the car after school (or at home afterward) and she is thriving at school.

I am getting used to the new school routines, which now means packing two lunches most mornings. I love how much you can tell about Ella & Claire based on the magnets they chose for their lunchboxes (Ella is using the same luncbox as last year; I just let her pick a new set of magnets). Claire’s chose a rainbow theme with flying hearts, butterflies, and a unicorn, while Ella went with the rock star theme.

There’s no school for Lucy this year, but I did sign her up for a mommy & me ballet class. I normally don’t do “mommy & me” except for Music Together, but Lucy spent all of last year lying on the floor outside of Claire’s ballet studio trying to get a glimpse of the little ballerinas inside and occasionally throwing a fit when she didn’t get to stay in Claire’s class. Since she isn’t old enough to do a class on her own, and she is now at home most days without her two older sisters to keep her company, I figured the least I could do was take a ballet class with her. She was so ridiculously excited about her new dance attire and could not stop talking about gong to “baw-ay.”

But then we actually got to class and she made me hold her the entire time while *I* did all the dancing. Oh yes, I remembered as I was tiptoeing across the “tightrope” made out of blue tape on the floor, this is why I don’t sign up for mommy & me classes.

Afterward, she twirled around her room showing off her dance moves and then sat in her rocking chair and lied to me about how much she liked ballet. Maybe she’ll warm up next time… or maybe I will just be a really awesome ballerina by the end of the semester!

Labor Day in New Jersey. With the Shontz cousins’ recent move to the area, the East Coast contingency of cousins now outnumbers those out west 12 to 7 (Ryan, Lauren, & Lily are not pictured here).

These water bottles go pretty much everywhere with my girls. I love that they keep drinks super cold so that the ice doesn’t fully melt even after an entire day (I have turned my kids into ice fanatics just like me).

While helping me make banana bread, Lucy managed to find a way to one up her big sisters in the licking the batter department. I guess she figured why wait for me to actually remove the beaters from the mixer?

I love the elaborate Playmobil worlds that Ella and Claire create.

Ella’s family portrait. I told her to draw us at her favorite place to go together and she chose the beach. Notice that she made sure to point out her new Dragon sneakers. I just bought them for her to wear to gym at school and they are her new prized possession.

Lucy is having a hard time adjusting to being without her sisters during the day. This was Ella’s second week back at school and Claire just started her “phase-in” days at preschool. On Thursday after I dropped Claire off at a friend’s house so they could play and then go to school together, Lucy cried all the way home saying she needed Claire, and then cried for an additional 30 minutes or so for good measure after we got home. She was not interested in being consoled, so what else to do but pull out my iPhone camera and capture the moment?

I couldn’t resist including this screen shot of Matt’s team name for his office fantasy football league. Matt did not pick the name out himself; it was given to him by his co-workers. Apparently at work they call him the CHO – Chief Hair Officer – because they can’t get over how much his hair looks like Mitt Romney’s. I had never noticed it before but I guess I do see some resemblance (Matt vs. Mitt). And just to maintain my political neutrality, this is not an endorsement of Mitt Romney for President. Just an endorsement of his hair.

First day of second grade.

We were all very happy that the start of school was not delayed by a hurricane this year.

Traditional first day of school cookies.

The cookies are a very calculated tool to help get Ella talking so that I can get the low down on the first day. If you didn’t watch the video of Ella’s thoughts on second grade that I posted a couple of weeks ago, you can see it here.

Matt had one of his fantasy football drafts this week and brought this monstrosity home with him afterward. If you take a close look at the back, you can see that Matt has had a pretty good streak going in this particular league that he’s in with a bunch of friends from his MBA program. (PS: The name of the trophy is some sort of inside joke, and has nothing to do with where Matt actually went to school.)

I actually had this trophy sitting on the mantle for a day or two before I took it out to the garage. When Ella saw it out there she asked Matt if he was offended that I moved it. His response was that he was surprised I hadn’t done it sooner.

Claire drew this violin as part of her first violin lesson this week. I’m excited for her to start playing, but also slightly nervous about now having to supervise two practice sessions every day.

On Friday night we celebrated the end of summer with a town-sponsored movie night at the beach. It’s evenings like this one that make me fall in love with where we live. Sometimes I do a double take when I realize that my children will grow up calling this little corner of the East Coast home, a place so different in many ways from where I was raised, but then I’m reminded that different isn’t necessarily a bad thing.

