Tips for making family yearbooks

look what we got in the mail today!

Our newest Team Studer family yearbook to add to our collection, which makes our coverage through six years now:  every year of our family since having kids!

I first started making our family yearbooks in 2012 and as you can see above, as it was my first year and I had little self control, I went overboard with photo selection and ended up making two books just to cover the one year! As time has gone on, I have become more selective as to what makes it into our yearbooks and how they are organized.

I try to make our yearbooks cover most of the things that make up our days in any given year.  A glimpse into what it is like to be in our family for that time (kind of like my Around Here posts but only stretched out over the course of an entire year).  It is one of my very favorite activities to sit and look back through the years over a cup of tea in the afternoon with kids asking questions about every page and begging, "when can we do that again!?"

some photos of older yearbooks' spreads

Now, six years experience under my belt of making yearbooks, I know what I like and how to make it possible to continue this activity - even with a plate full of kid raising and activities that we always have going on.  This is something that's important to me personally, and also a responsibility that I feel like I have as the in-house memory keeper (and photo taker).  It is definitely hard work, but every time we get a new yearbook (or look through past ones) I'm reminded again at how important I think they are.

Here are my top five tips for creating family yearbooks without losing your mind:

1.Organize your photos:  Keep your photos somewhere all together and in an organized way that you know what you are looking at.  I keep my 'real' camera photos (from my DSLR) on my laptop organized by month of the year.  I upload those photos to my Shutterfly albums (also organized by month) occasionally through the year.  I do the same for the photos I take on my phone and upload them (organized by month) through the Shutterfly app to keep both 'real' camera photos and phone photos all together for each month.  So when I'm making my yearbooks, I can easily find photos from someone's birthday to add to the yearbook.  And it helps remind me the events or moments that need added to the yearbook after I give the month albums a glance over and realizing I completely forgot about that trip to the water park!





2.Don't be in a rush:  It honestly takes me about six months (at least!) to complete our family yearbook.  I set time aside on Fridays in my planner that say "yearbook work" and as much time that the kids are willing to give me uninterrupted on each Friday - sometimes that's 20 minutes, sometimes that's an hour (thank you Netflix!) - and I do a page or two, or edit pages that are already done.  There are certainly options where the books can be made for you with a click of a button and the magic of the internet, but I like being in the driver's seat when it comes to photo selection/size/color theme/etc so it takes me a while to get it all polished and complete.





3.Think about layout:  one of the best decisions I made for my own sanity was to organize my yearbooks by category instead of going month by month.  Now I have a intro section which walks through our current family status, including a page for Dad & Mum where we answer questions about the year (what was our favorite tradition/event? our favorite husband&wife moment, #parentingfail of the year, our best lessons learned, our favorite family meals, and our struggles&challenges that year)

And in every one of the yearbooks, the kids each get their own page always with the same photo format (twelve photos around the border) and I write a little bit about the kind of kid they are right at this particular age (personality, likes/dislikes, favorites, hobbies, etc)

From there, the yearbook is divided into seven categories:
What was it like to live in our home this year?
With whom did we spend our days?
What milestones did we accomplish?
What gave us cause to celebrate?
What seasonal traditions did we enjoy?
Where did we go to visit?
What do the holidays feel like?

And then activities and moments are organized throughout those categories.  So things like my volunteer work with the alumni association goes under the Milestone category, and the first day of fishing season falls under seasonal traditions, etc.

4.Hop around the book while working on it - it doesn't have to be perfect the first time through.  I start by laying out the categories and then depending on how I'm feeling on any particular day determines what page I work on.  In the dead of winter, sometimes working on our summer days to the lake are just what the doctor ordered.  I also pull more photos than I need for any page and use them for my People pages (sections: with whom did we spend our days and what was it like to live in our home).  A picture of the grandparents at the hospital for Rustin's birth actually ended up on our family page instead of Rusty's birthday page.  Our family and friends' pages - along with the kids' individual pages get photos slipped in all along the way of creating the rest of the book.  (And usually the very last page done is the Dad & Mum questions because it helps us remember the last year as I do my final lookover of the whole book when it's done, hah!) 

