So I put a poll on the side of my blog about what I'm having - I'm giving clear until the day we find out what we're having for you to vote!

After you vote, I would LOVE it if you would comment and tell me what you think I'm having! I love knowing what people think (and why, if you have a reason).

I'm voting for boy, mostly because of a couple of dreams I've had (see Baby Mama post for one of the dreams). Don't base your vote on me though! I could definitely be wrong (plus, Nate thinks we're having a girl, so who really knows!).

Details...

Well, I've made my happy announcement and I can FINALLY tell everyone what I haven't been able to talk about for a few months! Some of it may seem a little like complaining, but I'm definitely not - I'm just sharing what I've gone through with pregnancy these last few weeks, so some of you can relate and some of you can look forward to such fun-ness.

I think I got pretty lucky as far as morning sickness goes. From about week 6 to week 12 (and even occasionally now) I did/do feel nauseous. I haven't thrown up at all (for which I am VERY grateful), but I felt nauseous all the time. It was kind of like being car sick all day every day. Not very fun, but at least I kept everything down. I did lose a lot of weight because nothing sounded/tasted good. I ate Ramen a lot because for awhile that and Buffalo wings were the only things that sounded good.

Now that the nausea is mostly gone, I've started getting lots of headaches. Trade one for the other I guess.

Nate doesn't think I really was that much more tired than normal in my first trimester (at least he doesn't think I SLEPT more than normal), but I was definitely exhausted. There were about 3 or 4 weeks where I showered at night and just threw my hair in a frizzy, awful ponytail every morning because I was too tired to fix it. I straightened my hair a few days ago, so I must be doing better now. I am definitely less exhausted than I was for a few weeks. I must say, I'm glad that's over (though it was nice to always have an excuse to sleep A LOT).

I have no brain. My sister AJ used to talk about something called "Baby Brain" (I'm sure that's a real term). She also commonly said "Baby's eating my brain." I had NO IDEA how true that is! I can't remember anything! If I don't write something down, I will forget it in less than 5 minutes. In fact, when I went visiting teaching last month, I couldn't think of the words "Word of Wisdom." The poor girl I visit teach had to listen to me try to figure it out: "it's that thing in the Doctrine and Covenants that talks about what you should and shouldn't eat..." My sister-in-law Emilie says it never comes back either (that part of the brain my baby is eating). Oh joy.

Those have been the three biggest symptoms I've had. I really haven't been that moody (if anything I've been happier), except when I'm really tired or really hungry.

So there you go! I have my 18 week appointment early December and we find out what we're having December 22! When I scheduled the appointment the receptionist said a cute idea would be to bring a teddy bear to the ultrasound tech with a pink bow and a blue bow. Then when she finds out what the gender is, to tie that bow around the bear and put it in a box (without showing us), then wrap it and open it on Christmas! Cute idea, but I don't think I'll be able to wait. :)

Well, sorry if that was boring. My belly is starting to show in earnest (I can't button some of my pants very well anymore) so I'll have to take a picture in the next few days.

Tagged...

It seems like I only occasionally get tagged and usually just post whatever fun tagging things I see on other blogs because I feel like it. :) But I was actually tagged this time (sorry it took me so long Linds :D).

I'm sure most of you have seen this picture tag - the 4th picture from your 4th folder in your pictures folder. Since most of our pictures are still on Nate's laptop, I had him look and e-mail it to me.

The 4th folder on Nate's laptop is called "Alisa and Me" so any picture from that folder would have been of US. :) This was less than 2 weeks after we met - we went to play in the snow with a bunch of Nate's friends from Colorado and this is after we got back in the car. Cute huh?

Hmm...now I get to decide who to torture next...I TAG: AJ (when you get time), Shan, Em G. Em C., Alta and Mom (oh, I'm only supposed to tag 4? Oh well).

Still can't tell what I'm posting about? Hmm...I wonder about you. Here, maybe this will help.



A brief note on the following reaction: we really didn't think we would get pregnant when we did. I don't think he believed me at first. Just goes to show Heavenly Father does things in his own time, no matter how or what we plan.




I think I wanted him to jump up and down and start crying like I did. But it's probably better he didn't.

So this picture is for my mom (who has been begging for pictures of me pregnant)
This was me at 6 weeks - I'm actually 14 weeks now and due May 13th. Honestly, I don't look much different from that picture (I've actually lost 7 pounds from then til now). Baby's still hiding somewhere in there...

