New Year Celebration

We celebrated New Year's 2015 with our usual tradition - spending it with our former neighbors and best friends. We love this tradition, and it  gives us a chance to get together with our friends. Plus, I get to hang out with these two handsome guys:

After work on New Year's Eve, we made the hour trek to their house. It had been a couple of months since we saw everyone, so we were very excited. We unloaded our stuff, and the New Year's celebration began!

I spent some quality time with Laken. Since I hadn't seen him since October, I had to make sure he remembered me. He wasn't sure about me at first, but quickly warmed up.

Since we hadn't seen each other around Christmas, we exchanged our gifts.

After exchanging gifts, Jenn and I did some catching up while the guys watched football. Javen and his cousins played before they left for the evening. I got some cute pictures of Laken while we were keeping him entertained before Grandma swept him away so we could have fun, just adults.

Once Grandma took Laken and Javen went to his cousin's house, we decided it was time for our fun to begin. We played a fun game called "Heads Up". You can't look at the words on the screen, and your teammates have to try to describe it to you so you guess it. The goal is to get all the words in the category you select. We had a blast! I haven't laughed that much in a long time.

I also got a good picture of Jeremy and me!

Jenn and I got some good pictures, too.

And, of course, some funny ones.

We are pretty boring people, and Clay had strep throat, so we didn't stay up long past midnight. We gave our kisses, and went to bed. The next day, we found out the weather was supposed to get bad, so we decided to leave before things got bad. We had already planned on meeting family for lunch at Eskimo Joe's, so we figured we could leave after that. Jenn, Clay, and Laken went with us so our family could meet Laken and visit with Jenn and Clay.

Other than having to leave earlier than expected, we had a great New Year's. We can't wait for all the years to come that we will continue the tradition!

Schwartz Christmas

Schwartz Christmas started in Perry on Christmas Eve day. We had a casual pizza and sandwich lunch and enjoyed spending time with family.

The whole crew

We love getting to see everyone, and being able to spend time with them. We opened our gifts, and spent the day lounging and talking.

That evening, we attended Midnight Mass at St. Joseph's in Bristow. This year, Father Bradley had the children join him in singing various Christmas carols. It was a blast watching the kids get excited.

This year, we decided to spend 5 days in Bristow. Since we were going to be gone so long, Dan agreed to let Beckett and Ellie stay with us so no one would have to check on them at home. Beckett did fine in the car; Ellie cried the whole way there and the whole way back. They did much better than expected at the house. By Sunday, they were willing to brave going upstairs to investigate.

Beckett

Ellie

Christmas Day, Jeremy made pozole (a Mexican soup). Since his family likes things spicy, he added a lot of different peppers, so I didn't eat it. Everyone seemed to really enjoy it, though. Justin came over around lunchtime and we opened gifts. It wasn't long before everyone was playing with their new stuff and was getting distracted from the actual gift opening. Mamaw and Pop also came to visit since they had no plans Christmas Day. Once Justin, Mamaw and Pop all left, we spent the evening playing cards.

The next day, Jeremy and Dan went to work on a few projects around the ranch. Tonya and I visited while we waited to see what they wanted to do for the rest of the day. We decided it would be fun to shoot, especially since Dan got a new gun for Christmas. We set up some explosive targets in the pond bed, and took turns trying to blow them up. It was a blast!

Dan setting up the targets

Tonya's turn

Testing out his Christmas present

When we ran out of targets, we found this poor guy trying to escape the chaos.

With new targets set, we continued our practice.

I was REALLY excited when I blew up one of the targets with the new gun. (Excuse the super nerdy comments at the end)

One of Tonya's gifts was permission to get another indoor cat, with the condition that she got rid of the goose and duck that had become her pets - the goose actually let Tonya pet him. I promised to get plenty of pictures of the goose and duck so she could remember them, only the duck was not so fond of having his picture taken. He ran every time I tried to take his picture.

After shooting, we went to Beach House and got a delicious hamburger and onion rings, and spent the evening playing cards.

The next day, we hung around the house. It snowed, so we weren't willing to go running around. We did run to Wal-Mart to get what we needed for dinner before the snow got too bad.

Glen (Dan's brother) and Tina (his wife) came for dinner. We had Pioneer Woman's Perfect Pot Roast and various sausages from Siegi's Sausage House. We played cards and visited for hours.

We went to church on Sunday, then came back to relax for a while before the trek home. We had so much fun spending time with family, and getting to relax for a while without having to worry about the cats being okay alone at home (really, I'm the only one that worries).

Hope you all had a very merry Christmas as well!

A Very Dean Christmas

We are very blessed to get to spend Christmas with my whole family every year. Jeremy and I really enjoy the time we have eating, cooking, laughing, and talking.

This year, Dean Christmas came the weekend before Christmas. My oldest sister, Tara, her husband, John, and their kids, Evie, Maggie, and Oliver came on Friday. We had planned on waiting until Saturday to open gifts, but the kids were too excited. So, after a delicious meal of homemade lasagna (one of my absolute favorites!), the kiddos donned their elf hats and began passing out presents. It was a blast getting to see them open their presents.

Maggie was excited to open gifts

Here come the elves!

What did we get?

Check it out!

Oliver got a TON of these, and was really excited about it. He said "I'm going Mario!"

I kept hearing "EEEE!!!" from Evie

"I can't wait to open it and play with it!"

All the adults (kids with husbands) drew names to give gifts. I We got the easiest to buy for - my sisters. I We got them each a cool t-shirt from a local store in town. They had a TON of awesome stuff. Look up Red Dirt Emporium on Facebook to see some of what they have.

I made canvases for my mom and my Mema (unfortunately I forgot to get a picture of the one I made for Mema).

Go Pokes!

On Saturday we hung around at my parents' house. Mom made a massive breakfast spread and stuffed us full of delicious food. The kids, Tara, and I watched some funny animal videos on YouTube while our food digested.

We played some fun games, too (a must for any Dean get-together). This year, we played a card game that went along with the "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" movie, and we played a game where you had to guess who belonged to the mustache.

We had a massive Mexican meal for lunch/dinner on Saturday, including tacos, street tacos, fajitas, Mexican quinoa, and all the stuff that goes with it. Mom and I made homemade sopapillas, which turned out delicious! The girls, Megan and I also painted some old wine bottles I have been collecting. Sunday morning, we all met at the truck stop near Mom and Dad's house for some delicious breakfast before everyone headed home. It was a great Christmas, and we can't wait until our next big Dean family gathering!