Christmas Update

I have been unsuccessful uploading pictures to the blog site. I will keep trying...
We had a wonderful holiday season. We traveled to Nags Head, NC to visit Ashley's Nana and Granddaddy and then to Newport News,VA to visit Ashley's Grammy and Bopper. We were surrounded by family for Christmas and it was great to share Ashley's first Christmas with everyone. While we were in NC we took Ashley to the beach for the first time and her Granddaddy took her to feed the seagulls which she loved. She would watch the birds and squeal in delight. We also ate like royalty as Dad prepared the best of the local cuisine for us including crab cakes, shrimp cocktail, oysters on the half-shell and more.....YUMMY. After a few days at the beach it was off to Newport News, VA for more festivities. Matt's entire family came together and Ashley met all of her Aunts, Uncles and cousins. Once again we ate wonderful food and celebrated the holidays. Ashley had a great time with everyone and Matt and I really enjoyed being around family for the holidays.
When we returned it was work, work, work for Matt and I. When we said that we would work any shifts so that we could have Christmas off our employers took advantage. We worked straight through new years and celebrated with a phone call around 2am. Things have finally calmed down a bit and we are enjoying the winter and trying to hit the slopes as much as possible.
This winter I will be revisiting downhill skiing. I haven't been on skis in almost 15 years and I will be trying them this Saturday. I have wanted to re-learn for a while and Matt set me up with ski gear for my 29th birthday which was Jan. 5th and he has promised a few lessons. If I can ever get pictures to upload there may be a few entertaining shots from my first lesson. Hopefully it will be like riding a bike, but I was never all that great to begin with.
Other exciting news is that we purchased a new car. It was time to move on from the Honda Civic to something a little bigger and a lot safer. We bought a Mazda M5. It is awesome. The M5 is a mix between a wagon and a mini-van so it has plenty of room and it is a 2006 so it has all of the newest safety features. It will be great not having to crawl into the back of the honda and wrangle Ashley out as she is getting really big really fast. I weighed her Jan. 9th and she was 17lbs 5 oz.
It has been so fun watching and playing with Ashley lately. She is really developing a strong personality and she is just such a neat kid. She is almost always happy and smiling and she loves to play. She likes to play and read with Matt and I and she will also sit and entertain herself. Recently she has become mobile. She is not crawling yet but she rolls everywhere. When she tries to crawl she pushes up on her hands and knees and then scoots backwards. I don't know if Clay and Tar are as excited about Ashley being mobile as we are. She rolls after them all over the living room and tries to grab their tails.
Well, that is about all we are up to. As soon as I am able to upload pictures I will.
PS - the skiing is great and we would love to have winter visitors so start planning vacations.