5. Remind yourself that the real gift isn't the photos in the yearbook, it's the memories that the photos help you remember. The thought of this has helped me be much better about selecting the photos that make it into our yearbooks (I'd guess less than half the pictures I take all year make it into the actual yearbook!) I try to make sure the photos that go into the pages evoke the feeling of what it is like to live this life right now in this age and stage of our family.  The photos and pages themselves turn out to be jumping off points for reminiscing and laughing about particular things that happened.  We spend more time talking about the pictures and the past while looking at the books together than we do reading the captions.

Do you do a family yearbook of sorts?  Or how do you keep and cherish all the photos you take along the year?  Any helpful tips to share? 

I have used Shutterfly for every year of my yearbook creation because I have been loyal to them since they have without any issues have held all of my photos since 2004 when I was studying abroad in Costa Rica.  Those were back in the days when I had to upload & dump my camera card after every weekend trip while abroad and then pray to the internet gods that my only proof of my experience was being saved on the Shutterfly website.  It was.  AND STILL IS.  in perfect condition, so I will always be loyal to them. (thank you Shutterfly!)  I find their book creation easy and beautiful and they are also my go to for holiday cards, birthday invites, and photo gifts.  This post has not been sponsored.  I just have always had a great experience with them and I'm sharing the love for a company that has taken good care of my some of my most precious memories. xxox

my favorite photo from 2015

There are all kinds of mommas out there.  Some of us are really great at helping out at school and bringing in the best classroom snacks.  Some of us moms can clean and organize like nobody's business.  Some of us plan amazing parties, and some of us seem to balance it all effortlessly.  It takes all kinds of us mommas - so be proud of whatever it is that you bring to your village!

Personally, I'm the kind of mom that has her camera or phone out to snap pictures of the big events and of the everyday normal, boring stuff.  Our family yearbook is one of my very favorite things to create and is the biggest motivation to have my camera ready to snag the photos of what our days feel like right in this moment of very young kids where the days pass by in a bizarre and loud blur.  I'm the girl receiving regular reminders that my phone storage is low due to photo capacity.

When I was happily browsing Social Print Studio and daydreaming about my next purchase, I started wondering about choosing a single favorite photo from 2015.  I mean, could it even be done, just one single favorite photo?

I took a lot of photos that I really love over the course of 2015, it was a big one for us, after all.  We traveled to the Dominican Republic for a family vacation, we celebrated our baby's first birthday, our son started Kindergarten...it was a record year!  Even though I have loved tons of pictures from last year, it didn't take more than a few minutes to zero in on the number one favorite capture.  Out of all of those major events, my favorite photo actually comes from a regular moment on a regular day with our two girls.

I am one of three sisters, and for all my life, I will be grateful to be a sister of sisters.  For all my life, I will be grateful to be a mother of sisters.  A complete dialogue of a secret, silent language occurs within a glimpse between sisters.  Our husbands sit among us with furrowed eyebrows as the three of us hold entire conversations without ever finishing a sentence in it's entirety.

As with all siblings, there is a loyalty that runs deeper than comprehension, born into our bones through shared DNA and childhood memories.  But with sisters, that loyalty is laced with understanding and empathy and forgiveness.  I see this already in our girls at only four and a year and a half and my heart swells with joy and relief.  They will always have each other, and hopefully they'll also adopt their, future cousins and sisters-in-law into their little circle of giggling and shared desserts and unfinished sentences.

That's what this photo shines out for me; that secret language between sisters.  The mutual admiration and love and reverence that sisters extend to each other.  I imagine I will spend the rest of my life looking out at our two girls sharing a glance just as this one and I'll understand that secrets are being passed, even though I'll never quite know exactly what those secrets are without asking.  And that's just fine, because I'm content in knowing that they have each other, that I have a lifetime of motherhood to watch their relationship grow and flourish.
Our girls.
I will love this photo forever.

--

I have been a fan of Social Print Studio for a few years now, they have excellent products and make ordering prints of all of those instagram photos that tend to get stuck in cyberspace rather than printed super easy.  For two years, I have created and printed a collage of twelve of my favorite photos for the year to display in our staircase photo wall.  And the mini square prints are perfect to tack into our kids' baby books of all those magical little moments that is kind of what instagram photos are for.   One of my favorite and most unique Christmas gifts was the tearaway calendar that my brother in law gifted me once.  All of these thoughts are my own, and seriously, check them out - I can promise you that SPS is awesome.


ps. scf, i love you.

