Today is Monday and sorry I haven't written in a while, but with all the last minute Christmas shopping and a stomach virus, things have been a little out of whack. Yes, I said the dreaded word: Stomach virus. I am the only one that had this terrible bug. That leads me to believe that it may not have been a virus afterall and that it was probably something I ate. Well, stomach virus or not, it was terrible and left me out of commission for about 3 days. I was feeling much better on Friday. Friday night me and Matt went out to eat with Brad and Holland. We love spending time with them one on one without the kids. Although the kids would have LOVED to have been together, Mom and Dad's need some time too! We stayed out until around 10pm. We sat at this restaurant for 3 hours talking. Needless to say our poor waiter was getting tired of looking at us! Paige came over that night and babysitted my boys. Lance had to go to his company Christmas party. The boys love aunt Paige. Will said that Paige played hide and go seek and gave then Coke! No wonder they love her!
Saturday, Matt got the boys up bright and early and out the door by 8:30 to do some Christmas shopping! He took the boys alone! What a great Dad! I spent the alone time cleaning the house and then running some much needed errands. When we all came back home, we laid the boys down for some naps and then made plans to go out to dinner with Scott and Amy and their two kids, Luke and Caroline. We met at CozyMels in Cool Springs. We had a great time with them too! Matt and Scott see each other everyday, but Amy and I don't get to see each other often, so we just chatted away! Matt and I are so very blessed to have such good Christian friends to hang around and have our children grow up with. I love talking with them, laughing with them and just watching our kids play together! It is such a blessing from God.
After church on Sunday, Paige and I did some last minute Christmas shopping and then I headed to the grocery store to stock up on some great deals I found.
Thursday is Matt's birthday, so I have arranged a little party with cake and ice cream and some other goodies that he likes with some of our friends and family to come over to the house. Paige and Lance, Joel and Marcie, Scott and Amy and their kids and Holland and Brad and their crew to name a few! It was going to be a surprise, but I just couldn't wait to tell him. He loves having company over and entertaining friends.
Well, I better go and try to get these boys to rest. We just came in from outside and walking on the trail. I can't believe it is 70 degrees in the middle of December! Crazy!

I'll write later!

Today is Monday and sorry I haven't written in a while, but with all the last minute Christmas shopping and a stomach virus, things have been a little out of whack. Yes, I said the dreaded word: Stomach virus. I am the only one that had this terrible bug. That leads me to believe that it may not have been a virus afterall and that it was probably something I ate. Well, stomach virus or not, it was terrible and left me out of commission for about 3 days. I was feeling much better on Friday. Friday night me and Matt went out to eat with Brad and Holland. We love spending time with them one on one without the kids. Although the kids would have LOVED to have been together, Mom and Dad's need some time too! We stayed out until around 10pm. We sat at this restaurant for 3 hours talking. Needless to say our poor waiter was getting tired of looking at us! Paige came over that night and babysitted my boys. Lance had to go to his company Christmas party. The boys love aunt Paige. Will said that Paige played hide and go seek and gave then Coke! No wonder they love her!
Saturday, Matt got the boys up bright and early and out the door by 8:30 to do some Christmas shopping! He took the boys alone! What a great Dad! I spent the alone time cleaning the house and then running some much needed errands. When we all came back home, we laid the boys down for some naps and then made plans to go out to dinner with Scott and Amy and their two kids, Luke and Caroline. We met at CozyMels in Cool Springs. We had a great time with them too! Matt and Scott see each other everyday, but Amy and I don't get to see each other often, so we just chatted away! Matt and I are so very blessed to have such good Christian friends to hang around and have our children grow up with. I love talking with them, laughing with them and just watching our kids play together! It is such a blessing from God.
After church on Sunday, Paige and I did some last minute Christmas shopping and then I headed to the grocery store to stock up on some great deals I found.
Thursday is Matt's birthday, so I have arranged a little party with cake and ice cream and some other goodies that he likes with some of our friends and family to come over to the house. Paige and Lance, Joel and Marcie, Scott and Amy and their kids and Holland and Brad and their crew to name a few! It was going to be a surprise, but I just couldn't wait to tell him. He loves having company over and entertaining friends.
Well, I better go and try to get these boys to rest. We just came in from outside and walking on the trail. I can't believe it is 70 degrees in the middle of December! Crazy!

