how was the experience of making my gift did you did you love it it was different because we were you know challenged with this year and its circumstances um so it i've never made an album quite like this before as far as you know the the technical side of things and i was riding with people over zoom which was we did it and i was very comfortable
with the people that i was but it was super weird um what we we persevered and created some stuff that i i'm really proud of um in spite of the challenges uh but recording it was really nice you know just getting to be in this video and for me and for my own um mental and emotional well-being it was great getting to go
into the studio and and sing these very uplifting songs and just made me feel made me feel happy and now i'm i feel like i've been celebrating christmas all year you turned the christmas lights on way sooner than anybody else did but um you know we're benefiting from it uh we get this amazing gift uh literally there's a christmas special
which is really important because it's one thing to put music out it's another thing to go out there and to bring it to life and to create a world around it um how was that because you know if you're going to do a show around christmas it is a very visual very tactile experience it's not just a concert it
needs to be an experience yeah we wanted everything to just be beautiful and classy and classic i had this incredible orchestra um that honestly kind of doubled as my audience in a way um we kind of spaced out in front of me and they were just this i got to watch them work and they got to we got to play and sing to each other
which was really cool yeah yeah they created sceneries around me and i just felt like i was in a snow globe half the time um christmas brings all kinds of different emotions to it um how did you sort of take on the challenge of contributing to this song book but we really just wanted to bring a little bit
of all of it you know we have sweet baby jesus which is all heart we have let there be peace which is just this choir kind of this epic feeling of you know togetherness and um just wanting it was our wish for the world and we did favorite time of year um that's on a different edition and it just i don't know it's just we kind of cover
all the grounds of where we could take christmas songs um and actually we added some fun you know we didn't take ourselves too too seriously um but you know we added some some fun and some light-hearted moments as well to to this project what are some of the key christmas traditions you know that you have developed with your family
none of our our family members mine or my husband's live anywhere near us so our traditions kind of been traveling um and uh and it's a little crazy but you know as long as we are lucky enough and blessed enough to have them in our lives we just go for it we go to oklahoma go to canada we try to come back here somewhere in
the middle for our own little family together christmas um i cook way too much food we eat way too much food and we do all the all the stainless stuff and all the you know stockings and all the things that most people do overall looking back over this year how challenging has it been to move through stillness absorb the
chaos that's moving around you and try to kind of create an equilibrium for yourself so that you remain inspired i'm definitely the kind of person who just likes things laid out before me i like knowing a step i like knowing what's going to happen next week next month next year and uh obviously this was just a giant curve ball for
people for type a's like me um so i feel like in the midst of all of it just being able to try and see the bigger picture and try to see the silver linings and it's like okay you know yes we are all doing things differently than we've ever done them before and you know even even when it comes to day-to-day life you know not just work
um but it's like are are we gonna let this get us down or are we gonna find a way to push through and persevere and continue to move forward in our daily lives in our work lives you know in our family lives and i i feel like we as a family and and all the people around me that i am lucky enough to get to work with we all chose to just keep moving forward
and keep making the art we wanted to make and keep you know just keep it all keep it all together at home and um everybody was just kind of in a united place you know machine gun kelly shows up in a playlist right here it's a holidays playlist but there's a real it's a really strong show of of your taste well i think
travis barker definitely kind of uh oh yeah so much of himself into it and i was a huge blink 182 fan um like in high school so you you can just hear those moments that if if blink was now um and i know that they're still making music but if they had just kind of started and we're kind of doing their their new thing right now i feel like
that's a lot what it would sound like so just kind of like the um kind of reckless uh recklessness of some of the lyrics and um i have enjoyed that record somehow along the way you found the time and you made the conscious decision to to start a relationship that would lead to the starting of a family these are so
impactful these decisions are ultimately the things that will lead you to the best memories but you have to say look this matters to me this is what my life is about too i mean i think it was more of a like i i can have it all you know i can do that um why not and and it could be i feel like i'm naive in a lot of ways and i just jump into big
situations all the time but somehow they always pay off because it's like i can do this i can figure it out and and i with you know getting married and starting a family you know you you see some women in the music industry talk about how they they chose not to have a family because they were focused so much on their career
um i kind of took the opposite route and i'm just like i i can't have it all i had my my son jake and three months later we had our first show on the cry pretty tour i was like i can do this i can i ca and we made it through and by the end of it i felt like i could do anything what is it about chris that people love
so much and we know how good his songs are but it just i feel like it's a human experience people just love chris he he just has this incredible voice you feel everything that he's saying i'm a vocal person i love just listening to people's isms and their vocal um abilities and and he just has such a vocal of he has such a great instrument um and
then couple that with just how he writes and he's so honest and um you know just says things simply but to the point and uh you put those things together and it's just it's a pleasure to get to listen to him but you're a big foo fighters fan and you know do you have a sort of good story about seeing them alive or have
you always been a fan like from the dot or how do they fit into your sort of musical jigsaw i feel like i've been a fan of theirs since i was a teenager um you know i remember listening to like my hero and everlong and stuff like that um but i i've seen them a couple times in concert when they've come through
nashville i got to see them at the ryman which was really cool um i got to be there when nirvana was inducted into the rock and roll hall of fame so i got to kind of see see dave grohl um do his thing on on stage which was really cool um you know in a different in a in a different role um but he's just always been really nice to me i
feel like any time i've i've seen him he's just been super sweet and it's nice to see people that have managed to stay sane in the music business and they've been around for for that long and they still make relevant art you know someone else who's on that list i think that that we could we could add is keith i think keith urban has
has fought hard to to build a life for himself with his family you've chosen you know a great collaboration from um you know his latest album featuring pink two incredible powerhouse vocalists why have you chosen this song i'm a big fan of both of them um i feel like they you know are artists that you might not you know
think to put together but it works for them um i've i've loved keith since i was able to go on tour with him many many years ago and he was one that you know i got to go out and see kind of how it was done and done right um i love how much he just loves music one thing that i always noticed um when i would get to be around him he
was always listening to new things he was always like on his phone like just listening to like new music that came out and just kind of consuming it you know figuring out what he liked about it or didn't like about it or you know what what the new newer sound was um i feel like because yeah he's always going to be relevant
because he always he does that you know um and pink is another female to admire in in the business somebody that's um done a lot seen a lot accomplished a lot still loves her family um still even more so now just creates beautiful art with her shows and with her songs and um yeah i like i like those two together how do you pay it back
when it was paid forward to you by the keith's and the people that helped you and brought you in how does it work for you to support new artists and how do you see your role in that well i mean our our tour last year the the cry pretty tour i was lucky enough to have some really incredible females along along with me and i feel like just us
getting to work together um hopefully they were able to to take some nuggets away from from that tour and and be inspired and just feel empowered all of us being on stage together every night that's the biggest thing is to just do what we do be an example and support one another and i i definitely feel especially as women
in this genre um i feel i feel like we have all kind of come together over the past few years um and just kind of created a good a good safe encouraging place for each other and that feels really good you know um hopefully getting to talk to people along the way um i know gabby barrett's on on my list there and um you know i feel like she's done um just
such a great job and and i'm always always there to answer questions or or give you know thoughts and feelings about things um to whomever you know might might might want to ask thank you carrie i really appreciate taking some time out of your day to speak with me and it's always good to see you thank you too merry christmas