So I don't have pictures to post, but I'm bored at work (Fridays are usually pretty slow) so I thought I'd just post some SUPER randomness. I'll be amazed if anyone reads the whole thing. Oh, and I'm color coding each different thought.

I made the mistake of bringing Christmas music to work today. I had one of Amy Grant's Christmas songs stuck in my head this morning (don't ask me why), so I decided I wanted to listen to Christmas music.

Bad idea. Look, I'm one of those people who gets REALLY bugged by Christmas taking over HALLOWEEN and Thanksgiving. I'm okay with it slooowly coming in over the month of November, but I mean really slow. Not like, the second October starts, Christmas stuff starts filling the stores. That bugs. I like to be able to enjoy each holiday on it's own, so I want Thanksgiving to be it's own thing. But listening to Christmas music got me SO excited! It makes me want to put up my tree and drink egg nog (I think Nate might hate Egg Nog...sigh...).

Lots of you probably already know this about me, but I LOVE to clean. I know - you think I'm a weirdo. Lately, I've been busy with other stuff and haven't kept my house as clean as I'd like. In fact, I realized two weeks ago, I hadn't mopped my kitchen floor since like August.
That's disgusting. It felt SO GOOD to get that floor squeaky clean again! And I love those days when I get a TON accomplished - all the dishes washed and the kitchen clean, laundry done, clutter picked up, etc. Does anyone just LOVE the feeling of your hard work and the finally clean house?

I have a new favorite show.
I was blog surfing one day and saw someone talk about a show called Pushing Daisies. The way they described it made it sound SO funny! I decided to give it a try and now I love it. It's really clean (which is amazing for TV these days), super funny and a very creative idea. I've heard rumors that they're talking about canceling it (not enough sex for viewers apparently...grr). Watch the show so they don't cancel it! To learn more, go here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pushing_Daisies

I've read a couple of books lately that were COMPLETELY opposite books, which was fun. I read a book called The Accidental Tourist by Anne Tyler. At first, it kind of intrigued me - it was basically told in stream of consciousness I think. That's how it felt at least, but after awhile it just kind of bothered me that things would change really quickly. One sentence to the next would be totally different. Blah. While I'm glad I read the book, just for the sake of reading something new and different, I really didn't like the book in the end and HATED the ending. Also, apparently, it was made into a movie!

The other book I read was called Deception Point by Dan Brown (by the way, I Wikipedia'd Dan Brown - did you know he used to be a musician?).
If you've ever read a Dan Brown book, you know they are very grabbing; his books are very hard to put down. I really liked this one because I feel like I was better at solving what was going on than I was with Angels and Demons or The Da Vinci Code. I even guessed the bad guy WAY before he revealed it! Definitely action packed and totally unrealistic, so read it!


That's all. Thanks for reading my boredness. :)

Pumpkin carving fun-ness!

On Sunday, we went for a drive to look at the leaves (most of which were already dead/gone/only semi-colorful) then came home and carved pumpkins. Here are some pictures of the evening.
This is the only wildlife we saw on the drive - yeah...can't really see it (it's a dear). Seeing that was probably the most exciting part of the drive.

Here's a picture I took of me and Nate from the car. At first Nate refused to smile for the picture, but finally relented and then it was blurry...boo.

He absolutely refused to smile again. I told him I was going to post it anyway. That's what he gets for being a punk about pictures. :D he he
So then it was home to carve pumpkins. Here is Becki working diligently on her pumpkin while...
Her husband (and mine) worked very hard at...not carving pumpkins. They cut the lids off the tops...

Trav and Rachel had this gargantuan pumpkin so Rachel thought it would be fun to stick her head inside and... Become the Headless Horse-woman! (with pearls on...)
Here are mine and Becki's final pumpkins (mine is on the left - scary huh?) I didn't get a good picture of all 4 of them lit up - it was too hard to get them in the dark. And here is my FAVORITE part of carving pumpkins! The SEEDS! We made three huge pans of pumpkin seeds, which were SO tasty.


So, Nate and I work in the temple on Friday nights and neither of us are huge fans of trying to find costumes for Halloween anyway, so that worked out nicely. Sorry if you were hoping to see fun pictures of costumes later....Can't wait to see yours though! :D

I'm a bad wife.