I'll write later!

Sweet brothers!

Will singing "We three Kings" at his Christmas Program

Jake singing "Jingle Bells" at his school Christmas program...

Dad doing a little painting.

Matt hard at work!

Playing while everyone else was working!

On the go-cart with Pop Pop

Nana and her boys
Well, it's been a little while since I've written. This past week has been somewhat busy so at then end of the day, I just crashed. Matt had a big project due this past Wednesday, so Monday and Tuesday he literally got about 4 hours of sleep b/t the two days. He is a project manager at a healthcare software company called GHX. He and a few other guys developed a special software designed for some the top healthcare leaders in the world...HCA and Johnson and Johnson and a few other spin-off Hospitals of HCA. Wednesday was the day that Matt had to present this program to the group. It was VERY important. Tuesday night he didn't get to bed until 4:30 and then had to be at work at 7am. Needless to say he was exhausted by Wednesday night. And to make things a little more hectic, Tuesday night was Will and Jake's Christmas program at their pre-school. So, of course, Matt wouldn't have missed that for the world. I don't complain to Matt about his long hours sometimes for work, b/c it is because of his hard work and dedication to this job that makes me able to stay at home with my boys. I thought that Matt needed a little break to be by himself and to just relax so, the boys and I headed to Tullahoma on Thursday. We just intended on staying until Saturday morning, but I talked to Matt on Saturday morning and he said he wanted to come up. So, we ended up staying until tonight (Sunday). My parents are re-doing all their molding in their living room. Changing them from oak to white, so my cousin Tommy and his son, Jonathan came over every night of the week and all day Saturday and Sunday working on this project. Of course Matt helped out on Saturday and Sunday. When power tools are involved, Matt can't help himself! My Mom and I spent most of the day on Saturday Christmas shopping in Murfreesboro. We had a great time. On Friday night, before Matt got there, my uncle Ron suggested going to a little restaurant called Miller's Grocery in Christiana, TN. It is between Shelbyville and Murfreesboro. It took about 25 minutes from Tullahoma. It used to be an old filling station and then a little grocery store. It was finally turned into a restaurant a few years ago. It had a write up about it in a magazine that Ron was reading and he was dying to take us there. Another couple of my parents friends went too. Miller's had a live Bluegrass band that was awesome! The boys loved the place. They hung out by the band the whole time! Miller's Grocery had great home-cooked food and wonderful display of the building's history. It was a cozy place to be on such a cold night! We all had a blast.
Not much exciting happened in Tullahoma. The boys chased the cats around and rode the go-cart and played outside in the rocks most days. We went to the Mexican restaurant last night and saw my Aunt and cousins.
We are so excited about Christmas! We talk about it all the time. My Mom is planning on hosting her family Christmas party on the Saturday before Christmas. Her family is quite large. Their will be about 40 people there. We are doing it a little different this year. We are having each family bring either a dessert or an appetizer and Mom will have a smoked turkey with rolls. We haven't had this party in about 5 years. We quit doing it after Grandma and Uncle Bobby died. It just hasn't been the same since we stopped doing the Christmas party. We all miss seeing and having fun with our family. So, me, Paige and my cousin Faith decided to get it together again. We plan on playing Dirty Santa that night too. On Christmas Eve morning we always have a BIG Christmas breakfast for my Dad's side of the family. That's alot of people too! About 35. Matt's family always has a great traditions too! We go to his house in Huntsville on Christmas Day. His Mom fixes Mexican food for dinner! Sounds crazy, but it is sooooo goood! It's a nice break from the traditional Turkey/Dressing. Matt's family is always so much fun too. Lot's of talking and telling old traditions and stories. So, you can see why I am so excited about Christmas!
The boys went to see Santa on Wednesday. We took him their lists and they sat on his lap and told him all what they wanted. Even Jake told him he wanted a dinosaur. They both looked so amazed as they were sitting close to this big old guy in a red suit. Will asked where Rudolph was....Santa said he was tied up outside. The weird thing is I can remember like it was yesterday, sitting on Santa's lap telling him all what I wanted. What a wonderful memory it is. I only hope the boys have such precious memories. I know they will!
Maybe I can write more this week. Talk more later!