The County Fair

It's one of my favorite early fall traditions to head out to our local county fair with my parents for an evening.  We made good on that tradition in early September this year and spent a great evening riding rides, making memories, and visiting with the animals.  Here's a little recap of some serious family fun at the Cambria County Fair this year.

We headed out to the county fair on a night that had beautiful weather, we caught a quick bite to eat and then under the demands of the small children in our group - we made our way to the amusement rides because they needed to ride.all.the.rides.  Even our little Violet Mary (an old pro at riding the kiddie rides at this point, ha) was deliriously happy to get on as many rides as possible.

The big kids even braved the ferris wheel this year with Chum and Aunt Uch!  Greyson and Gemma enjoyed the kiddie rollercoaster while Violet cheered happily from the sidelines.  Violet loved riding the kiddie cars (she cried each time I took her off the ride) and the kids happily went through the mixed up house about twenty times.  Uch and I rode the salt and pepper shaker ride (upside down!) and then Brandon and I rode the Spider/Scrambler ride - both of which I just laughed/screamed the entire time.  Amusement parks are getting so much more fun now that the kids are getting taller and brave enough to ride 'real' rides.  Poor Gem was just shy by about an inch for the big rides, but we told her that by next year, she'll be on all of them right next to Booboo!

Violet got a special treat with Abba!  They took a ride on a camel!  Both Violet and Abba's first camel ride, hah!  Now that is one lucky baby.  Violet wasn't afraid at all and afterward spent some time staring at and speaking weird baby/camel sounds to him.

We spent time on the rides well into the dark and then headed over to the animal barns to visit with them for a little while.  It was getting late (and a school night!) so we went through a little quicker than we have in past years - the kids so interested in rides contributed to this too! - but the kids still love to look at all the animals and ask a million times when we're getting a horse/cow/sheep/goat/pig.  

Another memorable year of county fair memories for all of us!

Team Studer's 15 Most Beloved Children's Books

Let me start by saying that I have a fanatical hunger for buying books for our kids.  As a former educator and a lover of books myself, having a plentiful library for our kids is somewhat of an obsession of mine.  I want my kids to have 24/7 access to the classics and the new greats, my favorite books as a kid, informational nonfiction books, fairy tales, stories with lessons in them, and books that only come out for each holiday. The best books are the ones that keep them laughing and wondering long after we close them.

We've been reading to the kids since they were newborns, so sitting down to read together is one of the most natural things I do with the kids all day.  Our kids love listening to books because they love the stories, pictures, and our sound effects - but more so they love the undivided attention it brings with us.  In fact, when the day feels like it's all crumbling into a pile of madness; my first move is to tell the kids they each get to pick some books and we'll all take a 'time in' to read together.




As our children's library in the house is fairly large (and ever-growing!), it's always interesting to me to see which books the kids gravitate towards naturally.  There are books that I love most for different reasons (the moral in Little Blue Truck , the message in Players In Pigtails , etc) but the kids have favorites of their own and those are usually the ones that I have memorized from start to finish.  These are our Team Studer top 15 Most Beloved Children's books*

*And by our Most Beloved books, that means our most beat-up, taped, chewed, busted up books that are asked to be read over and over again.



Mercy Watson to the Rescue - by Kate DiCamillo
Kate DiCamillo is a writing genius.  This book, these characters, this world is our bedtime bread and butter (hah! pun intended if you've read this book).  I seriously might know all the words to this entire book by heart.  We also have Mercy Watson Fights Crime but DiCamillo's first Mercy Watson book is by far our favorite.  Greyson and Gemma both love this story and I know exactly what page Gemma will drift off to sleep.  It's a chapter book, but we read straight through to the end every time we read it.  Thank you Ms. DiCamillo, seriously this is maybe top favorite book in our entire home.

