BIG SNOW

For our family, the Blizzard of '09 was an absolute blast and made the holidays a little (actually a lot) hectic. As you can see from the picture above, we have the best neighbors. Danny, from up the street, came down and plowed our driveway not once - but twice!!! If it weren't for him, we could forget getting out of the driveway!
The Gayler's started their drive from Texas on Friday, when the snow started. I tried to warn Amanda on Thursday that they should leave asap, but they weren't able to. They made it most of the way with no problems, until they hit Richmond and from then on, it was a nightmare! Luckily they made it (after 38 hours of driving!) and the only place they got stuck was on our street. And in comes Jeremy's new truck to the rescue to pull them home!
The sledding couldn't have been better! We were invited to go snow tubing at Massanutten, but after all of the fun we had in our own backyard for free, we just couldn't see paying for a so-so hill and lots of rules that take all the fun out of it. Sorry Pittmans :-) You guys will just need to drive to our house next time it snows...you'll never pay for Massanutten again!
As you can imagine, the combination of #1 the week before Christmas #2 2' of snow #3 4 FedEx routes, that's where the nightmare(ish) part came in. Needless to say, we didn't see much of Jeremy that week (He did get a few opportunities to enjoy the sledding with us, though). But, it's all done now and everything turned out fine in the end.

I have yet to buy myself some snow boots, so I improvised with Glad Press-N-Seal. Believe it or not, it worked REALLY well! My feet were a little cold, but dry - and that's all I can ask for in 2' of snow! In the first picture in this post, I am wearing Jeremy's Napoleon Dynamite boots from Halloween (like 4 years ago). They kept my feet suprisingly warm. However, once we got so much snow that it came over the top of the boots, I had to switch over to good 'ole platic wrap. ;-)

Next year, we just need a wench to pull everyone up the hill!

Little Snow

Since it's been so long since this snow, I'm not exactly sure when this was...either late November or early December. Not that it matters anyway. ;-)
It was only a couple inches of snow, but it was the BEST for packing snowballs and making a snowman!

Besides her Daddy, there is nothing that Abby loves more than the snow! She even attacked the snowman!

Time to do some catchin' up!!!

So, it's been almost 6 months since I put a post on here, so I've got a lot of catchin' up to do. Here goes..........These pictures/videos are from decorating the Christmas tree. Pretty self explanatory. :-)

Jake has done so well in school and loves to write notes and draw pictures for everyone. I had to take a picture of this one to keep forever!

Grandma (with the ferrets) watched the kids one morning for us and we came home to some wonderful gifts!

It's been well over a month since we decorated the Christmas tree, so as I watch the video of the kids dancing to Alvin and the Chipmunks Christmas song, all I can wonder is, "What did I feed them for dinner???????"

Mr & Mrs Brian Reid!!!!

Will upload photos later!
It was a BEAUTIFUL day and we definitely had a blast!
Congrats to Carrie & Brian!!!

Here's what it's like...

to find out that your kid is NOT on the bus on the first day of school...

Jake's First Day of School!!!

OK! So the drama of getting off to the first day of school is done!!!
What a relief!
Jake did WONDERFULLY! I could tell he was a little nervous, but he was very brave and we're so proud of him!
It might be hard to hear in the video, but he asked the bus driver if she had my phone number so that she could call me if he had any questions. :) SO SWEET!!!
So, right now he's sitting in class and in hour he'll be eating his lunch!!! OH, to be a fly on the wall in his classroom!
These pictures are all out of order, so sorry for any confusion. I just wanted to get them on here so everyone could enjoy the videos.
To celebrate Jake's first day of school, he requested lasagna for dinner and a chocolate cake with raspberry frosting for dessert. Rudy and I have our work cut our for ourselves today!!!
So far, the house is unusually quiet. Rudy is watching cartoons and there's no fighting! I'm sad that Jake isn't with us right now, but I think I can get used to this!

Here comes the bus!!!

Putting his bookbag in his cubby

Mrs. Rock

Looking for his classroom

Following the bus to school

Waiting at the bus stop!

Please excuse my acting like a spaz and telling Jeremy to "TAKE MORE PICTURES!!" and also excuse my blubbering at the end of the video...I can't help it! My baby is going off to school all by himself! I thought I was excited for this day and that I could be strong, but as it turns out, I am WEAK! ;-)