Pregnancy Update

Hey all,
I started a new blogger page when I first got pregnant, but I kept it private because I wasn't ready to tell everyone about my pregnancy right away. Well, I linked it to this page (it's the link right below Ginger's pictures or the link under "links related to Saria". I haven't been the best at keeping my blog up to date, but at least it's something. I have pictures of my pregnancy bump progress. Not every week, but most weeks. I can't believe I'm heading into my third trimester already! Anyway, click and enjoy!

Been a while

So really, I've just been way WAY to lazy to update my blog... that and I've been really sick... thanks to the fact that I'm PREGNANT. But here is a quick update on our life. Around the end of June, John and I had to buy a van for our business trips. We decided on the Dodge Grand Caravan, and with used models being only a couple of thousand less than a new model, WITHOUT all the guarantees, we opted for the new model. We literally drove this car off the lot with ELEVEN miles on the speedometer, and that was AFTER we test drove it for about five miles! Anyway, we tested the vehicle out by traveling to Wisconsin to see some close friends, and then on to Michigan for a scrapbook show. The car traveled AWESOME. Anyway, I have posted a picture of it from the Dodge website (because why go through the trouble of uploading a picture if it's already available to you?!). Our favorite features by far are the stow and go seating, the multiple cigarette lighter/car outlets, the flex fuel tank (we can use unleaded or E-85 which is as much as a DOLLAR cheaper-- but less efficient), and the $2.99 gas guarantee that it came with. Oh and it will be great for the upcoming child addition to our family when we still have to take business trips!

Snow Bird & Manti Pagent

A couple of weeks ago, while John's family went to Disney Land, John and I enjoyed his parents timeshare at Snowbird. Unfortunely, I was sick most of the time so we didn't get out much. We usually hike to the peak of the mountain and then ride the tram down. The snow and SKIERS deferred us from doing that this year. However, we did hike up to Alta, the next town up.... probably about 3-4 miles. We look at all the ski "cabins" which were really mansions in the mountains! Here are some pictures of that:


The yellow blobs behind us are skiers. You can see them when the picture is bigger. I had to brighten this picture because the bright snow made us really dark at midday!


We decided to hike into the snow a little bit at Alta and we found a nice rock to sit on for the pictures. Then we noticed the FIRE ANTS! Luckily we didn't get biten! But again, snow makes things SUPER BRIGHT!


We also went to the Manti Pagent. We have gone for the last four years and now it's just tradition. This year we opted for the blankets. Can you tell I'm tired?

John got his MBA

So it's been a while since I have updated the blog, so I'm doing a couple of posts at once. John finally graduated with his MBA. Here are some pictures of the event.
All the pictures can be viewed by clicking on the picture link on the left sidebar.

Ginger's Latest Modeling

We decided to expose our dog to soccer, John's beloved sport. So John dressed Ginger up in some of his old soccer work out clothes and took her outside to play with a soccer ball for the camera.


We tried to get her to nose the ball or paw it forward, but she didn't seem to have any interest in that.

We did succeed however to get her to stand next to the ball for a picture!

I just through this was a cool "soccer picture" shot! Our dog puts up with so much from us!

Amy & Carlee

My best friend is getting married and she came to visit me with her beautiful 1 year old daughter. She came to look at wedding dresses in Utah. It was great to see her the few days she stayed with me. John got some great pictures of Ginger and Carlee! They were fast friends, but Carlee learned to lean away when Ginger's tail got wagging!

Brittney's Married!

For the last year, my cousin, Brittney Sprague has been living in our spare room. Well, this past weekend, she got married to Cody Sodaborg (not sure on spelling). It was a gorgeous wedding. She was married in Las Vegas, Nevada and you'd never believe but it turned out to be RAINY! Here are some pictures that John took.