I see all these people posting cute things about their husband's birthdays and how much they love their husbands, etc. etc.

Did you know Nate's birthday was almost 10 days ago?

So, to show him that I don't hate him and that I DO, in fact, love him like all those other wives love their husbands, I'm posting about his birthday (the worst part about it, is that occasionally, I forget the day of his birthday. I can never remember if it's the 18th or the 19th - don't ask my why, but it's awful).

So happy birthday Nate! I'm glad you were born! :D

For his birthday, we made Boneless Buffalo Wings (of course - if you know Nate, you know that's his favorite food). We had a bunch of his friends from Colorado and their spouses over - 13 of us in total - so we made a LOT of wings. And, amazingly, I took a few pictures. Aren't you proud?

So here's the birthday boy, blowing out his candles (his birthday cake was apple crisp and candles melt really bad in apple crisp - we learned that the hard way).
From left to right, Annie and Quinn Hout, Nate and Brett (Brett is our most prompt friend, by the way).

Mekelle and Jake Sorenson. She's pregnant. Can you tell? Of course not. She's tiny. :) Again from left to right, Damien and Natalya Olenslager & Adam and Becki Johnson

Travis and Rachel - Rachel also dislikes cake as much as Nate, so she was happy for the apple crisp. :)

So there you have it. A wonderful birthday celebration.

Let me tell you what I did at work this afternoon:

I'm not sure why I was thinking about this, but I had been talking to some friends about the song "American Pie" by Don McLean and I had no idea what day it was that "the music died." (I know, everyone knows that and it's SO sad that I didn't). These friends mentioned that it was the day Buddy Holly, etc. died in a plane crash (by the way, I only know who Buddy Holly is because of Weezer...). So, since I didn't know anything about it, I Wikipedia'd it (hey, if "googled" is a word, so it Wikipedia'd). I learned the whole story about the plane crash and what other things the song is about (apparently, it makes references to the Beatles, Rolling Stones, Janis Joplin, Bob Dylan, etc).

Did you know that?

Then, that got me thinking (because Wikipedia mentioned it) about the song "We didn't start the fire" which I have ALWAYS loved, though the only words I knew were the chorus. I just loved the beat and it was popular when I was really little. SO I got going on that with the help of Wikipedia. It had a list of all the things mentioned in the song and what Billy Joel was referring to, so on any that I didn't know about or wanted to know more about, I clicked on the link.

Did you know, by the way, that the song is all about things that happened throughout Billy Joel's life? It starts with the year he was born. Pretty cool idea I think.

ANYWAY, this whole post is just to say how COOL Wikipedia/the internet are. I know there are definitely problems with the internet, but I'm so much smarter than I was 2 hours ago!

PLUS! I was reading about the Berlin Wall (mentioned in Billy Joel's song) and it reminded me of this movie I saw about 15 years ago. I couldn't remember the name, I just knew it was about some people who built a hot air balloon to cross the Berlin Wall. So I googled that: "movie about people crossing the Berlin wall" Lo and behold, the 23rd link was to Yahoo Answers where someone asked the SAME question and I got the name of the movie! (it's Night Crossing by the way).

I've made a list of movies and book I want to see and read because of all this reading (The Color Purple, Bridge on the River Kwai, A Streetcar Named Desire, read the Catcher in the Rye again, etc.)

GO WIKIPEDIA!

(I'm sorry there are no pictures - our camera has been in the closet for WEEKS. I'll try to post pictures soon...)

Win a Free Handbag!

As many of you know I'm obsessed with purses, and there's a new website launching in a few days (October 15), where you can register to win a free handbag! (for those guys out there, who don't know, a handbag is a purse). Even if you don't win a new bag, they seem to be relatively affordable (okay, honestly I only end up buying a purse MAYBE once a year...) so check it out!

Go to www.handbagplanet.com to see their different bags, which are WAY cute and there are TONS of styles!

I love it!

This is for Nate, because it thoroughly embarasses me, but he thinks it's so funny, so I'm sharing all of this since I know he wants to tell the world how funny I am (without even trying!).

I'm on a roll lately.

You know how I have funny dreams? Well during the summer, Nate and I would go to sleep about the same time. Now that school has started, however, Nate is usually up a couple of hours after me.

I'm scared to fall asleep before him now.


