It's been awhile

I think it has been a few years since I have written on a blog!  I think I forgot how to work everything, I am going to have to relearn how this all works!  I just thought I would say how much I love all my family peeps out there and that it was so fun to be able to come down for Thanksgiving.  Maybe next year I'll get back into blogging...

The Sweetest Things

I just want to get on here and say how much we've enjoyed spending time with the family this past year, especially the fun times with all our sweet nieces and nephews. Every moment with them has been precious. It's wonderful to see them growing up and learning new things. It's fascinating how different they all are and how they're developing their own interests and talents. I don't know what the future holds for us, whether or not we'll ever have children of our own, but I do know that our nieces and nephews will always hold a special place in our hearts and we love them so much. Jonathan, Emily, Ethan, Sydney, Makayla, Ben, Savanah, Amren, Malia, Hailee, Spencer, Alyssa - we hope you have the best of Christmases and the happiest of new years. Your Uncle Jeremy and Aunt Devi love you with all their hearts!

Remember when?

Do you remember quite a few (many, many) Christmas' ago when I got the Clue game? Do you remember what we listened to over and over again while we played the game and ate treats?Snoopy and the Red Baron!? well I found it and listened to it on Rhapsody. If you ever get the chance to find and listen it might bring back some old memories! good ones too. its by the Royal Gaurdsmen. (snoopy and the red baron, snoopy and friends). I just thought that I would share that great Christmas memory.

What parents think when their kids all grow up

I have read what has been said first on our anniversary and what Mom said about being thankful for what we have done in raising you all up.
First off when we started our family college classes on marriage and family relations was still about 5 years away from being offered. Second we were excieted about starting a family but really naieve on how hard it was going to be. Not only did I have to finish school and then get a job but we had to fit raising up the first 3 of you on little money. It only slowly got better as I started working more and more. For every day of overtime I worked I always felt as if I had missed something special in each of your lives. And yes I realize that with scouting and Ham radio I missed things as well and I regret not spending more time with each and everyone of you. I am very proud of how you have turned out who you picked as spouses and how for the most part we still get along pretty well. When we made mistakes we did so because we are not or ever have been perfect. We are still working on becoming better and trying hard not to make the same mistakes a second or third time.(or fourth or fifth or sixth time)
I had to chuckle a bit when we started getting calls asking if everything was alright after Kellee was gone all of 3 days. We actually have been looking forward to trying to remember what it is like to get to know each other again. That doesn't mean that we don't want to have you visit or call, but we actually are finding things to do together that we used to do but somehow never seemed to be able to do because of plays, recitals, concerts, parent teacher conferences always seemed to be in the schedule.
Its also so nice not to have to cook to make sure that what ever was fixed would be eaten by the kids. We can now have various foods that haven't been on the menu because of some of our children and their picky eating habits.
I could wish that we could retire soon and have all the free time in the world but it isn't going to happen. What we want is to have family get togethers where our home is the meeting place for everyone to come and know that you are loved and wanted to VISIT. Hopefully this Christmas since I have off Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and the day after all off we can have a party and play games and eat lots of goodies.
I love you all, take good care of your spouse, try to be better than we were (it shouldn't be too hard) Love your children and teach them correct principles. Dad.

This is in response to the two previous blogs.
Reading those was thanks!!!
As a grandparent you wonder what your kids think of their childhood.
apparently as a parent i did do one or two things in an ok way.

I have always enjoyed sewing for my kids and now my grandkids. I also enjoyed
the trip to boise , helping with the kids(wasn't sure if getting them ready was appreciated or not, but now i know it was,)and seeing Makaylas' excitement for the dress. I hear that she
wears it every week and likes that no one else has one like it, as with some of her
other dresses. i consider that a thank you. I would like a picture of her in that dress
sometime.

Thanks again for being wonderful children and grown-up people and for having THE Best
children in the world,

Need to go and take a sleeping child out of highchair and put her to bed

Anniversary

I want to wish Mom and Dad a Happy Anniversary yesterday. It has been 38 years. Thank you for being my parents thank you for all you have done and still do for me. I love you both.
Jenn

WOW!

It has come to my attention that my post about "How the West Was Won" was a yawner. What?! Well, I am not here to promise you anything more exciting, just something new. For those of you who read this blog (if there are any of you) you may find this post just as boring, but it is new and that is something that we have not had in some time.

Wow! That is about all I can say is wow! We came "home" on Sunday evening to find the table was set and dinner was ready for us. Mom, Kellee, Stephanie, and I along with our kids had gotten in from Boise to find that dad had made us dinner, complete with vegetables and Koolaid. I knew that he was going to make us dinner because mom had told us about it when we stopped in Tremonton, but I expected No-bake cookies!!