Getting into Shape for Summer

So now that summer is here, I've been more active than I have this past winter. I usually run every day, but this winter I got lazy and didn't want to battle the cold (I no longer have my gym membership). So for the past week or two I have been running, playing racquetball, and going bike riding. I have had my share of sore muscles! Well yesterday, I was excited to discover that I can successfully bike from my house, which is close to downtown Salt Lake, to Bountiful - where my job is located. I was worried about going over the point of the mountain, but it really wasn't that bad. All in all, I biked about 25 miles yesterday. I was bracing myself for the sore muscles I would have today but the only thing that is sore is my BUTT! I really need to invest in one of those gel bike seats. I was always too cheap to buy one before, but maybe JUST MAYBE, there may be something to them!

Ginger will RUN

It is FINALLY starting to get warm and stay warm! Last Saturday, I planted my garden and and spent the day outside. Well we decided to go for a bike ride and we wanted to take our dog. We loaded our bikes into the truck, got Ginger and drove over to John's parent's house - about six miles from ours. Well, if anyone know our dog she has AMAZING energy and never seems to run out. I take her running nearly every day but for her going at my jogging speed, it's a fast trot. So she ran next to our bikes the whole way and when we got back, we road through the park (where I take her running) and she was ready to run around the park a couple of times. I thought for sure we had worn her out, but then she ran around some more in our back yard and played inside. I SWEAR I don't know HOW to wear her out (except maybe snowshoeing for three hours!)

Sorry this didn't get posted sooner... I had it only as a draft (I actually publically posted this on June 12, 2008)

Ernst & Young Here I come!

This fall I am quitting my job and going back to school full time. I'm two years out from receiving my Masters in Accounting (if all goes well). I have my degree, but since it's not in business, I need to take some prerequisite classes before I'm able to apply for the masters program. I'll finish up all those classes by Spring of 2009 and plan to attend graduate school that fall. I'm taking the GMAT in June (this year) to give me time if I need to retake it if by chance my score isn't high enough (I'm hoping that is not an option though).

Sorry for all the background, but it's kind of the reason I'm so excited. Because I have already started to take classes, I got involved in the accounting club. The club has professionals come in to talk to the students and the professionals plan events for the students so they may get to know them better for recruitment purposes. Anyway, after a lot of events, I really liked Ernst & Young the best. The people seemed sociable and while long hours are required for a big four firm, there was still flexibility. The employees seemed happy with their work environment. Therefore, I was pushing to ultimately get a job with them. I was also excited not to have to spend every day in the office!

They have a summer leadership program that I blogged about a couple of weeks ago. It's a foot in the door and a step in the right direction toward a career ultimately. I interviewed for a position in the program (it's a two day program where you basically get to job shadow) and I found out yesterday that I WAS ACCEPTED! I had felt like the interview went well, but because it's such a competitive place, I still had my doubts. So it made my day to get that phone call yesterday! If my plan goes well, this opportunity will lead to an internship with them next summer and then a position as a staff member the following summer when I graduate from the master's program, so yay for me!

Spoiled Dog

So, John and I may not go out and buy things for Ginger all the time, but we definitely give her our undivided attention, take her running, take her to dog parks and play endlessly with her. She's one of those dogs that will come up to you and if you don't pet her, she will nudge your hand until it falls over her head in a petting stroke. Anyway, now that Ginger has stopped chewing her blanket that she sleeps with at the foot of our bed, we decided to get her a bed so she wasn't just sleeping on the floor (she's not allowed on beds, couches, chairs, etc.). The decision came after one day when I was sorting the wash into piles Ginger made her self a spot to lay on in our dirty clothes.

Anyway, we finally found a pillow like bed that fits her pretty well. We literally put it on the floor where her blanket use to be and this was the immediate response!

Harry Potter Suite

So Mnbc posted this letter that was written to J.K. Rowling and I seriously think it's about the most illogical letter I have ever read and don't even get me STARTED on the grammar!