Night #1: (from Nate's perspective) Alisa was sleeping and all of the sudden rolled over and said (with her eyes open and rather loudly) "Initiatory....staff..." at which point Nate started laughing, which woke Alisa up (actually, it was probably her loud talking that woke her up). She tried to explain how it made sense, couldn't, got angry and rolled over to go back to sleep.

Night #1: (from Alisa's perspective) That evening Nate and Alisa had gone to an accounting event, at which a whole bunch of accounting wives were on a panel and talked to the student wives about having a husband work for this accounting firm. They kept saying the different areas of service (meaning audit, tax, human resources, etc). So in her dream, Alisa was on the panel and some girl asked her to name the areas of service. Of course, since she was sleeping and this was a dream, Alisa couldn't think of ANY. But she had to say SOMETHING, so she said "Initiatory..." and immediately realized it was wrong. So she tried to cover her tracks with "staff..." because every company has staff, right? By this point, she was awake and was going to try to make Nate think she hadn't been asleep, but couldn't think of ANYTHING to say. So she went back to sleep.




Night #2: (from Nate's perspective) Nate hears Alisa say (again, rather loudly) "OOOHHH NOOO." So Nate asks what's wrong. Alisa MUMBLES something about not being able to carry/hold onto something. Nate asks what she has to hold on to? "You know," Alisa says "Binders," (while opening her hands into the shape of a binder). Nate laughs, of course. Alisa gets upset, of course, because it makes sense in her head. She tried to explain it, gets upset, rolls over and goes back to sleep.

Night #2: (from Alisa's perspective) Alisa and Nate were on an African Safari (I'm not even making this up). They got to a part where they had to climb down a steep cliff, in a crevice. Alisa needed both her hands and was, apparently, carrying binders. Hence the conversation. Not sure what happened to the binders, because Alisa climbed down the precipice and the dream continued (Alisa never woke up and doesn't recall the conversation with Nate). She remembered the dream the next morning when Nate asked if she remembered what she said to him, though she didn't remember saying it out loud.




Night #3: (from Nate's perspective) Nate walked into the room and Alisa turned to look at him and said something about a tour and coffee. Then she sort of sat up, reached over and started playing with his chin while smiling at him (yep, her eyes were open AGAIN). Nate started laughing, Alisa got angry, turned over and tried to insist that he understood what she was talking about with the temple and taking a tour. Of the three nights, Nate thought this was the funniest.

Night #3: (from Alisa's perspective) Alisa and Nate had just worked in the temple that night, so it was fresh on her mind. One of the temple workers Alisa works with had been talking about giving a tour to a sister who had just started working in the temple. Somehow, all of that transferred into a dream. Alisa only vaguely remembers the dream and knows she was in the temple and there was a coffee cart for when this new sister finished her tour. That's the extent of Alisa's recollection of the dream. She does remember playing with Nate's chin, but her eyes were closed and she wasn't smiling. She woke up enough to hear Nate laughing, tried to explain, got angry and turned over and went back to sleep. Of the three nights, this one is the most embarrassing to her.




So there you have it. I'm crazy.

And I have to quit sleeping.

Not tagged, but doing it anyway...

Nobody tagged me, but I need a break from work and I LOVE filling these out (plus, maybe it will inspire someone else to fill it out and I can read about them!).

Where were you born? Good 'ol Roosevelt, Utah

Middle name? Nanette (I used to wish it was my first name, actually - I thought it was prettier and easier to pronounce. :D)

How old will you be this year? This year, I already turned 22. I'll be 23 in about 4 months.

Nicknames? Alis, Alf, Dad, Babe, Fella (I don't really like that three of those nicknames sound like they should be for men...never thought about that...)

Are you taller than your mother or father? I'm probably about the same height as my mom - She might be a little bit taller - don't know for sure.

Do you cry often during movies? That really depends on my mood and the movie, but I do often cry in movies, yes (ALWAYS in movies like Charly, Titanic, Pearl Harbor, etc).