Will and Jake waiting patiently for the Christmas parade to begin.

Matt and his boys at the Parade

Me and my boys at the Christmas Parade

Will devouring the cotton candy in less than 5 minutes!

This is Jake 2 minutes after the Parade

This is Will 2 minutes after the Parade

Will and Jake going to church with the blazers NaNa got them.

What a fun-filled weekend we had! Saturday morning I got up early and fixed some sausage balls for the boys and Matt. Matt loves these and so I make them fairly often in the winter time. I went and got a one hour massage on Saturday morning. My parents got me 6 one-hour massages for my Birthday. They were Heaven sent. So, believe me, I plan to use them b/c Lord knows I need them!

The Franklin Christmas parade was Saturday and so we were very excited to take the boys to their very first parade! We got their early enough so that the boys could have a great view of all the floats, cars and candy throwers! Although it was a bit chilly, it was very much a great adventure for the boys! They absolutely loved it! Will's favorite part was diving into the street for all the candy that was thrown from the floats. Jakes favorite part was listening to all the bands coming by playing Christmas music. It brought back so many memories for me as a kid growing up in a small town. My family and I had a great tradition of going to the Tullahoma Christmas parade. It was always on a Friday night (it still is...) so my Mom got off work early that day and went and parked the car to"save our spot." Me, Paige and Dad would go meet her to pick her up. We did this a few hours before the parade began. We always parked it in the same area. It was our tradition to meet my parents friends, Donald and Marilyn there too. Mom and Dad got us Hot Chocolate and cotton candy. My dad always bought us the crazy plastic dolls and toys that were way over-priced hanging from those rickity carts. It was so much fun!
Of course I had to buy the boys some cotton candy, but I just couldn't bring myself to buying those crazy over-priced toys...Sorry Dad! Will ate the whole cotton candy bag in a matter of 5 minutes. His face, hands and tounge were as blue as could be! Jake didn't particularly care for the cotton candy; he couldn't get used to the texture of it. Only time will mend that. Who doesn't like cotton candy???? After the parade was over, we hurried back to the car to drive home. We weren't in the car 2 minutes and both the boys were sacked out!
Saturday night Matt and I got to go out to eat by ourselves and then go Christmas shopping for the boys. Our neighbors and good friends, Bonnie and Nancy came to babysit. They are wonderful. Always helping us out. They wanted to come keep the boys so that Matt and I could have a night out by ourselves and get some shopping done. They won't let us pay them for babysitting. We just trade services when the need arises. Great huh?
We got home around 9pm and Bonnie and Nancy looked worn out and the boys looked like they had been playing their hearts out! They love Bonnie and Nancy!
We got up and headed for church this morning. My Mom bought the boys some blazers from the Gap and this was the first Sunday it was cold enough to wear them. They looked adorable! I was so proud to show my handsome little boys off! We had another great sermon today from Pat Bills and Albert Lemmons. Pat is our Youth Minister and Albert is one of the ministers there too. Albert is quite amazing and so is Pat. So needless to say, the sermon was out of this world! They are both so inspiring and speak exactly what needs to be heard. We had a double baptism today. It was a husband and wife who were newly weds. Albert married them on Thanksgiving Day. He has been studying with them for a while and wanted to start their marriage off with baptism! It was very emotional. We are so very blessed to be going to this church and have our children at a church like this. I can't wait for Will to begin the UpStreet for kids. He will start that when he is in Kindergarden. Upstreet is a ministry designed to lead children to know, love, and follow Jesus by having an environment where they have Bible study, worship and connect relationally through small groups.
Paige and Lance came over after church today to visit. I made a really good homemade soup for lunch and they wanted to take some home with them. The soup was good. It was called Chicken and Wild Rice Soup. Very simple to fix. I got it off the Southern Living website.
Well, I am so worn out from this weekend. I need to go have my grape juice with Matt. Maybe I will get a shower before bed. That would be great! Ha...Ha.......
Write more later......