In An Envelope…
Written by joythebaker on November 17, 2009 – 12:29 am -
Here’s a fun fact: my Mom is a scrapbooker. She’s a serious scrapbooker. She’s got the paper cutters, the corner choppers, the fancy albums and colorful background paper… there are stickers…. so so many stickers. She’s for real. Scrapbooking is the new rubber stamping. Remember the rubber stamp craze!? Yea, we’ve moved on. Scrapbooking.
I went to my parents’ house a few days ago to find these envelopes gracing the brick fireplace. The envelope in front had my name on it. I was hoping for an early Christmas stocking. Boy oh boy did I get it. Among other darling and embarrassing photos of myself, I found a chronological history of my school days. From preschool to high school. Every cute, awkward and downright horrifying picture.
Now. Because I don’t know any better. Because I’m certifiably batty… allow me to share with you preschool through seventh grade. The later, more awkward years will follow, and we’ll all cry.
Though she will deny it, my Mom gave me this haircut herself. I remember very well. Even at four, I knew how ridiculous I looked.
First grade. Somehow I think I rise above this bowl haircut.
Second grade. That tiny headband is failing…. big time. Nice frock. I would totally rock that these days. Is that weird? That’s weird.
Nice corner fading third grade! I feel like there are some serious adult teeth hiding out in that mouth.
Oooh yes. Full of teeth. You have to grow into your teeth. It’s true. It’s like puppies with big paws. Should I tell you how much I loved this Cinco de Mayo dress with matching hair ribbon? Yes. A lot.
Mixed girl hair is a hard thing. It wants to be curly. It wants to be straight. It wants to ruin your life. What are you going to do? Button your shirt all the way up and hope for the best.
a) Why do the school photographers make you look in the ceiling corner. It’s awkward.
b) I thought this shirt was so clever. I was right.
Oooh Joy . Triangle hair. So short. So much volume. I wish I could have gone back in time to tell you everything would work out ok… but the truth is that you’ve got some seriously awkward years ahead of you. Yeesh.
Enjoy the kitchen intermission. Laugh at me. Please… go on… laugh. If your Mom is a scrapbooker, you might not want to laugh as hard. Your time for an embarrassing envelope will come.
Tags: Beyond the Kitchen, Joy the Baker, photos
Posted in Beyond the Kitchen, Thoughts, life | 106 Comments »
ooh i adore a photo history like this!!! my dad has taken millions of pictures of me, and i also cringe when i see the silliness that was/is me at times. nevertheless, the memories are precious! thanks for sharing yours
I may or may not have some VERY similar photos! It’s good to be able to laugh at yourself…right??
very endearing…good notes for me to take when raising our kids!
Ohhhh yes I know well the trauma that is photo-day for curly-wavy-haired young girls. Did you ever have the photographer attack you at the last minute with a spray bottle and a comb? No? Just me?
Your photos are darling, of course. I made the mistake of trying to *look* like I was smiling instead of actually smiling. I would gingerly rest my upper teeth on my bottom lip while pulling the corners of my mouth back. I’ll let you practice that in the mirror now…
We, ourselves, truly our worst critics because I think you look beautiful in every single one of those photos. I wish I had all my childhood photos.
I had that exact same half polka dot/ half flower print button up collared shirt! I also had problems with tiny headbands…I feel your pain!
I had that same triangle cut in 7th grade! Ha! I had the brilliant idea to *perm* my hair and have that cut, for extra frizziness. Add mint-colored glasses and I was a winner.
And Joy, you may not like these early pics, but your eyes are *stunning* in them. Seriously. Gorgeous color!
you look like fairuza balk.
Hi Joy!
We appear to have a couple of things in common! My mom is also a serious scrapbooker, she even has that cricut thing that cuts paper into all sorts of shapes. I also received a childhood scrapbook, last Christmas, with all my school photos in. And last but not least, I also have dark, curly/straight hair that’s almost impossible to tame!
Great post, and I love the rest of your blog too!
Lisa
Your pictures are so cute! You haven’t changed (except your hairstyle). At least your pictures are better than mine!
Oh, Joy. You crack me up. May I call you Joy? Being that you just shared these amazing little school-day flashbacks with all of us, I guess it’s acceptable.
I would like to say that I for one, appreciate all and I do mean ALL of your circa-elementary school hairstyles.