What is your biggest pet peeve? Oh, I have way too many. Switching lanes without turning on your blinker, people who talk/laugh really loud in a work environment, slurping drinks/soup, girls who don't know how to walk in high heels and wear them anyway, people who use the self-checkout lines in the grocery store, but aren't QUICK about it (I don't care if they have lots of stuff - just if it takes them FOREVER to figure out how to do it), etc. :D

Favorite color(s)? Green

Favorite food(s)? Uh oh. I'm really hungry right now, so....Ramen, chocolate ice cream, fries with Franks & ranch to dip, celery, apples (only if they're crunchy), boneless Buffalo wings

Favorite restaurants? Fuddruckers, Cafe Rio, Applebee's

Favorite smells? RAIN, apple cider (esp the candles), ANYTHING vanilla, babies :D

Favorite time of the day? Right before I fall asleep and I'm completely relaxed.

What brand of shampoo/conditioner do you use? I use Thermasilk for days when I am straightening my hair and just the Costco brand for other days.

What brand of make-up products? Hah. The only makeup I EVER wear is eyeliner, mascara and eye shadow. The eyeliner and mascara are Mary Kay (thanks mom!) and the eye shadow is from AJ and I have no idea where she got it.

How many pillows do you sleep with? Two - one for my head, one to go between my knees (they hurt if they rest on each other)

Do you play an instrument? I sing and can play "As Sisters in Zion" on the piano, but that's about it.

Have you ever been skinny dipping? Not the way you're supposed to go....

Did you play any sports in High School? Swimming (mostly backstroke) and track (hurdles)

What was the last movie you saw in the theatre? Regular Theater or Dollar theater? In the regular theater I think it was 27 Dresses and in the dollar theater, I think it was...actually I can't remember. Been too long.

What is your favorite article of clothing? My jeans that make me look skinny. The bottoms are completely frayed and they're REALLY dirty right now, but I'm wearing them anyway. :)

What is your dream vacation? Right now it's Italy. It changes often, but that's where I would love to go right now.

What was your first impression of your spouse? I thought he looked like his younger brother (I don't think that anymore). I also really liked his car (red Subaru Legacy). And I liked his muscular shoulders (I don't think I've ever told him that...)

If you were an animal, what would you be? Monkey. I LOVE climbing!

What is your dream car? Honda Pilot

What is one of your weaknesses? I get sick of people/annoyed with people really easily. Also, I get offended too easily.

What do you fix for dinner when there is nothing to fix? Ramen of course. Nate makes a quesadilla (he hates Ramen).

If you could live in a different decade/era what would it be? If we're going for clothes, I would want to live in the South around the Civil War. I LOVE those dresses. For lifestyle, I've always thought the 20's seemed kind of fun.

What is the emotion you feel the most? Exhausted, and I do mean that as an emotion. I just got a job promotion and called as Relief Society President in my ward, so I'm always a little exhausted. But I'm also usually just happy. :)

Do you consider yourself outgoing? I used to, but not anymore. I have a really hard time starting conversations with people I don't know. I'm fine if I'm with people I know (maybe a little too comfortable with some people) but for the most part I'm pretty quiet.

What is something you are constantly working on? Not letting emotion rule all of my decisions (that's for you Nate) :D

What is a word or phrase you overuse? Babe. One time I tried to go 24 hours without calling Nate "Babe." I made it 7 minutes.

What was the hardest thing that happened to you this past year? My grandpa's funeral. While I was okay with him being gone, the circumstances around his funeral were a little jarring and I had a really hard time with it.

What is the best thing that has happened to you this past year? Graduating was pretty awesome!

What is one thing you hope to accomplish this year? Oooh. Maybe finish the quilt I'm working on...we'll see.

The best piece of advice you learned this past year? This wasn't really advice and I definitely didn't just learn this this year, but I've learned BETTER to just be patient and let things happen when they happen - I don't let myself get as stressed as I used to. Hence the quote at the top of my blog. :)

Wedding, beaches and "Disseyand"!

A couple of weeks ago, we went to San Diego for Nate's brother Trav's wedding. I, of course, was awful about actually taking pictures (I took my camera EVERYWHERE, but it sat in my purse...sigh...).

Here are some of the highlights from our trip (thanks to everyone who's pictures I borrowed!):

DISSEYAND!

For two weeks before our trip, I walked around the house saying "I go to Disseyand!" like a 4 year old. Nate got really sick of it, but I hadn't been there since I was THREE, so can you blame me??!?! We ended up having a really fun time, but realized if you want to be able to do everything you want to in both Disneyland and California Adventure, you need at least 2 days...

This was our favorite ride - California Screamin' (it's actually in California Adventure). I'm not sure why Nate is so hidden in this picture, but this is the whole fam, minus the parentals.

