Grandma Gardner

My Grandma Gardner died 10 years ago today from cancer at the age of 67. Since my children have never met her I decided to post things that I remember about her. She was a wonderful lady and I love her very much.

When we would go over to her house for Sunday dinner she would always have roast and potatoes. I still remember the smell of her house when we would go there.

She gave me my first perm.

I remember helping her make apple pies, she had the apple peeler that hooked to the counter and would crank the wheel, then she would cut them up, put them in a big bowl and put the cinnamon and sugar on them. At this point I would help a lot by eating the apples. Yummy! and still to this day every time I see apples with cinnamon and sugar I think of her.

Her and my grandpa have a cabin at Bear Lake, where we would spend most of our summer. I love it there (it is like my second home). There are so many memories there.

During "Raspberry Days" up that Bear Lake after picking raspberry they would always go back to the cabin and make raspberry jam all day long.

During all the years at Bear Lake my grandma never once wore a swimming suit in fact I think I only saw her once get in a life jacket touch the water and get in the boat.

When she would come down to the beach she always had her pants rolled up and enjoyed watching everyone everyone play.

She was a very loving person, I never once heard my grandma talk bad about anyone.

My grandma loved the gospel and you could tell by the way she taught and lived it.

Her and my grandpa served a mission to the Washington DC temple. While they were there the cancer came back and she lost her eye but that didn't stop her. She still had a positive attitude.

My family went back to visit them in DC before their mission was over and had a great time spending time with them. Grandma could come every where with us because she got tired fast.

Eating at Fudruckers in DC. The only reason I remember this is because we where all tired and hungry so it seemed like hours before we got there.

Eating vanilla wafers and milk at her house.

Her and my grandpa would drink Pepsi all the time. It always looked so good and they let me try it once. I don't like Pepsi!

We always played down in their basement. She had paper from work and we would play office or school.

She worked in the Church Office Building, downtown Salt Lake City. We only went and visited her there a few times but when we would go we would go to the top of the building and look down on the city.

She always had open toed high heel shoes for us to play with. When they came back in style my grandma was the first person I thought of.

Her house was never dirty or cluttered.

My grandpa and grandma always had the "candy can" in the truck of their car. Everytime they came to our house they would open the truck and let us have a piece of candy, even the neighbor kids knew about it and got a piece.

When we were all up at Bear Lake every morning we would roll my grandpa out of bed. He would lock the door to tease us but my grandma always let us in.

They always had nuts and/or chocolates on their counter to eat.

She made the BEST chocolate cake with chocolate frosting.

I loved going over and talking to my grandma and grandpa after they retired they would stop what ever they were doing and talk as long as you wanted.

A few years before she died she gave me her opal ring that she got in Australia (where my dad served his mission). I treasure it very dearly.

When coming to her house she was always at the door waiting to hug us and then when we would leave she would hug us and then stand out side and wave until our car was gone.

Her and my grandpa collected swarovski crystals.

Eating Christmas breakfast at her house. (eggs, toast, bacon, sausage)

Eating her pancakes up at Bear Lake. I don't know what she did but they were the best.

She was born in Wyoming and never knew her mother. Her mother died due to complication after giving birth to her a few days later. What a reunion that was after my grandma passed away to finally see her mother.

She loved her family more than anything and we all knew it.

Grandma thanks for all that you taught me. I love you!

Happy Birthday Madi Girl!

Happy Birthday Madilynn!

Our Madi Girl turned 2 years old today. What a joy she is in our family. We love her sweet hugs she is always willing to give.

Here a few things Madi likes:
she loves to sing, dance, dress up like a princess, play with dolls, smile, run, swing at the park, tease her sisters and probably all the nursery kids, draw (she just does little circles all over the paper, it is really cute and she will do it for a long time concentrating really hard), she loves her sisters "Sannah" (Savannah) and "Rella" (Olivia), she loves to play chase, play with bubbles, she loves to watch me cook no matter how hot or dangerous it is, she does whatever Savannah is doing, she loves her soft blankets, she likes to do things by herself (because she is old now).

We Love You Madi Girl!

VOTE!

Remember to VOTE today.