I was the kid whose mother actually allowed her to sport a GIGANTIC, gauzy hideous hair bow and a half bottle of Pantene Pro-V hairspray to hide budding “baby hairs.” That whole in the the O-zone layer? It’s my fault. To make up for it I carry my own bags to the grocery store and drink out of a nalgene. I hope it’s helping.
Sigh. The things we did when we were too young to care.
Anyway, yours is one of my all-time favorite blogs. sometimes I cannot read it at work without having to explain the outright laughter. That’s a good sign.
you are adorable at every stage! you are totally right about growing into your teeth! my chompers looked HUGE in third grade. My eyebrows are the one thing that really changed over the years….maybe one day I will divulge!
*hole
(in the o-zone layer)
Not whole.
I hate it when people do that. I hate it when I do that. I have an English degree. Okay no more comment-hog.
You were such a cute child. Your comments really cracked me up. You have said what we all feel when looking back at school pictures. Thanks for the laughs on a gloomy day in Iowa.
i think i had that exact same cinco de mayo dress, or at least a very similar version!!
Hi Joy ~ I’ve been following your blog and love it. Thank you for your openness. It’s very refreshing!! When my mom passed away 15 years ago I realized how important our photos and family stories are and created an album from the envelope of photos she had given me. Before my grandma got alzheimers I made an album with her where she wrote all the stories of growing up. These are some of my favorite treasures. We ALL have the awkward photos from our childhood unfortunately but you are so lucky that your mom is making albums with some of them. Someday when she is gone, you will turn the pages of those books and be so glad she was a scrapbooker.
love it! and i am the scrapbooker in this family
This is awesomeness! Serious awesomness.
I had the same exact hair and it sucked! I wish someone taught my six-year old self how to do a proper blow-out or gave me some frizz serum or something. I always wanted to brush my hair like all the other girls. It wasn’t in the cards for me.
Okay I totally had that last haircut (but it was a frizzy mess on picture day) in the 7th grade! You were the cutest little girl.
My mother has every picture from pre-K to 12th grade in an 8×11 frame in the living room. Every year she just put the new picture on top of the old one. And yes – she will take it off the wall to share with boyfriends when they come over (I guess to show them what their kids would look like?).
Thanks for sharing! =)
Everyone has pictures like this hiding somewhere….thumbs up to you for posting them! I know I had horribly giant red plastic glasses and braces and wore a matching red dress in one picture…my mother claims it’s her favorite! oh mothers
Aww..you look so cute! I just love your eyes..so pretty!
My worst photo has got to be my 4th grade school portrait. I had worn a hideous purple and pink striped shirt and decieded to match it with purple skinny jeans with a matching sneakers and a hairband to boot.
Worst part..my mom loved that photo so much that she enlarged it and framed it in the living room. So, everytime I go home, I’m faced with this awkward purple monster staring down at me. Yikes!
Your four year old photo is especially adorable! My aunt was in beauty school and practiced on my hair for my second grade photo…a classic school photo nightmare:)
Oooo, lawdy!! I’m giggling myself silly over here… Oh the memories this brings back for me. My hair was just fine until 3rd grade, when I begged my mom to let me get my ass-length ringlets cut into a bob. With bangs. It was a bad move. And fashion basically went downhill around that time too, I mean, not that the early 80’s were spectacular or anything, but late 80’s through early 90’s… ughhhhh! That’s really all I have to say about that.
your 1st grade bowl cut is super cute aktually
I have a fantastic one from the 3rd grade where I had decided to give myself a fringe (bangs) It was a secret fringe operation so I locked myself in the pantry (in the dark) without a mirror & snipped them. They ended up about 1/2 an inch long & fluffy.
Not only did I have lousy hair for about 6 months my mum grounded me for cutting my own hair.
OMG, those are hysterical. Sorry, I totally laughed. Don’t worry, pictures of me at that age are equally funny.
Last Thurs, Nov 12, I met your mom on a flight from LA to Denver. We chatted for the whole 2.5hr flight — what a delightful lady. Your dad was sleeping so didn’t get a chance to visit with him.
She of course, suggested I look at your blog — a very proud mom indeed.
You do have a very fun site and I look forward to reading much of it.
Rita, Gunnison, CO
Rita! That’s so sweet! I’m so glad you stopped by to say hello! Lovely! My Dad is a habitual napper… too bad you didn’t get to chat with him too… he’s pretty hilarious!
