It seems like it was 5 minutes ago that I took this picture of Ian on his first day of preschool in September:
The year flew by and before I knew it, it was time for end of year pictures.
Here he was before his last day of preschool:
This year, the end of school is a touch more bittersweet. Ian will be attending preschool at the elementary school in our neighborhood instead of the school he’s been going to for 2 years. The new school will be the same school he’ll be attending for Kindergarten through Fifth grade. Having to say goodbye to the First Trinity is hard but we know he’ll love the new school. (AND Matthew will be attending Ian’s old school in a few short weeks!)
First Trinity has a tradition of doing a school-wide field trip to a local farm at the end of the school year. Last year, Ian was pretty hesitant around the animals and pretty much had a breakdown when he was expect to wait his turn for the tractor ride. This year went much better!
Pictures before we left for the farm. The kids in each class decorated shirts to wear for the day. Ian’s shirt was sooo cute!
Arriving at the farm:
Ian posing with Daddy and waving to someone he knows:
Posing with me:
With his teacher (we just loved her!):
Waiting for the tour to start:
Checking out the pig:
Checking out the little chicks:
Ian can be a little fussy about stuff so the fact that he was willing to pet the animals on the tour was absolutely shocking to Mike and me.
He was waaay freaked out about this tractor though and wouldn’t get close for a pictures. LOL
They brought out a goat to demonstrate how to milk it.
Ian was far more interested in it than we expect (are you sensing a theme here?!?) and went up to pet it.
Apparently, Ian thought the goat was peeing. LOL
He was very interested in trying to milk the goat and got into line.
He chatted with his buddy Ben about it too.
Then, it was Ian’s turn!
Can you believe my Ian did that?!?!
Next we saw some rabbits:
At this point, we started losing Ian a bit. He really was done with the animals and ready to check out the tractor ride.
First we had to check out the horses.
See all the awards/ribbons the horses had won?
Ian was being distracting at this point so I don’t know what kind of horse this was. What I do know is that it’s rear end was taller than me. The man in this picture was probably 6’2″.
An adorable little miniature horse:
Ian being punished by having a photo taken in front of the “how many hands tall are you?” sign:
Next up, TRACTOR RIDE!!!
Ok, not literally a tractor ride. A tractor pulled a wagon around the fields. We got to sit in the wagon directly behind the tractor/driver.
Hence the giant smile.
Our wagon mates:
The tractor and 300-year old tractor driver:
Self-portrait during the tractor ride:
Video of our ride:
Big smiles after the ride:
After all that adventure and braveness, going for a pony ride ended up being the part of our day that nearly broke Ian. We couldn’t seem to talk Ian into going on the pony ride.
After lots of begging and a little bit of bribery, we got Ian on the horse.
And look at the smile when we did!
And bless their hearts, they actually stop a few seconds down the path so the parents can take a picture!
Video of his ride:
After the pony ride, we just let Ian explore as he saw fit until it was time to go.
Checking out a random go-cart:
And the sandbox:
Feeling brave enough to sit on a tractor:
And one final picture with me and Daddy:
Ian did AWESOME and we were so proud. I sure do love that boy!
We’re heading out on our beach vacation very soon. I don’t think I have to explain how much needed this vacation is.
In honor of our upcoming vacation, this week and next week will be Outerbanks-style flashbacks. The quality of the pictures aren’t wonderful because they’re low resolution scans of printed, film camera pictures.
And, in honor of Mike’s birthday tomorrow:
Mike’s birthday fell during our last trip to the Outerbanks. To celebrate, we threw him a surprise “Finding Nemo” party.
Outerbanks, NC
August 21, 2003
Click HERE to see it larger!
Scrapping resources:
-Template: Little Moments, Big Memories-Week/Digital Scrapbook Place
-Background #1: Cabanarama by Brandy Buffington/2ps
-Background #2, background #3 and week stamps: A Year to Remember: Project 365 by Little Dreamer Designs
-Days of week and “week of” labels: Cathy Zielske’s Layered Template 26 at Designer Digitals
-Alpha: Times New Roman
Now that I’m nearly 2/3rds of my way through the year, I thought I’d share my thoughts on this project.
While I enjoy looking back over the pictures and layouts I did at the start of the project and I appreciate all of the things I documented that I surely would have forgotten, I seriously doubt I’ll ever take on a daily project like this again. Even though I know in 1, 5, 10 years I’m going to love the results of this project, I don’t think I’ll ever try another daily photo project.
Taking the photos is kind of a pain in the rump. Not entirely because I’m a bit of a photo-aholic. But, it’s a lot of pressure trying to come up with something worth taking a photo of and worthy of a paragraph explanation. Sometimes life really isn’t that exciting.
And the sheer volume of pictures is overwhelming. I tend to take a lot of photos because I don’t know what will make a good story on a daily basis. So here I am, struggling to stay on top of my weekly layouts and almost 4 months behind on pictures. While I’m never “on top” of the photo situation, 4 months backlog is nuts.
And because I’m behind and because I’ve overwhelmed with the project, I tend to take far fewer pictures “just because”. It seems like 75% of the time the camera is out with the motive of getting a good P365 shot. I miss just being able to pick up the camera for fun. I don’t pick the camera up because I don’t want to deal with MORE pictures to edit.
And who the heck knows if anyone even bothers reading them.
Anyway, I know I’ll appreciate it in the long run but I’m going to be darn glad when 12/31/10 hits and I’m FREEEEEE! 🙂
Click HERE to see it larger!
Scrapping resources:
-Template: Little Moments, Big Memories-Week/Digital Scrapbook Place
-Background #1: Cabanarama by Brandy Buffington/2ps
-Background #2, background #3 and week stamps: A Year to Remember: Project 365 by Little Dreamer Designs
-Days of week and “week of” labels: Cathy Zielske’s Layered Template 26 at Designer Digitals
-Alpha: Times New Roman