Sam and Dave Dig a Hole - by Mac Barnett
I love this book so much.  It's a bonus that the kids love it too because I don't mind reading it at all.  Sam, Dave, and their pup go out to find something spectacular and, oh boy, do our kids love knowing all the spectacular that Sam and Dave just barely miss out on!  They love being 'in the know' like the dog (hahah!) and then the odd twist at the end keeps us forever speculating on what actually happened on their adventure. We've only had this book since last Christmas and it's in a heavy rotation of here.

Peanut Butter Rhino - by Vincent Andriani
Bar none, the funniest book we have in our collection.  I was first introduced to this book when my little sis purchased it many a year ago in one of those Scholastic order forms you get in school.  The copy we have is actually THAT copy, so it's no wonder it's been taped up about one hundred times already.  It also helps that my voice for the Rhino is straight up ridiculous and the pages are organized similarly to a comic book.  I mean, is there anything more funny than a Rhino who doesn't know his squished sandwich is still stuck to his butt?  um, no.

Bringing the Rain to Kapiti Plain - by Verna Aardema
I discovered this book while teaching and fell in love with the rythm and the folktale that makes up the book.  The story is set to the pace of 'The house that Jack built,' so it's fun for the kids to hear the story grow up on itself on each page.  Greyson especially loves the idea of shooting the rain from the clouds with a bow and arrow and sometimes we go outside and try to do just that on cloudy days.

Goodnight, Gorilla- by Peggy Rathman
This nearly wordless book captivates my children with some sort of magical pull.  My kids from age 8 months to 5 years all love this book.  It's also one of the first choices when the bigger kids get to 'read' to Violet because the lack of words on each page somehow gives them the confidence to read it without being reminded that they can't yet actually read words.  This book is brillant.

Peter's Chair - by Ezra Jack Keats
Oh, Peter, we can so relate to his ache to keep his own things for himself instead of sharing with his baby sister.  We love Peter because WE are Peter.  Peter doesn't want to give his 'baby things' for his little sister because they are his, but as he finds, he doesn't need them anymore.  The struggle is real over here too with three siblings, so Peter's story is a refreshing and gentle reminder of how big kids get to do big kid things and they grow out of baby things.  Plus, Peter tricks his mom with a funny prank towards the end and the kids think it's absolutely genius.

Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? - by Eric Carle
We have three copies of this book and read all of them, but our favorite is the interactive slide&find book.  This book has lovingly grown up with our kids from babies (beautiful colors and repetitive words) to toddlers (they love the funny voices I add to each animal), to preschoolers (who find this book easy to 'read').  Eric Carle is wonderful and we have several of his books.  Our second favorite (almost made this same list!) is The Very Hungry Caterpillar.

There's a Mouse About the House! -by Richard Fowler
This book may come as blast from the past - my sisters and I loved the crap out of this book when we were little.  I randomly saw it in a bookstore a year or so ago and had such a feeling of nostalgia I bought it on the spot.  Now my kids are loving the crap out of it.  We've lost and then found the mouse in our own house multiple times.  We've had to packing-tape the mouse up twice now and also the mouse holes in the book.  It's not a great wear and tear book for little ones - but they don't care, it's all busted everywhere and they are still constantly pulling it out.  It's seriously the most fun book ever.

Knuffle Bunny: A Cautionary Tale - by Mo Willems
If it's by the amazing Mo Willems, you know its going to be good.  Knuffle Bunny makes our kids laugh and they love knowing Trixie's problem while her Daddy keeps walking totally clueless about the missing bunny.  Knuffle Bunny is our favorite Mo Willems book, but certainly not our only.  We also have the second Knuffle Bunny and two Pigeon books.  My next Mo Willems book that's on my wishlist is Waiting is Not Easy.

Smart Kids: Predators - by Roger Priddy
The kids LOVE these books.  I LOVE these books.  I want all of the Smart Kids books (we already have three of them).  They have just enough information to totally delight the kids, but not overwhelm them.  And if the kids are restless and need something to hold them over until dinner time, I tell them to go get a Smart Kids book and look through it, to which they happily do.  Huge full page pictures of the animals up close and cool graphics to tell you how dangerous and how big each predator is.