Wow..I have the almost EXACT same photo as the last one you posted. Pink shirt, gold chain, slowly coming down from enormous hair hair, blue background. Crazy! Mine is circa 1992 I think!
Thank you for the picture parade. I just recently went through all my grade school pictures and cringed the whole time-but its days like those that keep you humble and remind you that even that icky guy I work with probably has horrific grade school photos too.
Dont worry, my 5th-8th grade pictures include a horrible poddle perm on my very fine very blonde hair….ugh
i LOVE this. glad you shared
Thanks so much for the kind comment on my blog today. You have made my day! I feel like I need to blog about Joy the Baker checking out my humble blog. And how cool that it was the day I posted your Root Beer Float Cake. Thanks again!
it’s always fun to look at old school photos.
Joy, you were beautiful right from the beginning. You have those big cartoon Bambi eyes! My sister has big lovely eyes like that as well.
Your school photos remind me a lot of mine – except my mom allowed me to style myself (including hair accessories) for my school photos so every year I look all kinds of CRRAZY.
Hahaha! Love the photos….remind me so much of mine…except my mother saved nothing so I don’t have any school pictures to look at anymore? You didn’t get photos in front of the wagon wheel? haha! I thought every kid in America had to deal with the ugliness of the wagon wheel.
At least the evidence of your childhood hair and fashion missteps are contained within an envelope and scrapbook (or would have been..lol)..my mother has a wall of shame and takes great pride in framing our more unfortunate moments for the whole world to see!!!
Great entry
That was fun. In my forth grade photo I’m wearing the ugliest shirt ever made. It had a farm pattern which was repeated all over the shirt. The worst part about it was that my Mom loved it so much that my sister’s fourth grade picture was in the same shirt.
In the last school pic, you are looking very much like Lucy from the movie, “The lion the witch & the wardrobe.”
yeah, school picts. don’t know why our parents forced us to take school pictures but everyone else was, too. The blind following the blind kind of thing.
Now that I have 3 kids school age, no, we don’t have them do school picts. Not when our friends, uber-good photographers, take much much much much (X 1 billion) pictures.
Oh Joy, those pictures were awesome! Very cute! I agree with the mixed girl hair being horrid. Mine is constantly frizzy and to make matters worse, I had the huge plastic glasses up until high school. lol! Thank you so much for sharing! =)
Ummm, you’re a Jackson. That’s all there is to it.
-Sarah
I’m going to dig up the picture of me in 2nd grade with big tears in my eyes and braids brought up on both sides like puppy dog tails – why oh why?
Oh geez! I think I have it worse than scrapbooks. My mom has every stinking photo of me from K-12th grade framed on the wall going upstairs to the second floor. Size 8×10!! Talk about embarassment when friends and boyfriends come over! My husband still makes fun of me and remembers the first time he saw “the wall!” Atleast I have two sisters that have to deal with the same pain!
Love it. I would be very afraid to share some of my hair styles.
Hair!! the bane of our existence, at least you did not have to suffer pin curls every night!
I agree….mixed girl hair is a lot to deal with…but you have to admit…the drama of it makes it worth it:)
Great blog:)
My mom has them in a plastic bin, ready for scrapbooking! Same torture ride through the 80s. She was partial to cutting a huge fringe of bangs, like starting at the top of the head or those evil sponge rollers for school pictures. awful.
i am totally laughing– sorry! more to do with your commentary…the photos are really super cute!
You looked so cute in all of them! And I love the triangle cut on you, no matter how poofy the hair got. I agree, mixed-girl hair can be a blessing and a curse. I’m half black and half white–what are you?
I love your 7th grade picture! It’s very Molly Ringwold era-styling…if you weren’t going for that, sorry, I don’t mean it in a bad way at all!
I fear for the day we have to clean out the “picture drawers” in my mom’s house…there are some scary historical shots in there…oh yeah.
Wow, it’s like the evolution of man posters… LOL.
Hey Joy. Just wanted to take this opportunity to say I am very happy for you and extremely proud of you. You’re an amazing person, full of talent and greatness and I am glad you’re unleashing it on the world one set of tastebuds at a time… Though your writing was never anything to sneeze at, either. And photography seems to be treating you quite well…
Pick up an instrument and you’re a Rennaisance Woman.
Anyways, Be Well.
Danny
Ok, I know that you MUST know these are seriously cute pictures. Pretty blue eyed girl you were/are!
My 8th grade photo is used to get terrorists to confess…. nuff said.