EcUaDoR!!

4 days until.....

Cloud Forest in Eduador! {So excited to go here :)}

Baca Ortiz, the children's hospital, one of the hospitals I will be working at as a nurse

Otavalo, the largest outdoor market in the world, in the top of the mountains of Ecuador

I will also be there during Ecuadorian Independence day, August 10th, which is going to be super fun! I'll be living with an Ecuadorian family and eating 100% authentic food...I have a doctor's apt today to get my medications to take for WHEN I get sick from the food...! I cannot wait!!

Congrats Adam and Megan!

This is my roommate Nicole, and Kristen, and my old roommate Julia at my other roommate Megan's wedding 2 weeks ago! Megan and Adam met in our ward last fall and they are so cute! Congrats you two! We love you!

The 4th in Lund

Over the Fourth of July this year we went out to Lund Nevada for the Kogan/Gardner family reunion! It was filled with swimming in the pond and hot springs, four wheeling, hiking, shooting guns, talking and spending time with family, and lots of food! It was so fun to see every one! Can't wait until next time! And my lucky parents got nominated to be in charge of it! HAHA!!!

Grandma and Uncle Mike

My cousin Tatton and I and my grandparents

Brax and the puppy

Cupcakes for the 4th!

Best line of the trip, "Kara what is this?" "Savanna dear, that is cow poop on your face..."

Braxton coming back from the pond

My cousin Kendrick trapped my aunt Rhonda in the port-a-potty...sick!

My favorite baby!!

Bumpy road=blurry pictures...

Petroglyphs

Hiking around on the petroglyphs

Me probably in trouble for taking a picture...

Beautiful Lund!

These rocks are SO cool! There is a massive rock and the inside looks like this! It's called Wonder Rock!

More Wonder Rock

21st Birthday!

This post is VERY late, but I have just been WAY too busy to even think about blogging. But I am finally making a little bit of time today to catch up! So here is the post from my 21st birthday, June 28th! It was the best birthday ever probably! It lasted about 4 days, so much fun. It started out on Friday when Braun, pictures below, asked me to dinner. While we were eating at about 8:15 he says we need to be somewhere by 8:30, I told him that was fine I'd be ready. We left the restaurant (the delicious Ottavios) at 8:25 and Braun says why don't we run home and take the food back before we go. I was like oh it's fine let's just go straight there, but he insisted we go back, I just said ok! We got there and he couldn't find a parking spot so I just said well just stop here in front and run the food in and I will wait here, he said no he wanted to park. He finally found a spot and I was like I'll just wait here, he said no that I needed to come with him. By this time I was just like geez why are you so adament about this! But I did not suspect ANYTHING. We walked into his apt and I saw a bunch of people and I hurry and shut the door because I thought we had walked into a big group date haha! Then I heard them all yell SURPRISE and realized what was going on! I could not have been more surprised!

The cake, treats, and pinata!

In Mexico at birthday's they always throw part of the cake in the person's face or push their head in the cake when they blow out the candles, Brandon decided to bring this tradition back to the US I guess :)

Cute :)

My adorable roommate Kristen and Braun planned this whole thing! Thank you SO much! I love you both!

Next it was time for the pinata!

All those years of softball paying off :) I broke the broom...sorry boys!

We had a bubble blowing contest with the gum from the pinata! Kristen is a champ!

David with half of his now broken broom!

Jake wanted to learn how to waltz

Sunday was another surprise mini party from these boys!

Mitch, Ryan, Steven, and Kris! They were so nice! Mitch and Ryan wrote out two big happy birthday signs, one in German and one in French, (mission languages). Then they had a little jar that said "25 reasons why we love Kara!" They both wrote little notes and put them in there, it was so sweet! Then Steven and Kris baked a giant cookie in the shape of a 'K' and put candles in it. There were "2" and "1" to equal 21, since they only had 2 candles :) Thanks so much boys! That was so sweet of you!

The German sign from Ryan

The French sign from Mitch!

This cookie tasted SO good!

These notes were SO sweet!

Saturday night Kristen took me to dinner at P.F. Changs! It was my first time and it was SO good!

Monday night my family came down for my birthday party with them! We went to dinner at Los Hermanos with my grandparents and my aunt and uncle and cousins! It was so fun! Inspite of Todd trying to hook me up with the waiter and giving him my number...luckily it was the wrong one....

Needless to say as soon as Kristen and I got home from this dinner we went RUNNING! We were SO sick from all of the food over the weekend! Eating out every night, except Sunday her brother made us a huge dinner though, and tons of cake, ice cream, cookies, fried ice cream, and more! It was such a wonderful weekend and thank so much to all of the people who made it awesome! I really have the BEST family and friends in the world! Thanks to everyone for the text messages and facebook messages as well! You guys are GREAT! Love you all!!