Chloe, Instead - by Micah Player
Another sibling book that lends to the fact that having little siblings is both hard and fun.  We originally got this book to read before Violet was born, but it's been heavy in rotation long since then.  The illustrations are bright and beautiful and the kids love Chloe and her hilarious, mischievous nature.  The ending is so sweet, I almost cry every time we read it (hah), and it's such a nice reminder that being a big sibling takes a lot of patience and kindness.

This Jazz Man - by Karen Ehrhardt
I bought this book because of a Intro to Jazz class I took in college when I fell in love with Jazz music and it's history.  To my sheer delight, this is one of our kids' favorite books.  It's set to the rhythm of 'This Old Man' and each page portrays a famous Jazz musician.  We usually end up looking up the real life musicians on youtube after reading the book.  There is a little mouse that hidden somewhere on each page too, which is a big draw for the kids to point the little guy out.

Mr. Brown Can Moo! Can You? Book of Wonderful Noises - by Dr. Seuss
This book has the wackiness of Dr. Seuss without the length.  I love it because it is both fun to read and also short enough that keeps the kids attention.  I can say it with my eyes closed and the kids like to try to 'sing' the last page with all the noises.  We have the tiny sized board book, so it's easy to carry in the diaper bag (one of the reasons our is so beat up).  It's our favorite book to read while we wait for our food to arrive at restaurants.

A Lot of Otters - by Barbara Helen Berger
This book will forever be held in my heart because it is a favorite bedtime story for my kids while they were still young enough for daytime naps.  Each page has beautiful, almost drowsy, lyrics and honestly lulls the kids to quiet reflection.  Maybe its the beauty of the otters drudging up stars from the bottom of the sea, or the peace that comes when the worrying Mother Moon finally finds her lost child who is safe floating in a box.  I don't know what it is about this book, but we all cherish it.

My No No No Day - by Rebecca Patterson
We all love this book.  Bella is having a crap day and she just wakes up with a bad attitude.  The rest of her day, she goes on to describe all the things that go wrong (spoiler alert: everything annoys her today) and then finishes with her apologizing to her momma before she wakes up to have a better day the next day.  There are some negative reviews on Amazon for this book because Bella doesn't get any consequences all day for being cranky - but we use the book as a way to see how sometimes we all have hard days, life is like that, but it doesn't mean every day is a hard day and it also doesn't mean that every kid who is cranky in public is a bad kid (including our own)!  I also always point out Bella's momma in the book who looks so ragged and tired (so much like ME! Hah!) and how even after Bella is not very nice all day, her momma still comes to tuck her in at night with her favorite story and forgives her - because that's what parents do, they love their kids, even on the hard days.

What are some of your family's most beloved and worn out books?  You know I'm always trying to grow our library over here!

If you're in need of some fresh ideas, you can check out some of my favorite instagram accounts who catalog children's books with reviews.  I basically build my Amazon wishlists off of the accounts of The Little Book Collector, Kid Lit BookaDay, and The Littlest Library.



Disclaimer:  This post includes affiliate links to Amazon.

Family Yearbook: Category Layout Design

Creating our family yearbook is one of my biggest (and time consuming) projects of the year but one that I love doing and our kids love having on hand at the house.  I use Shutterfly to create my family yearbooks (and to store all of my pictures).  Shutterfly might be a little more expensive than other places (I wouldn't know, I've always been loyal to them) - but throughout the year they offer regular specials including sometimes 50% off of photo books (!) and free shipping.  So, it's always been worth the money to order our high quality yearbooks from them.  (these opinions are entirely my own and not endorsed in any way).  

I started the family yearbook project in 2012 and since have gone back and finished a 2011 yearbook and finished our 2013 yearbook this spring.  I'm currently working on finishing a 2010 yearbook (the year our first child was born) and then I think moving forward we'll just stick to the current years.

For our 2013 yearbook, I tried a new organizational plan instead of sticking to the chronological months of the year like I had in previous yearbooks.  And I must admit, I love the new organization.  It has given me the opportunity to use many more miscellaneous pics without trying to use up a whole page on something relatively insignificant in the year just because I love a particular picture. 

By setting up the yearbook by category instead of by month/seasons, the book flows by grouping pictures together that are connected in some way.  The kids have really enjoyed this 2013 yearbook because all of their favorite things are mostly grouped together - so it's easy for them to find all the holiday pics at once, or all the vacation/trip pictures at once.

