Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas!

The boys happy about Christmas!

My Birthday still

Just us Girls on a beautiful December day.

(We actually bought something.)

Isaac before we left.

We were just missing Miriam to have all the girls together.

My Birthday!

Gardner Girls at Gardner Village

Sara with Tiana and my mom

Hyrum takes a picture of me on my 31st birthday.


I've had a great birthday thanks to my friends and family. I knew Cesar would be on call today so I organized what I wanted for my birthday and I am happy. Cesar and I went to dinner last night for some great food at Mimi's Cafe thanks to Tiffany who was so awesome to watch all the kids. Such a great gift.

Happy Thanksgiving!

I'm so thankful for all my blessings. I'm thankful for my wonderful family and great friends. We forgot to take the camera to the Thanksgiving dinner so you get a letter instead :). I guess just getting the mashed potatoes there was enough. Thanks to Cesar, the mashed potatoes were the most delicious I've ever had. He put bacon bits and cooked sweet onions in.
I feel so blessed and know that I am blessed. I know that God answers prayers. I know He loves me. I know He knows each one of us and wants us to come unto Him. God is a God of miracles.
We are coming on hard economic times. I think if we all help each other and work together we'll make it through.
Today I went shopping for the first time in my life on "Black Friday." I couldn't believe the line and the parking lot at Target at 10 minutes to 6 am (when they opened). As I was leaving, a news guy was interviewing a group of girls about their shopping and how they had started shopping at midnight at the Southe Town mall. He said something like and, "Who are you shopping for?" and they responded in unison, "Ourselves" with big smiles. Then they did a little dance. I've been thinking about that all day. Then I read in the news how people trampled a Walmart employee who opened the store in New York City. I think we could use some hard times to humble us. We are way too self centered. I myself bought stuff for myself today. I need to look outward more.
I love getting together with my father's extended family. There is sooo much good there. Before everybody finished eating the big meal, my grandma read a letter from her sister who is on a public affairs mission in Romania and how amazingly they're accomplishing good. Then my grandma asked for a short report about the three grandchildren missionaries we have out right now who are in, Guatemala, South Africa, and Korea. Isn't that amazing?
On the way over to the dinner Cesar bought himself another violin so he can practice and play with Isaac. Miracle # too high to count. (How we get things that function for about not very much.) I hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving. I am thankful to God for you. Because, if you're reading this, you are my friend and I love you. God Bless You Yolanda :)

Kid's Play with Horses

Reed smiles for Elder Gardner
The horses the boys play with all the time.


Isaac being his usual silly self for pictures on the eve of his written violin test.
(He aced it!)

Hyrum sporting some scars from slamming into a curb last week at recess. They called me from school to pick him up because he was so scraped up. Another boy ran in front of him while playing soccer and he tripped and cut two fingers, his knee, his nose, and got a huge welt on the forehead which you can't see because of the hair. "How fast were you running, Hyrum?"

Miriam with Three shirts on because, "It's cold outside."

Hyrum was shooting a Playmobile catapult at a group of horses. The kids lined the horses up for Rob to see.

Sara's nearly crawling

This wasn't a score, just a good play in the first half.

So BYU lost Saturday. O well. But we got together at grandma and grandpa's. Sara took her first arm "steps" while there.

Antelope Island Great Salt Lake after soccer.

Sara and I looking at the sunset over the Great Salt Lake yesterday.

(Cesar isn't always working! Here's proof.)
The crew on Cesar's day off for the week.

It was getting late and the bugs started coming out.

At first when I saw the picture I thought I had mud on my forehead.

Cesar

I showed Cesar my blog and he wanted to post stuff, which was great. Then he said, "I'm going to make my own." So now his blog has way more on it than mine does and he started last night. But he's writing his in Spanish for his family. He called me today from well baby nursery call and told me to check out his blog. He didn't know what to say about me (he put a little blurb about the rest of the family) because all I do to him is whine about how hard it is when he's not home. So I said well, I'm going to play in the region volleyball tournament this week. I saw a sign for a 5k run on Thanksgiving day and I'm thinking about finding out more about it. He's like, "Isn't Thanksgiving pretty soon and that's a long run." "Yeah, I'd have to start running more tomorrow." I better do it so I will have something to write about other than how hard it is that I have five kids, a house, a resident husband who is never home and when he is, he is doing stuff like fixing cars, chopping wood and still working since he still has notes to write. Okay I better go to bed so that tomorrow I can run and have something else to do other than be too tired to do anything. :) Hopefully Sara will sleep well tonight and I can get up more than five minutes before I have to take Isaac to violin practice. I fed the sister missionaries tonight and tomorrow I will go visit a sister who just had a baby. Today in church, for the first time I asked one family to take Miriam and the branch president's wife came and took Reed so I only had Sara and the two older boys. For some reason that was enough. Sara was tired, it being her naptime. I'm thankful for that help today. Otherwise I just might have left church with not being able to handle Miriam and Sara and keep the three boys quiet.

Isaac's soccer

Isaac and Hyrum playing soccer

Thanks to Tiffany, Isaac and Hyrum played AYSO soccer. Yesterday was the last game of fall season. They had a great time and I'm so glad they played because it gave them something really fun to look forward to each week.

Halloween

School's going and things are calming down

It's naptime and I hear Miriam in her room talking. That is just the way it goes around here. She has to have things her way and Sara makes things tricky for her. This picture was taken a couple months ago while in the islands the day Sara was blessed.

The Start

So, I'm starting the blogging thing. Here it goes. :)

Since I actually have some cool pictures to share I decided to start.

A sunset one evening while we were in the Canary Islands.

It was a miracle we made it. Putting everything together to be able to go truly was a blessing. Cesar combined two years worth of vacation during residency so we were able to be there for a whole month. Sara (number 5) was 7 weeks old when we left.

Here are a few pictures we took.

Here are our beach racers. (Sara's too little.)

The kids getting buried. Miriam was last.

My strong husband after building a castle.

A beautiful view of the mountains at a restaurant where we ate goat and rabbit meat.