Our year all wrapped up

This year seems to have flown by. It seems like just a couple of weeks ago when Alex and I were heading out for the movies, only to get up in the middle of the movie and walk out because it was that bad. :) So much has happened, it is hard to just hit the highlights...

It has been a year full of new beginnings, sad endings, births, celebrations, cook outs and dinners with friends, the start of many new relationships and the ending of some others, struggles and successes, major accomplishments and goals met, short outings and long trips, unfortunate news and yet prayers answered, hurdles overcome despite all odds, and most importantly to me is growing closer as a family through it all!!

I love my husband and my family and look forward to a great 2009 with them all.

Happy New Years!!

Just a few of our Christmas moments

The night before Christmas Eve we had our Christmas get together with Alex's dad's family and this was a picture taken of us.

Left to Right: Alex, Ashton, Andy (Alex's dad), Me & Maddie, Debby (Alex's mom) & Clint (Alex's brother)

When we got home, we found a package that had been left for Ashton from some "friends" of ours. It was a nice little drum and a pair of cymbals. Ashton decided that before bed he, Alex and Maddie needed to "play band". So, of course, I couldn't resist another picture.

I'm not TOTALLY sure which of the three are MORE in to the "playing band". (Check out Alex's face!!) LOL

Christmas Eve, Alex had to work for a little while, so the kids and I went to my grandparents' house to visit for a while. We had a nice time and it was good to ge to see them. A few years ago, we started a little tradition and we have dinner with Alex's parents and the kids open their presents there. They had a great time playing and seeing what they got. Ashton was particularly excited about his "I Spy" Cars book.

And Alex was pretty pleased with RockBand. And let me just tell you.... we have played and played and played. He thinks he is a pro at it now. LOL

Before we headed home, we decided to take a family picture. We don't seem to get too many of these and I want to cherish them as long as I can possibly get the kids to cooperate! So, this is our Christmas Eve photo for this year. And trust me, there were some FUNNY ones, but this is one of the more tasteful and semi cute ones.

Christas morning, the kids got up EARLY. Alex was NOT pleased with that. As you all know, Alex treasures his sleep and doesn't seem to ever get enough of it in his book. The kids were just so excited that they couldn't wait.

I think I took about 100+ pictures over the course of three days, but thought I'd spare you all that. This is just a couple of cute ones showing how excited they were. Ashton loves his "tracing thing" that Santa brought and Maddie loves her computer to do her letters that Alex and I got her. All and all it was a wonderful few days packed with lots of family and friends. I hope that you all had just as good of a Christmas as we did!!

Much love,

The Perrys

Our Weekend and Great Friends

Alex and I had a date night on Friday. It was SSSSSOOOO nice to get a break from it all and just enjoy each other!! We really need to do that more often. We had dinner, which was super quiet, and then headed out to do some shopping for the kids. We are always done way before now, but this year things have just gotten in the way and we're a little late finishing up. That is okay though.... it gave us a reason to get out and spend some time together without the kids. :)

Saturday, we had dinner with some friends and let the kids exchange gifts. They LOVED it!! Ashton is so excited to tell everyone what he has gotten and Maddie likes her new boots so much that she wants to wear them EVERYWHERE. It makes me super excited to see them on Christmas morning!! I'm starting to feel like a kid all over again... getting super excited and counting down the days until THEY get to open their stuff. Funny huh?! The kids had a great time playing together and the adults had some fun playing games too! It is a blessing to have such great friends and get to spend time just hanging out!!

Sunday, the kids and spent the afternoon napping. Yes, we all took naps. Doesn't happen around here very often, but we did. Alex had some shopping to do, so he headed out and we all crashed. It was a nice, lazy afternoon at our house!!

Tomorrow starts a whirlwind of Christmas gatherings for us. So, in case I don't get to post again, I hope everyone has a safe and Merry Christmas!!!

Christmas Program at Church

Last Saturday night, our church had a Christmas Party and the kids sang two songs for the crowd. Maddie was so excited and had been practicing at home like crazy. She gets on stage though and every single picture I have looks like this....

She did not sing a word, instead just stared at all the people watching her. I don't think we have to worry about her pursuing a career in singing. LOL

Ashton, on the other hand, sang away. He seemed to really enjoy himself. We looks so big standing up there with his little hand in his pocket like he is cool stuff. LOL

Santa and his Reindeer

This past Saturday, Santa and his live 8 reindeer we at Providence to visit. I had to run to JoAnn's to pick up a few things, so I talked Alex in to taking the kids to visit and HOPEFULLY get their picture made with Santa.

We managed to get there right as it was opening and surprisingly, there was not many people there at all. It was great. We got in and out and were on our way.

Ashton and Maddie thought the reindeer were neat, but didn't want to get too close. Any one that knows our kids, knows they only like animals from a distance.

Here is a shot of the reindeer. Alex and I were amazed at how large their antlers were. (And yes, Katrina, I was one of those people that didn't get up to the fence to take my pictures.... LOL)

Finally, we got in line to see Santa and get the kids picture. Well, as you can see.... Alex and I had to have our picture taken too.

On an exciting note....

We have been telling Maddie that Santa would be taking her passy when he came on Christmas Eve and leaving her presents instead. She knows that is where Ashton's went and has been fine with it. Well, on Saturday morning when we told her we were going to go see Santa she ran to her room, got her passy and said that she was going to give it to him so he would bring her presents. I really didn't think that she would go through with it, but while we were in line to see him, she told me to get it out of my "poppit" aka pocket and give it to him for her. It was cute! So far, she has done great. The first two days it took her a long time to fall asleep, but since then, she has been a super big girl. YEAH!!!!!!!