Should you be interested (since the rest of this blog is going to COMPLAIN about it), the link to the letter is: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24189855/

First of all, who ever wrote this letter has obviously never learned the formal structure of an argument or even how to make a sentence flow from one idea to the next! This person is criticizing J.K. Rowling of suing one of her biggest fans because she feels that this fan is infringing on her copyright of Harry Potter. She is criticized because she has awarded this fan an award on his website which is a lexicon for Harry Potter. She encouranged it. But here is the thing, this fan's website was not for profit, but simply for hobby and it wasn't like he was posting her serious on his page. But now he comes out with a book in which he makes money from a publisher. Even the fan was concerned about copyright issues, but the publisher promises to protect the fan against any lawsuit and this fan publishes a book. Now JK Rowling feels that this book which is basically an encyclopedia for Harry Potter infringes on her copyright. Now I really don't care whether the suit has a good legal cause or not. My point is this letter doesn't even focus on that. It really just tells J.K. Rowling how much this person is NOT a fan and it's an excuse to vent some of his or her stupidity as a person!

Attack Scare

So, this morning John had to leave early to finish setting up for the Scrapbooking USA Expo in Salt Lake. He had to be there at 7:00a.m. I decided to get up with him and take our dog for a jog since the remainder of the day she would have to remain in her cage (the show goes until midnight - I am going over to help after I get off of work). We live right next to Liberty Park which is THE BEST park ever for all around activities. Well, Ginger has been there plenty of times and she was excited to go. I normally run about 2-3 times around the park which is approximately 3-4.5 miles. We got to the first bend in the park where there were two stray dogs. Well those dogs came running over to us and they surrounded Ginger. One in front of her in her face and the other behind her. Her shackles came up and she was on a leash. I tried to keep running with Ginger, but these dogs wouldn't leave her alone and they looked like they were ready to attack her or myself if we did any sudden moves. I started to get a little scared as it was pretty early and there was no one around. I'm not one to ever scream or yell or really lose control of a situtation, but I backed up against a lamp pole and just began screaming at these dogs to go away. At one point they started barking and jumping on Ginger and I started to cry because I didn't know what to do and I didn't want to get hurt. Well the whole thing lasted about five minutes and the dogs seemed to lose interest and ran off to another runner with a dog. I took my oppotunity to turn around and run out of the park. I still really wanted to run but I was afraid of the dogs. I decided to run around the outside of the park block just across the street. Well, again when I got to that corner, one of the dogs seemed to notice Ginger and began running toward the street. Because the street wasn't busy at that hour, I didn't think the dog would hesitate to cross the street and attack Ginger or both of us. So I gave up and sprinted home. I also heard some other people yelling at those dogs. I didn't even see if the dogs had tags as I didn't want to be anywhere near then. Anyway, it was probably one of the scariest moments of my life as you never know what an unfamiliar dog will do, nor do you know how vicious they can be. I'm just grateful that Ginger and I were able to get away without being hurt! Ginger reacted very well to the situation and seemed to stay calm. I came home to call animal control, but I couldn't find them in the yellowpages. I could only find pet stores. Dex DOESN'T know! I finally gave up and got ready for work.

Young Women's President

I was put into the young women's presidency last June right before our young women went on a pioneer trek! I've been the first counsler, but all I have ever really had to do was play and give rides and teach every once in a while. Well, NOW I'm the PRESIDENT. I'm excited because I have some ideas I want to impliment, but scared at the same time because I'm going to have such a HUGE impact on these girls lives. So I'm excited, but nervous.

Accounting

I have been going back and forth over the last year debating whether I want to go back to school, my desire to learn, and my nack for accounting. I went to an openhouse for Ernst & Young, one of the big four public accounting firms. I have gone to a couple of events put on for accounting students for them and I was still really intreged with the idea of a career there. After talking to John, I made the decision that if I was going to go back, I had to do it 100% and not just half way. Therefore, we decide that in August, I would quit work and attend college fulltime to finish the classes I needed to apply to the masters of accounting program. I should finish my Masters in May of 2010. I applied for the summer leadership program for Ernst & Young and have been accepted for an interview! I'm super excited about it. It will happen Friday, April 11, 2008 in the afternoon. Hopefully, I'll be accepted into the program. Additionally, I am studying for the GMAT and I plan to take it June 14, 2008.