This is us on California Screamin'. It stops you right at the beginning, does a countdown and then shoots you forward! Way fun.

Somehow, I "got" to be in front for Splash Mountain. Everyone else got a few drops here and there - my whole front was soaked. Good thing it was warm that day! (I'm holding my pants out to show that my fitted pants were all loose because they got wet. I looked like such a freak until they dried).

When we got home, everyone asked me if we saw all the Disney characters. We really didn't see that many! (we were focused on the rides). We saw Brer Bear, Winnie the Pooh (didn't get a picture), AND....
Mrs. Incredible! Or Elastigirl! (which ever...)

After all that playing....
(Okay, this was actually lunch time. We all get a little tired when our blood sugar gets low...)

Another group shot (this isn't a real street behind us, but is looked seriously real until we were that close).
And finally, the castle. It's really blurry, but you get the idea. :) I love Disseyand!


BEACH/FAMILY PICTURES

We went to the beach a couple of times just to play and go sea kayaking. One morning, we got all dressed up fancy and took family pictures. I would love to post them, because they're pretty good, but I only have access to them on the photographer's website. There are a few of them on there, if you're interested www.ninaseibertphotography.com.

After we took pictures, I really wanted to play in the water a bit. I pulled my pant legs up and walked out as the wave receded, then ran back to shore as the wave came back in. After a while, everyone joined in!

Ready to run....

Run!
Back safe from the wave...Or so we thought...

One of the times, the wave came up a little higher than we expected -- and by a little I mean a LOT. It completely came over the top of Kim, Connor and my heads. It was AWESOME! (the trip home was a little uncomfortable - it's amazing how much sand and salt I had everywhere).

That was one of my favorite parts of our trip. I don't think Rachel would agree with me....

WEDDING

And then, of course, the reason we were there:

The Happy Couple...awww....

All the brothers: Nate, Jordan, Trav, Connor, Jakob and Aaron

All the sisters (funny how my family has WAY more girls...) Paige, Kim, Trav, Lindsey, me and Rachel's little sister Rebecca. And despite the fact that I look like it in this picture, I'm not pregnant (I really need to learn to hold my stomach in while pictures are being taken!).
And the Frakes Fam! We just really like each other. :D

And that was our fun trip! It did make me realize I don't want to live in San Diego, like I used to want to, for which Nate was thrilled. It is definitely a fun place to visit!

I will probably be murdered for posting this, but I can't help it. This has a long history, only part of which I know. If you want the rest, you'll have to ask Adam and Trav (oops, I guess you can't tell it's them...maybe I shouldn't have said...)

Enjoy!



Sorry it's kind of dark...they didn't know I was filming...

E-mealz.com - a gift from heaven!


Dave Ramsey has done more for me than just the financial stuff Nate mentioned. Nate was listening to his radio show and heard a commercial for something called E-MEALZ.COM. He looked at the website, then told me to take a look.

I was in awe.

I have such a hard time with grocery shopping on a budget and just cooking in general. When I shop, usually I just wander up and down the isles looking for anything that could be turned into a meal. Doing that, I usually spend WAY more than I plan to (impulse shopping...), then I get home and realize I really don't have anything to make a MEAL.

This website is the exact answer to my problem. For $5 a month (which really isn't much for what this site does), they create recipes and then a shopping list to whatever store you shop. Not only that, but they do a week's worth of groceries for $30-40.

I started doing it this last week and I couldn't believe how amazing it was. These are YUMMY recipes with lots of variety! They're well rounded meals and I spent exactly my grocery budget for the next two weeks!

The only downside is that the recipes come out weekly, so you have to go shopping once a week (I usually go every other week). The other thing is that this only covers dinners, so if you're weekly budget is less than this requires, it won't work (or you'll have to go without breakfast and lunch!)

Despite those downsides, I really love this website. You sign up for three months, then can cancel or renew as you want. So if you want, you can do this for three months and end up with a pretty good amount of recipes to use and exactly how much the ingredients cost!