Christmas with Grandma and my family

Last Friday night, we did Christmas with my family and my mom, Grandma. We headed down to Casey's house, my sister, just after lunch with hopes that Maddie would nap on the way there. Well, that didn't happen!! Instead, we watched Christmas movies.

The kids had a great time all playing together. After dinner, we let them all open their presents from each other and Maddie LOVED her "princess" dress from Addison and couldn't wait to show it to everyone.


Ashton has NO IDEA what this game is, but he was excited about it! He has asked me several times when Courtney, my sister-in-law, is coming to play it with him. She told him she would come play one day and he doesn't forget ANYTHING! LOL I tried to tell her that she couldn't just tell him that because he wouldn't be forgetting it. Guess we're going to have to call her over break and get her to come visit.

Fun in the Snow

Last Thursday night, we had a little bit of snow at our house. The kids had just finished helping us cleaning up after dinner and I happened to walk through the dining room and saw that the ground was covered. WOW! I didn't even realize it was snowing. The kids were SUPER excited and couldn't wait to get outside. Alex didn't really want to take them and I had a bad head ache, but hated to not let them play. It isn't like we have snow too often for them to get to play in. So, I finally agreed to carry them out very briefly. We bundled up and headed out. THE LOVED IT!! Maddie refused to smile for the camera, but she had just as much fun as Ashton. This was really her first time to actually play in the snow. Last year she was still too little to really do anything with it. The two of them ran around like crazy kids, laid down and made snow angels and even threw balls of snow at me taking pictures of them. They had a great time.

Christmas Cookies

I haven't done much blogging the last week, not because I didn't have stuff to blog about, instead because my camera wasn't working and I couldn't put my pictures with it. We've actually been doing a lot and I've had some great pictures too.

Last week, the kids and I decorated our sugar cookies that we'd made. The kids had a lot of fun cutting them all out with their "cutters" as they called them and so I decided we'd tackle the decorating. As you can see, I let them do them the way they wanted.... some are cute and some, not so much, but regardless of their appearance it was a lot of fun!

Last year, Alex and I had a small little Christmas party with some of the people he works with. It was nice and we all had a great time. This year when we started talking about doing it again, we decided to make it a variety of people and not just people he worked with. We started on the guest list and it just kept growing and growing. I finally had to pull the plug because I wasn't sure how many more we could get in our house at once. LOL

Everything went really well and everyone seemed to have a good time. I was excited!! I planned on some little goodies for the kids to do, but they got so distracted with playing that we never even did them. Ashton and Maddie asked "are we having another party today?" on Monday morning. I laughed and said, not today....

Tuesday, I took the kids to school and headed to Mt Juliet to meet up with a few girls for some shopping. I have gotten really behind on my Christmas shopping this year and I'm usually much better than this. I've just been super busy with sewing that I've managed to keep putting off shopping. Plus, Alex's parents and us adopt a family together every year and I was so focused on getting their stuff together and back to the family early that I haven't done much of my own shopping. Yesterday, I managed to finish up what we lacked for the adopted family. I also picked up a few more items yesterday that finished a couple of people, but still have more to do. Today, I plan to get back out there while the kids are at school again and see how much more I can finish up. I am determined to get some stuff done because our Christmas with my family starts this weekend. I've gotta get busy.....

Have a great rest of the week!!

This Week's Wrap Up....

I've been really bad about keeping up with my blog the last few weeks. I really should do it more because when I sit down, like now, I've got so many things I could tell you about but don't want you to be reading for an hour. So, just to hit a few high lights for the week.

First, the kids and I got up one more and spent about an hour or so making sugar Christmas cookies. They had so much fun. After we were done, I started thinking and I didn't take a single picture!!! What was I thinking?! I missed a super cute opportunity.

Thursday night, Alex and Ashton had some "boy" time and they went to the Predators game with a friend of Alex's, Gomer. Ashton had a great time. Right before they left for the game, he told me that he was going to have popcorn. Alex told him probably not because he didn't have any money. So, I took Ashton in the other room and got him a $5 bill and told him to put it in his pocket and he could buy his own popcorn. He immediately asked me where was the rest and where were his coins. He prefers coins over bills anytime! WOW, what it would be like to be young again and think "coins" are better than bills.....

Yesterday, the kids and I got up and out of the house early for some errands and a little Christmas shopping. Boy was it cold!! The kids were both ready to go home in just about half an hour, so needless to say, we didn't accomplish a whole lot. :( This is probably the first year ever that I've been so behind on my shopping. I'm typically done by this point.

Las night, Alex and I had a MUCH needed date night. With life and hectic schedules, we've not had a date night in a while. We went to the 107.5 The River, Acoustic Christmas concert. We've been three years in a row now. Last night, it was downtown at the War Memorial building. I didn't think we'd ever make it with the traffic. Nashville was having their Christmas parade and there was also a Christmas run. It was a total mess. We finally found a parking spot, got in the super long line and waited to get inside. It was so cold and it seemed like forever before we made it to the doors. Once inside we quickly found a seat. The concert was pretty good. There were a couple of acts that were "interesting" to say the least, but overall it was a great night out.