What made the night even better was that we had family there with us. Matt’s sister, her husband, and their five kids just moved into town from London. It has been almost six years since we’ve had family less than two hours away from us, so it is surreal to think that my kids will now have five cousins just minutes away. We shared a pizza dinner on the beach and then Ella, Claire, and cousin Brooke got to work building a seashell fortress.

Later on Aunt Ashley took the kids down near the water to explore.

Lucy found a new buddy in cousin Will.

Am I the only one who thinks they could almost pass for twins? I can already tell this is just the beginning of a beautiful friendship.

Our bedtime stories ritual always seems to be changing and evolving. Lately we have started taking turns picking out books to read aloud at night (yes, Mom and Dad get a turn too). When it is her turn, Ella likes to read the books aloud herself, which of course means Claire wants to do the same thing when it is her turn. Since Claire doesn’t read yet, sometimes Ella will sit next to her and whisper the words in her ear while Claire repeats them out loud… and other times Claire will just make up a very imaginative story of her own to go along with the pictures.

Teacher assignments arrived in the mail and Ella was so excited that she got the teacher she wanted. “I want to start tomorrow!” she screamed. When I asked why she wanted that teacher so badly, she replied that “she just seems nice.” She also really liked the “BEE Binders” she saw in this teacher’s classroom when she visited at the end of first grade and wanted one for herself.

Matt and I celebrated our 13th anniversary this week.

We went to a fabulous little restaurant for our anniversary dinner. If you live in the area, I can’t recommend it enough. You wouldn’t think apricots and ricotta cheese on toast would be life changing, but it truly was.

The oil delivery truck arrived this week, which means summer is really coming to an end and cooler weather (and depressingly high oil bills) must be right around the corner. The cost of oil heat is one thing I don’t think I’ll ever get used to about living in this part of the country.

School starts on Monday which means our pool days are almost over. These striped towels have been a staple this summer. Ella always claims the blue one, Claire the purple, and Lucy by default is left with red.

While Ella was trying on a pair of new school shoes, I worried out loud if she would grow out of them too fast. “Don’t worry Mom, I stay small for a long time” was her response, which is completely accurate… I think Claire will catch up to her shoe size sooner rather than later, even though they are almost three whole years apart!

(Disclaimer: photo taken with Matt’s Blackberry)

Ella and Claire got to attend their first NFL game at MetLife Stadium on Friday (a pre-season Giants game against the Chicago Bears). Matt was invited to the game by a work colleague, and I was originally supposed to go with him but couldn’t find a sitter on short notice so he took the older girls instead. I have never been to an NFL game so I was a little jealous, not so much about the game itself but about the fact that they got to sit in Commissioner’s Club seats with a gourmet buffet (including lobster, filet mignon, and fresh sushi) and all the snacks and treats they could eat.

When I asked for a rundown of everything they ate at the game I got this impressive list:
hot dog, french fries, “a whole batch of candy,” popcorn, soft pretzel, potato chips, ice cream with chocolate fudge, more candy, and one last redeeming item… lots of water. Ella and Claire each got their own “swag bag” as well: an Eli Manning backpack filled with stickers, pencils, pom poms (Claire said she’d always wanted a pom pom), and NY Giants chapstick, among other things. The Giants lost but the girls definitely had a night to remember. I was happy that they got the chance to go, even if it meant that I missed out on free lobster. At least they brought me home a big bag of Swedish Fish!

Have I ever told you that I have a thing for biscuits? I’m not sure why; maybe it has something to do with
my dad’s Southern roots. Or my affinity for carbs. All I know is that I love
biscuits.

I still remember a completely unmemorable trip to San Diego that I took 10 years ago for a public accounting training session (yes, public accounting training sessions truly are as boring as they sound) solely because I ate at a restaurant while there that served amazing biscuits. Drizzled with honey. Those biscuits still haunt my dreams.

So when I heard about this place in Portland, I knew we had to go.

One Pine State Fried Club for Matt. One fruit & whip biscuit for me. One side of fried green tomatoes to share.

One happy girl.

Before heading back across the country, we drove through the Columbia River Gorge (which, in my opinion, is one of the most beautiful places on earth) to spend some time with my dad and sister.

We went on a short hike that turned out to be not so short after all.

But finding wild Oregon blackberries growing along the trail made it worth it. I have told my girls stories about how I used to pick and eat blackberries growing wild near my home as a kid (they literally grow everywhere), so I loved that they were able to experience this in person.

I think Lucy liked them.

