Happy Valentines Day!

By now, you should all realize that I am doing my best to get caught up here on The Vineyard Family blog. I know it's tough, but stick with me, please!

Due to the Big Snow, Jake's Valentine Party got moved to the following Monday. It was a very sweet party and I even got to bring a date to Jake's party!

Jake and his classmates made bags to hold all their Valentines cards and candy.

Sweet Mary Robinson (I am a little obsessed with her...she is just darling!!)

Here is my date that accompanied me to the party.

The darling Mrs. Pittman....

....and the fabulous Mrs. Pringle. Oh how I will miss those two women next year!

Jake and his bag. He can never just simply smile for me!

It didn't take Reid long at all to find the classroom toys!

Another precious party at FPDS! Next party up--the Easter Egg Hunt...stay tuned!

(Maybe by next fall I'll have that party posted!!)

The Big Snow

On Friday, February the 12th, Brandon got a total of 6 inches of snow!

It was absolutely beautiful and a wonderful surprise to wake up to that morning,

Needless to say school was canceled (for the 5th time this year due to weather issues-I am sure that is an FPDS record!!). My Reidy was the only one who would venture out with me. Xan and Jake stayed indoors-one watching TV and the other playing Mario on the Wii.

Sweet Reidy!

My neighbors are the only ones who have trees in their front yard. The snow covering them made their yard the prettiest one by far that morning.

After a morning of playing in the snow, Reidy came inside to warm up and color with Jake who was still in his pajamas!

Finally we convinced brother to come out and play with us.

I realize there are a lot of pictures of Reid, but he was just so cute in that coat and hat!! I don't know what I'm going to do when he out grows it!

Our sad attempt at a snow man. Not as easy to do as I thought it would be. We used candies for the buttons, mouth, and eyes. Not a great idea considering the candy bleed onto the snow man.

Momma's little snow angel!

Winter '10 has been the most fun and I hope this is a new normal for Mississippi winter weather!

Maybe next year we'll get to go skiing!

Christmas '09

We had a wonderful Christmas in '09!

We stayed in Jackson this year and got to spend time with both sides of the family.

Jake got Operation this year, so Reid got a kiddie version of the game. (Can't leave Reid out!!)

Here he is playing with Daddy.

Christmas Eve we always open gifts with the Vineyard side of the family.
Thank you Aunt Colleen-it's just what I wanted!

I had to include a picture of my China pattern. This is the Chelsea Bird from Mottahede. There are 4 different dinner plates with 4 different birds on each plate. Makes for a fabulous setting, but also makes it difficult to collect all the pieces. I don't have a ton of fancy stuff, but my china is my very favorite thing and I get pieces every year.

Jake playing with a new Leapster game

Baby Luke, missing his first Christmas with the Vineyard's. What a Darling!!

Christmas morning-Santa brought Jake a bike...

..and Reidy a remote control train set.

And he also brought everyone New Super Mario for the Wii.

I can not stress how much fun this game is! If you have a Wii-it is a must have! If you don't have a Wii-go buy one so you can play this game. I have already beat Bowser and am now working on my Star Coins in World 9!!!!

I had no time to make cookies for Santa and Wal-Mart was closed Christmas Eve night (can you believe it?!) so I had to scramble to figure out what I was going to do about a cookie for Santa. I then remembered seeing a McAlister's Chocolate Chip cookie in the consul of my car. Now the cookie had been in my car for probably a month. When I took it out of the wrapper it crumbled into a dozen pieces, but we pushed it back together on the plate and the boys never knew the difference. Apparently neither did Santa. I think the extra glass was for Tinker Winks.

Tinker Winks left his traditional until we meet again next year note. This year he included a gift. I do NOT intend, however, to make that part a tradition! (I found a stuffed version of Tinker Winks at Barnes and Noble. One they could both play with and hold.)

Jake already forgetting (as he does with most things) that Santa brought the train for Reid.

Reidy and his darling frog boots (that we wear EVERYWHERE-ALL THE TIME).

Paints found in Jake's stocking.

The boys playing with the train set. (Found it on ebay for 30 bucks. Whata deal!!)

Here are the boys in front of the tree before I take it down.

One last picture of the boys tree before it comes down too! I think I took everything down on the 27th this year. What a Scrooge!

Until next year...

1st & Last Annual Making of the Gingerbread House

In an attempt to make lasting childhood memories, I decided to take my friend Laura's lead and build a Gingerbread House with my two boys. Yes, this was going to be a life long tradition that my boys would grow up telling their children about. I ran all over town purchasing candies, and cookies, and all the ingredients for icing (a recipe that I researched for day's online to find-mind you!). I got it all set up on the breakfast table and called the boys-our lifelong tradition was about to begin!

Here is the finished product!

And here are my boys minutes into our G.H. project. Our mother-sons tradition lasted a total of five minutes. I think Jake iced one Graham cracker "roof" top before asking if he could watch TV. Reid's only contribution was eating the M&M's I purchased to make the "multi-color cobble stone sidewalk".

I must say, I did a pretty good job considering this was my first Gingerbread House. Look, I even added blue sprinkles in the "snow" to add an icy effect! It really was a lot of fun. Perhaps I oughta make it a tradition with myself.

Maybe next year...right Reid?

Bass Pro with Santa

Well this year I opted to go the less expensive route (i.e. FREE) when it came to getting a picture made with Santa. I packed the boys up on what was certainly the coldest day in December and we headed to the Bass Pro Shop to have our moment with Santa Claus.

Bass Pro really went all out this year. The entire boat section of the store was transformed into the North Pole and Santa's Village. It was really pretty neat. They also had a race car track set up so the boys could be entertained while I held our place in line for 45 minutes!! Here are my boys in their "Sunday Best". It wasn't until we had waited in line for a while that it dawned on me I could have put some effort into their outfits. Nevertheless--we got a good picture made with Santa!

My handsome little fellas!!

Santa finally asked them what they wanted for Christmas and Jake (knowing Santa was passing out Candy Canes) told him all he wanted was that Candy Cane he had in his hand. (Way to take advantage of the big moment!)

Jake here- pleased with his treat! And I have no idea what Reid was saying, I was just so proud that he wasn't scared of Santa anymore!

Relaxing on the boat after seeing Santa. I highly recommend Bass Pro if you want to skip the mall. It's worth the wait...and hey, it's free!!

Santa comes to FPDS!

This year Jake and his classmates got a big treat when Santa Claus came to First Pres to do an "interview" and to read The Night Before Christmas!

Jake, as always, intently listened to the story

He wasn't your typical jolly Santa. I don't know where they found him, but this guy was down right surly! Like maybe he had never been around children before. It was pretty amusing to witness!

Here is the guy from the "press" interviewing Santa on what it's like to work with elves and travel with Reindeer. You can be sure that Santa's answers were short and to the point.


Look closely and you can see pretty thing, Miss Ellen.
The Christmas party was precious (of course) and Jake had a big time getting to see Santa.