Pro Life

As a mother I felt that I should post this. This is really sad and makes me scared for what could happen.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kri8G-lGYfg

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

I decided to make just one post of all the things we did for HALLOWEEN so here it goes.

First Jason and I went to Murder Mystery Party at the first of the month that some friends did. Jason was the lawyer and I was a news reporter. It was a ton of fun, thanks Jankes for a fun night.

We made pumpkin bats for Family Night. I got the idea from the YMCA and thought they were really cute. Just don't make them too early, ours got mushy and I threw them out before Halloween.

We went to Night Eyes at the Zoo last friday with the Morris'. We had lots of fun, it was little cold and we thought we would get rained on but it turned out to be a great night.

We carved pumpkins. I don't know who loved it more Jason or the kids.

Savannah had a Preschool Halloween Parade. She got to be the line leader, which she thought was really great.

Then we went trick or treating last night, Beggers Night (for those of you who don't know, here in Iowa we are weird and go trick or treating the night before Halloween and it is called Beggers Night.? I don't know why.) This was the first year Savannah really got into it, we went together for awhile as a family and then Jason went home with Olivia to pass out candy. Savannah wanted to keep going and so did Madi so I took them around to some more houses.

The girls were so cute Savannah and Madi would BOTH knock on the door and say "Trick or Treat" (Madi's little voice was so cute) and then we told them if they don't say "thank you" you won't get the candy (I hate when kids don't say, "thank you" or they ask how many pieces they can have, pet peeve of mine.) so after they go their piece of they would say, "thank you" and run to the next door. It was so fun watching them. The best part was the weather, it was so nice I wore a short sleeve shirt. 100% better then the first year (2006) in Iowa when we got frost bite just walking out our door.

We also made treats thoughout the month. The tradition that I had as a child, making and decorating sugar cookies with different kinds of candy. Jason made caramel apples which we tried to eat (he burnt the caramel so it was really hard to eat, we ended up throwing them out but it was the idea the counts) while watching the classic Charlie Brown's Halloween. And then we made cupcakes with whitches hats, (I found the recipe at Target).

Tonight we went to our Ward Halloween Party followed by Trunk or Treat, just in case the kids didn't have enough candy already. It was nice weather again that it was all outside. We had chili, corn bread, salsa and chips and pumpkin deserets out in the pavillion and then the trunk or treat in the parking lot. It was lots of fun!

Hope everyone has a fun and safe HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

Family Home Evening

After the General Priesthood Session of Conference a couple of weeks ago Jason came home with a list of things we need to work on, not nessesarily things they talked about but things that he started to think about while sitting there. One of the things on the list was having a more structured Family Home Evening every Monday night. So he gave me the assignment to make a chart so everyone knows their part during Family Night.

Last week Savannah was in charge of Music which she wasn't too happy about, she really wanted to do the lesson, but I told her we have to take turns. So she got creative. The next thing I know she said, "mom, this is my piano", when I looked she had sheet music (pages ripped out of a coloring book) leaning against the arm of the couch and she was pretending to play. It was so cute. For Family Night we had to relocate the piano to the chair but it worked just as good, she played "I am a Child of God" while we all sang.

I LOVE watching my CHILDREN learn and grow, it is the JOY of my LIFE!

"No, I do it!"

A few weeks ago my sweet little Madi thought she turned 2 and got attitude, she is still sweet she just has attitude too. Everyday she tells me "No, I do it!" when we do certain thing like putting on her belt, picking out her clothes, buckling Olivia in her chair, closing the door, etc. The other day she even reminded me to put bows in her hair. And now every morning if I don't get her out of bed soon enough she takes off her jammies. (Savannah did the same thing at two but at least she was two and we thought it was because we had a new baby in the house, guess not.)

For whatever reason (the Spjut genes) my children become independent very quickly. It is a good thing but also a bad thing when they want to do things that are not very safe or they want to try things that only older children should be doing. Don't get me wrong I love my children and love watching them learn and grow very much, it is just that from age 2-hopefully 4 is a hard stage for me to control my children. So ready or not I have a two year old again (least I still have sweet little Olivia for one more year).