So this will be my first serious post on our blog. If you know me at all, you know that I enjoy talking about financial issues (OK so enjoy is a VAST understatement). Our good friends Damien and Natalya had mentioned Dave Ramsey a few times during financial discussions, but I was always quick to dismiss what they shared with us because the ideas seemed "too conservative", "unreasonable", and "impossible". For example, Dave says you should cut up all credit cards, not buy anything unless you can write a check for it (or use a debit card), with exception of a house on which you shouldn't have greater than a 15 year mortgage. About a month ago I was sitting at work bored, and decided I would listen to Dave Ramsey's radio show. On his show Dave answers caller's questions about money issues. In the process of listening to Dave give these people advice I had a huge paradigm change about money. Long story short, Alisa and I are reading Dave's books and committing to follow his money advice for the rest of our lives.

Now many of you are probably thinking, "How can you be so committed to the teachings of this guy?". Or maybe you think we've been roped in to some "secret" get rich quick plan. First, Dave will be the first to admit there is no "secret" to getting rich; he teaches that handling money is 80% behavior and only 20% knowledge. The secret is not just knowing what to do, but having the discipline to control spending habits and lifestyles. And as to to how we can be so committed to this plan...maybe it will be best if I share some of his teachings. As you read over these statements think about where you hear these principles taught regularly.

-Stay out/get out of debt because "the borrower is a servant to the lender" says Proverbs. I always enjoy when Dave challenges people to find one good statement about debt in the bible (I would extend that challenge to any modern day scriptures).
-Have 3-6 months expenses set aside for rainy days. Dave calls this building a wall between you and Murphy (you know, Murphy's law?). People tell Dave he needs to be more positive, and his response is always "I am positive...that it is going to rain"
-No matter your income develop the habit of tithing/giving

As you can see, Dave's main goal is not getting rich. He wants people to reach "Financial Peace", in fact that is the name of his first book. He teaches basic principles that anyone, at any point in life can follow. He makes you realize building wealth and financial peace are not as much a function of what you make, as how much you spend of what you make. How many of us have heard of some professional athlete, musician, or actor going broke when they've made millions? Just recently I heard Ed McMahon and Michael Jackson were fighting foreclosure on their homes.

So why am I blogging about this? Mainly because we are so grateful for Damien and Natalya introducing us to Dave, and I would feel guilty if I did not at least attempt to share this stuff with other people too. Now I know that many of you will just think we're crazy and that we're joining some weird cult, but frankly we don't care. For the first time in our marriage, budgeting did not end with Alisa falling asleep or us getting frustrated, and we're already enjoying the peace that comes with preparing for tough times so that they will hopefully be a blip on the radar and not a life catastrophe.

For those that are curious, I refer you to Dave's website www.daveramsey.com. It is great timing because until Tuesday his books are all on sale for $10.00. I would recommend starting with "Total Money Makeover"; it is a very easy read and very entertaining.

This is sort of random, but I thought it was funny and indicative of my thought processes for the last few days, so I thought I'd share a dream I had today:

First of all, I have to give a little background. Nate and I have been looking for another car. Nate started listening to a guy on the radio named Dave Ramsey - he's a financial advisor and is a very firm believer that the only thing you should be in debt for is a house. He says that besides a house, if you can't pay cash for it, you can't afford it. He also believes you should have an emergency fund of 3-6 months income saved. That being said, Nate and I have decided to try to live that way. We still have quite a bit of a payment on our car, so we decided to try to find an older car that we wouldn't have to make payments on, but would still be reliable.

So there's some of the background, now here's the dream:


I dreamed I was pregnant and apparently I was 9 months because I was in the hospital. I'm not sure why I was there because I wasn't in labor - I was just kind of sitting there so they decided to induce me. However, Nate wasn't there because he was out looking at a car we wanted to buy. I'll say that again. My husband wasn't at the hospital with me because he was looking at a car. So then a nurse came in to say that I might have to get a C-section (not sure how it got to that point since I still wasn't even in labor). I asked her how much that was going to be so she pulled up an estimated price on a computer. It was $877,435. For some reason, my eyes were really blurry so I wasn't sure if it was $80,000 or $800,000. I figured out it was the slightly higher number and told the nurse I wanted to call my husband to talk about it (which, I think is rather funny - imagine that phone conversation: "Honey, the nurse says it's going to cost $800,000 to do a C-section. Should we see if there are other options here?"). And that was pretty much the end of my dream.

So if you haven't figured out where my brain has been the last few days...well...maybe you should read it again.


I hope your dreams are less bizarre than that.