At the suggestion of a friend, I'm going to share below the categories/questions on how our 2013 yearbook was set up.  If you are in the process (or planning) of creating a family yearbook, I hope these categories/questions can help you brainstorm various ways to organize your family pictures in a meaningful way.

Each category/section transitions like the page above with the overall theme listed and some photos that correspond to the category - usually pictures that I like but don't warrant a full page spread on their own.  In the case of the first category (Our Family), it is a double page spread photo of our family all together (which has been the same for all of our yearbooks regardless of set up).

Categories:

1. Our Family -  this is a great section for using our favorite pictures of just the kids or us.  Lots of instagram pictures included in this section that are captured randomly throughout the year on random days.

Dad and Mum Page pictures and questions:

• What was your favorite trip of the year?
• What is your favorite holiday tradition?
• What was the hardest challenge of the year?
• Favorite husband&wife moment
• #ParentingFail
• Favorite meals
• Best Lesson Learned

Pets Page
Individual Kids Page:  include what they were like this year.  Favorite activities, movies, books, funny things they said/did, knicknames, and things they learned

What was it like to live in our home this year? - This section also used many instagram and phone pictures.  Just the everyday captures of what it was like in our days.  It was a chance to showcase the tiny little things we do to spend the days away in this year, with the kids this age.

Home improvements
Things we did at home (playtime, cooking/baking)
Misc. pics of us at home together

With whom did we spend our days? - The kids love these sections as they are filled with familiar faces and obviously so much love.  These pages are usually created as some of the last pages when creating the book because many of the pictures are overflow from the holidays or events pages.

Big Brother & Little Sister page
Just us (Immediate family)
Family
Friends

What milestones did we accomplish this year? - This was a fun addition to our book this year and was inspired by my 30th last year and Brandon taking on his first year of coaching.  After seeing the connection between those - lots of other things made it's way into this section including big Firsts for the kids and an obstacle race we participated in last year.

Milestone birthdays (30th)
Races/Runs
Big Firsts (first haircut, ride a bike)
New jobs/change in jobs

What gave us cause to celebrate this year? - The pictures here are obvious and these pages would be included in any yearbook regardless of layout.  The benefit of a category organization though groups all of the parties and celebrations together which makes for a very happy and fun section to look at :)

Birthday parties (our friends and the kids')
Showers (wedding, baby)
Family reunions
Weddings
Anniversary

What seasonal traditions did we enjoy?  - This is one of my favorite sections; it's all the little things we do throughout the seasons that have become like traditions for us.  They aren't huge events that we spend months planning, but rather the little things that keep us happy and specific to the seasons.  It's as though these little bits of fun sprinkled throughout the year are what keep us always looking forward to new fun events.

Yearly traditions (Screen Free week, Alumni events, Shark Week, local festivals)
12 Months of Kindness
Winter events (sled riding, hotel sleepover)
First day of Trout/hunting
Annual parties
County fairs

Where did we go to visit? - lots of pictures available because they are the events that I have my camera on hand.  These are the things I'm obviously documenting because they took some planning to accomplish.  It's nice to have them all in one section together and this is section that gets a lot of comments from the kids like, "When can we go there again?!!"

Kid playdate trips to new places (circus, indoor playground, outdoor concert, petting zoo)
Family Day trips (Lincoln Caverns)
Family vacations

What do the holidays feel like? - If there is a most joyful section of the yearbook, it is this one.  Which is part of the reason I made it last (it's easy to locate!)  The holidays are filled with so many smiles and loving traditions.  This is by far the kids' favorite category and we have spent time looking at the previous year's holiday adventures as we approach the same holiday in the current year - as a reminder to what we'll be doing and what it means for our family.

Single page photo collage for most holidays (Halloween, 4th of July, Easter)
Multiple pages for 'big' holidays (Christmas) including traditions, Kids & their Santa wish list, celebrations/parties

My favorite part of this style of yearbook has been that I believe it represents a more true to life picture of what it is like to be a part of our family for the year.  The overall feel of what it is like to be in this family this year; our kids this particular age, the family and friends we spent time with, and just the regular life that we experience right now.

Do you create family yearbooks?  How do you organize the pictures?