The girls with Aunt Emily…

… and the next morning with Grandpa Paul.

And then just like that, our 10-day West Coast trip was over and it was time to fly back home and enjoy the last two weeks of summer before the start of school.

The Olympics in London may have ended while we were away, but they were still going strong in our house after we returned. Here are the girls playing Olympics gymnastics in their swimsuits. Ella was the coach, and Claire and Lucy were gymnasts Jordyn (named after actual Olympic gymnast Jordyn Wieber) and Lily (named after actual baby cousin Lily), respectively. I kept overhearing Ella in the living room instructing Claire and Lucy to put chalk on their hands and do “double twists.” Hello cuteness.

On Saturday, after having a few days to recover from our travels, we
decided it was time to head into New York for the day and visit the Met,
something we haven’t done before with the girls.

We took a tip from Design Mom and stopped at the gift shop first to let the girls pick out a postcard. Then while we went through the museum, we had them try to spot the original from their postcard.

Ella was especially into this idea. She has loved Van Gogh ever since she learned about him in preschool when she was three years old, and was very excited to find this self-portrait from the postcard that she picked out. After the museum we had dinner and dessert at a brand new bistro/bakery, Sugar & Plumm, on the Upper West Side. And with that, another summer week was in the books.

While we were in Oregon, the girls mostly just wanted to stay at Grandma’s house and play. My mom had out all of my childhood toys and my kids absolutely could not get enough of them. We are talking about an entire collection of vintage Fisher Price Little People, my American Girl doll Samantha (which you can no longer purchase) and all of her accessories, and all of my old stuffed animals, including a killer whale that had this inscription written in my own 7-year-old handwriting on the tag:
“This is Baby Kandu born June 22, 1987, at Sea World.” What are the chances that my own 7-year-old Ella had actually asked for a killer whale stuffed animal at the beginning of the summer? Of course, we had to bring Baby Kandu home with us at the end of our trip.

We did manage to drag the girls away from Grandma’s House of Fun for a few outings, however.

Claire has has been dying to see an elephant in person (she was very disappointed that there were none at the Central Park Zoo when we visited last month), so I knew one of our first stops once we got to Portland would be to take her to visit the elephants at the Oregon Zoo. I know there are elephants closer to home, but I grew up visiting Packy and friends so I couldn’t pass up a chance to bring Claire here. After the elephants, the giraffes were her second favorite animal there.

Haystack Rock, Cannon Beach, OR

One of the most iconic places from my childhood is Cannon Beach on the Oregon Coast. On the countless trips I took there with my family, our first stop was always the Cannon Beach Bakery. Without fail, my sister and I got doughnuts (chocolate iced for me), my dad got a cheese stick (or two), and we would get a bag of seagull food for the beach. The bakery is now in a different location and doesn’t look anything like it did when I was a kid, but I still can’t make a trip to Cannon Beach without stopping there first. They no longer sell seagull food, and I got a cheese stick (or two) this time instead of a doughnut, but it still felt like old times.

Meanwhile, my kids all got chocolate chip cookies roughly the size of their heads. After the bakery, it was time to head down to the beach.

Sweatshirt weather in August… only in Oregon.

Clockwise from left: (1) Matt and Ella walking on the beach, (2) a heart drawn in the sand by Claire, and (3) my seashell and rock collector.

Beach twirling.

One morning, we got up and headed straight to downtown Portland for breakfast.

We had to be tourists and make a stop at Voodoo Doughnut, since I’ve heard so much about it.

The line was about an hour long. We were told that the only way to avoid a line was to come at 4am. There was a crew from the Travel Channel filming a show while we were there (not sure exactly which one, but it is supposed to air sometime in December). They interviewed the man standing right in front of us, so maybe we will make a cameo as well?

After our long wait (thankfully my kids had been trained to stand in lines at Disneyland earlier in the week), we finally got our doughnuts.

Matt and I each chose the bacon maple bar, Ella and Lucy got the “Marshall Matters” M&M doughnut, my mom opted for a classic French crueller, and Claire decided on the very pinkalicious Dubble Bubble doughnut…

… of which she enjoyed every. single. bite. And afterwards she even shared the piece of bubble gum in the middle with her sisters.

Matt and I haven’t been to Portland in over three years, and the whole time he kept commenting on how all those episodes of Portlandia we’ve watched now make so much more sense to him. There’s definitely no place quite like it, but I think that’s a good thing. And all I know is, it will always feel like home to me.