And no, I'm not pregnant. :)

If you saw my post below, you noticed that I was 75 on my library's waiting list for Breaking Dawn. Amazingly, I was okay with that. As long as no one spoiled the book for me, I didn't have to read it the second it came out on August 2.

However.

A friend came over on Saturday night and said she had bought Breaking Dawn, but had finals this week, so she didn't want the temptation around her while she studied and asked if I would keep it for her (thanks Dana!).

Yeah!!

I just finished (did anyone doubt it would take me more than a couple of days?) and it's VERY good. I won't give anything away, I just wanted to increase your excitement to read it. As always, with this Twilight series, I laughed. I cried. I gasped. I got really tense. And I loved it.

Enjoy!

Seeking a Peaceful Resolution Between Humans and Vampires

"MountainStar Blood Services personnel will be taking blood donations from 2-6 p.m. at the Cullen’s Culinary Cafe on the third level of the bookstore during regular hours, and will return that night dressed in vampire get-up to accept donations during the “Breaking Dawn” Book Launch Party from 11 p.m. to 12:30 a.m." http://byunews.byu.edu/archive08-Jul-vampire.aspx

This was a great marketing ploy by the BYU Bookstore rolled up into a nice little service project. I however saw this as more than just a plan to sell books and save lives. It gave me an idea that might finally bring a peaceful resolution to the struggle between humans and vampires.

As I was reading this article the following thought came to me: "Why don't the Cullen's hold blood drives?" This would benefit them for many reasons. 1) It would satisfy their desire for human blood without having to drink nasty animal blood. By my calculations the Cullen's kill hundreds of animals a year trying to curb their craving for human blood. All the kind bears and mountain lions will roam free once again without fear of Edward or Emmett hunting them. 2) They could convince more of the "mislead" vampires to join their coven because they would no longer have to give up human blood. With the strength of their new coven they could potentially overthrow the devious and evil Volturi. 3) It would mean a cheap birthday present from Bella to Edward (I'm sure a fresh pint every six weeks would be more than enough to satisfy him). It is the least she could do for him saving her every other page.

I decided to present my plan to Alisa. Of course she completely disagreed, and hot little debate ensued. Alisa made this point:

it's like if you'd never had Filet Mignon, you wouldn't know what you were missing, right? And if you'd only had it once or twice (a long time ago), you would have forgotten. But then someone brings some to you all of the sudden and you remember how great it was (or realize if you've never had it) and then that's all you want. More and more yummy filet mignon.

My response to her was very simple. If I had a cow that could regularly give me a piece of filet mignon without dying, then I would never kill that cow (that would be one magical cow)! I would give away my firt born's bed to the cow. It would be a never ending source of my favorite thing to eat! So of course the vampires would prefer to live by blood drives; they would choose it by their own self interest (Adam Smith's invisible hand works for vampires too).

To address a few final points you might try and make. 1) Humans would totally be for it because who wouldn't want to give their blood rather than dying? 2) Yes there are vampires like James that kill for fun. That is when we give Batman a call, and did you forget the Cullen's will be the new heads of the vampire world? 3) Another way to control all the energy that vampires spent on hunting is to start a VBL (Vampire Baseball League).

Llama Fest!

Every year, in Spanish Fork at the Hare Krishna Hindu temple, they have a Llama fest (I have yet to discover why they combine a Hindu temple with a Peruvian animal festival - can anyone enlighten me?). We (Nate, Trav, Rachel, Natalya, Damien, Brett, a friend of Rachel's and me) decided to go, since none of us had ever been and we were all a little curious what the hulabaloo was all about.

And I brought my camera :D

This is the Hare Krishna Temple. Pretty huh?

Brett, Nate, me, Travis, Rachel, Natalya and Damien
Inside the temple
Also inside the temple. We decided it would be easy to be a vocalist in this religion, as all we ever heard them sing was "Hare Krishna" over and over.
This was the 2nd picture I took of Nate next to the Llama - he wasn't smiling in the first one. :)
Nate pretended that he wasn't having much fun, but he didn't even know I took this picture. :D h

This Llama, according to Nate, looks like his mom (just the hair) - sorry Kippy - he insisted and thought it was just so funny....

One more with Nate and a Llama - he probably shouldn't have touched it since his hands smelled like Llama for the rest of the day. Yuck!

There was also dancing going on in a Pavilion down the hill - we only watched for a few minutes and I wish we could have watched more, but by that time, everyone was ready to GO!