Back to School

Just a quick update...
Happy New Year everyone! Carol and I had a great Christmas/New Year's break and we hope you all did too!
Carol and I started back to school today. This is going to be a tough semester and truthfully, a tough year. God willing, and if everything goes according to plan, when December rolls around Carol should be graduating as a Nurse Practitioner and I should be one semester away from completing nursing school. Please keep us in your prayers! We will keep you posted on our progress...keep checking back!!

A Very Merry Christmas!!

Matt and I have come to learn that one of the best things about being married is double the Christmases! This year Christmas was a week long celebration for us, which worked out perfect since I worked Christmas day. The celebration began the Sunday before Christmas with the Hammer's. Every year we play dirty Santa. The goal is to find a gift to bring that is a good deal! This year like every year, dirty Santa did not disappoint with a fight over Christmas dishes, a snowman, and tools. I ended up with a toaster with a retractable cord, which I was very excited about!!

(Bryan had just stolen the beautiful decorative snowman that Mitzi wanted)

All the Hammer Cousins!

We celebrated Christmas Eve early with my family on Tuesday night. Every year the cousins, my brother, sister, and I all sleep in the same room eagerly awaiting Santa. It has been a fun tradition, one that we just can't give up. One tradition we did give up though was getting up at 5am on Christmas morning to open presents. This year we slept in and woke up at 7am!!

My family celebrated Christmas on Wednesday complete with an amazing Christmas dinner! After dinner the boys played Wii and Anna and I worked hard at completing a puzzle!

On Thursday we celebrated Christmas with Matt's family!

Then Christmas continued on Saturday celebrating in Ponca City with my dad's family!

Christmas dinner!!

Bryan and Neil with their new sweaters!

It even snowed for a few minutes!!

Christmas of 1999 was one of my favorites! We woke up to a white Christmas that year. Here is all the Stangeland cousins and Grandad at the farm on Christmas day.