It got me thinking today about how much I appreciate my mom and dad for all that they have taught me or given me throughout my life. Things such as endless trips to the library, even more trips to dance lessons, and enduring our Beginning Band Concerts. These things helped to make me who I am, but the list doesn't end there. I am grateful for the opportunities that I had to help make dinner and bake bread. I am glad that I had younger brothers and sisters to take care of because it gave me a lot of practice for being a mother. I am also glad that I had the opportunity to pick rocks out of the dirt that would be our garden because it helped build character or something??

They are still giving of themselves to their grandchildren which was evident this weekend as mom sewed Makayla's dress and helped Steph and I get our kids fed, changed, and dressed. I think it is safe to say that we all had a great weekend and it was so much fun to be together as a family. Makayla's baptism was lovely and she looked beautiful in her dress. WOW! That is about all I can say is wow!

Jonny is the Beast.

For those of you who don't know. Jon tried out and (all 8th graders try out)got the lead in the 8th grade musical "Beauty and the Beast" he got the part of the beast. Their is a lot of speaking parts and one or two singing parts and of course he has to dance with a girl. He will having practices during the summer and the performance is in the (I think ) first quarter of school. So it will be in September or October???? I will let everyone know when it is for sure and you all are invited to come. Jon would love it, Hahaha. Ivan and I are very proud it is very exciting we can't wait.

How The West Was Won

A month or two ago Andy and I were watching How the West Was Won on TV. I didn't remember ever seeing it before, but I knew the music. Did we do it as a 5th grade play (or did Jenn do it?) or was it standard 7th grade band music? Or both? Please respond

Spring, Kids, Chicks

I can't wait to have spring come and then summer. Spring means babys, we might be getting some new baby goats, they are so cute. Then comes the baby chicks and fun around the farm. Yeah!!

flooding

Do you remember when we lived in the old house and it would flood downstairs in me and Alisha's room? Well, out house is doing the samething. Although not for the same reason.
Ours is the rain and snow we have outside. I am very thankful for the rain and the snow but not to where it is comming into my house. It is the second time that it has done this, the first time was in January when we got a warm spell. That time we didn't catch it until till Jons room was all the way wet and starting to stink. and Ethans was almost all wet. This time we did better. But still had to rip up carpet that was dripping wet. Yuk!!

I am a loser

Ok so my family lives out in the boonies. And it takes us over 2 hours to get us any where close to the Gardner side of the family. So I want you to know that if we don't make it to a family function you will understand. I looked at Stephanies blog and saw that every one had come except us and Becca and the this last weeekend at Sydney's party everyone probably came except for us, I feel like a big loser. I do have an somewhat of a good excuse besides the 2 hour drive time (4hour round trip), is that I had a husband and a daughter that were sick -fever, cough-. I don't even get Becca to come to my house cause its out of the way by a half an hour. I understand. I am not mad. But I just have to vent because I would love to go to my Family activities but I sometimes can't . I am sorry.
WE love to get visits from family when ever we can get them.

Rigaletto

Last Friday we had a school talent show and someone sang a song from Rigaletto. I haven't seen the movie in a long time (keep that in mind), but I remember wearing out Jenn's CD whenever I visited. I enjoy the story and the music and sang along in the audience as the little girl sang on stage.
I was thinking about the story yesterday and debated whether or not I should write about my thoughts here. In the story there is a rich hermit who moves to a poor town with many sick, crippled and invalid. Strange things start happening and when tragedy strikes the hermit is blamed for the misfortunes of the townspeople. In reality the hermit has been the hero, but the townspeople fail to see this until it is too late.
The song that was sung at the talent show was "[Won't Someone] Let Me In" Many times in my life I have felt like the words of that song. Won't someone let me in? When in reality I was ostracizing myself. I was keeping myself out. I was like the townspeople who blamed the hermit for their troubles and failed to see the help all around me. I had to be willing to reach out. There is a scripture that our stake president is fond of quoting in the Doctrine and Covenants 88:32&33 it has a connection for me and I hope that perhaps you will see it too.
. . .to enjoy that which they are willing to receive, because they were not willing to enjoy that which they might have received.

For what doth it profit a man if a gift is bestowed upon him, and he receive not the gift? Behold, he rejoices not in that which is given unto him, neither rejoices in him who is the giver of the gift.

Those are my thoughts as raw as they are. . . I am not going to summarize or editorialize any further than that. I am sure that this post may be foggy, incoherent, and incomplete, but if you know me then you know that is how I operate. Knowing how much sleep I had last night might help you feel sorry for me rather than embarrassment.

Sequestered

Yowza. I haven't been in the blogosphere in a long, long time. I don't know why I'm coming back for this short visit, but there it is. Right now I'm in the playroom at my parents' house while Jeremy and my dad hash out this week's homework assignments. Yeah, you heard me. Jeremy R. Gardner started school this semester, thanks to some sisterly prodding during the Gardner Christmas Festivities. It's been a bit of a challenge, but thankfully my dad can help him out with his various computer programming quandaries. I've been (mostly) adhering to a rigorous exercise schedule that includes eleven (count 'em: 11) workouts a week. Jeremy has even been joining in on a few of them. Other than that, life goes on pretty much the same from day to day. We go to work, we come home and get a lot of mileage out of Netflix, we go to bed, and start the whole process again the next day. A few recent bright spots in our mostly monochromatic lives include:

• Seeing Kellee's senior piece at her dance concert was incredible. Kellee, I've been to so many of your concerts since we moved here and it's been amazing to watch you grow as a dancer. Your choreography was so beautiful. You should be so proud of yourself for the things you've accomplished.
• Going to the joint birthday party of Spencer and Stephen at the Halls' new house in Nephi. What a great night and what a gorgeous house! It always astonishes me to see how fast the little ones are growing up. You all have such beautiful families.
• Celebrating the holidays with family. I love being able to see everyone and hang out. Thank you, Motts, for the wonderful quilt! I use it pretty much every day and am so grateful for the effort that went in to making it for us.

And last but not least...

• Going to California! In October, we were lucky to have the opportunity to take a little mini-vay to San Diego so Jeremy could participate in a national Star Wars CCG tournament. Of course, we spent the obligatory day at Disneyland too, so it wasn't a total loss for me. We spent some time on the beach as well, dipping our toes in the Pacific Ocean and collecting the odd seashell. It was over way too quickly, but we were glad we got to go.

Well I guess that's all I have for one night. I guess it's time to make my way downstairs to see how the boys are doing on their computering. Until next time...

Sydney

Sorry about the lack of information in the last post. The websites are www.thediydish.com and youcanmakethis.com

Sydney is a pretty happy baby most days. Is that because we've spoiled her? Probably. I like to think that she was just born that way and we are pretty lucky. Last night I think I ruined it all because for some crazy reason I decided to open up Becoming Babywise.

I learned that we have made the mistake of using sleeping props. Of course we couldn't have that, so last night we decided to put her down before she was completely asleep so that she could learn to get there on her own. She was definitely tired enough especially after she had spent some time crying. She was finally settling down, so Andy checked in on her and found her sitting in the middle of her crib. After a quick and necessary diaper change we repeated the process. She was settling down, but just when we thought she was asleep, she would start crying again. This went on for almost an hour- come to find out, she was sleeping sitting up and waking herself up probably with a head-bob. We cheated a little bit and rocked her for five minutes and laid her down, apparently she hasn't figured that part out yet-the laying down part.
She fell asleep at 11:00pm and woke up at about 9:00am which I consider a good nights rest. Unfortunately she has cried and been more needy today than she has in the last 11 months combined...that may be an exaggeration, but maybe not.
She is getting more confident in her walking and can make the signs for milk, cheese, dog, EAT and finished! She shakes her head "no" when we make the sign for it or when we read it in Click, Clack, Moo "no milk, no eggs!" She can make the sound a dog,duck sheep make "woof, quack and baa" She can also show you what a lizard does. This last one is my personal favorite and I have been practicing with her for quite a while.

Crafting

I found a new blog that I like to visit. It is called DIY dish and it is by twins that live in Cache Valley. They are contributors to Studio 5. They have other blogs that are linked. I haven't spent a lot of time digging through all their projects, but they look like fun. You should all go and check it out.
Sydney took about 4 steps today all by herself. She has taken steps by herself before, but this time it was without any coaxing from mom or dad. She wasn't aiming for the couch or chair either, just walking and we don't think she even realized it.

Baby it's cold outside...

Ok so the weather here in Cache Valley these last 2 weeks have been very cold and now we are starting our yearly inversion here and the highs are in the teens and lows in the single digits and below zero. If we are lucky we get into the 20's. I am so glad that I have a nice warm house that has a wood stove (2 actually). Our high on Monday is supposed to reach 10 and our low -9. happy happy joy joy!!!