Kensington Fourplex

Just before John and I were engaged to be married, John ventured into the real estate world. He bought a four plex and at first, everything went pretty well. We were even able to rent out our house and live in a one bedroom unit for a few month after our marriage. But then, we realized we both owned too much junk and we missed the green house. We put our complex up for sell and we ran into a few gliches. We had problems with offers going through and then we had a big blow when a city inspector came out and told us that our complex was not even recognized by the city as a fourplex and we would be subject to fines because of a dispute that had never been settled with previous owners. We went to community meetings where originally a waiver was voted upon for us but then later retracted. We paid money to the city thinking it was easily resolveable and even had a hearing where many city people came to inspect the complex. Needless to say, these problems did not make the complex sell any easier. In fact, we had four offers fall through because of city problems. It always seemed like we had to be fixing this or that at the complex and with trying to sell, we didn't want to kick our tenants when they failed to pay on time. It would be harder to sell if the units were empty. Our complex quickly became our money pit!

So John and I held our breath until 4pm today when a offer was made and would close. As of right now, 5:30pm mst, we no longer own the complex and everything is out of our name.
Of course though, one final thing would need to go wrong, because we couldn't escape that easily! This past Saturday, one of the drains in one of our units started backing up what may have been raw sewage from the toilets. Of course our insurance on household repairs did not have any services for immediate emergency dispatchment on the weekends, so John and I were forced to go outside of our plan to hire a drain and sewage specialist to fix our mess. Needless to say, John and I were not ready to celebrate prematurely! But finally we can breath and the problem is our no longer!

Can you tell how excited we are?! Having real estate was a great experience though. It taught us that we never want to do it again! With today's market slump and raising apartment rates, the only way to make money in that business is to own multiple properties and to not be as soft as we tended to be toward our tenants! At anyrate, it was a huge burden we were praying would be lifted from our shoulders and finally it has!

San Diego Zoo

Okay, so along with our Hollywood trip, we went to the San Diego Zoo. I just didn't take the time to post these pictures as well.

They had these fun little ape statues around the ape section so I thought I would make a friend!

Is this not post card material? John captured this picture of the meerkate exhibit!

At anyrate, the zoo was cool, though I was a little bummed that there were no giraffes. Later I found out from a friend the there ARE giraffes, but they were in the section of the zoo that was closed due to construction. we only saw Zebras and gazels.

When we entered the zoo, we made a plan of how to attack so we would get through the entire zoo by the time it closed. The first we looked at were the monkeys....

The black monkeys were the funnest to watch. They were probably the most animated of all the monkeys. I don't have all the pictures posted but they were the ones swinging through all the vines. Here we have a monkey just chilling and scratching his back as it hangs. And then I thought it was funny that a little kid monkey was trying to push around the older monkey. I wonder if they were brothers!

Monkey's have the weirdest grooming behaviors! If evolution in the sense that we came from monkeys DOES exist, then I'm glad we have graduated from grooming in this fashion!

Here is a monkey trying to steal a flower that the other monkey was eating. The other monkey was turned away but as soon as it realized what happened, it turned back and the stealing monkey scrammed. It was quite funny!

The SAME monkey then tried to steal from another monkey and this time stays to fight for it. The stealer monkey never did get a flower to eat by itsself, but here it is playing tug a war with the flower.

It seemed like most of what we looked at was birds. Although the zoo did have these AMAZING huge walk through aviaries that looked tropical and had birds flying all around you. It was pretty cool!

So there was this little twig that FOUR birds were perch on all perfectly aligned. We thought it looked cool. The next picture we took because these birds had the coolest head feathers. We found out later they were called crown pigeons. These were both taken in one of the giant aviaries we got to walk through.

This bird was eating fruit and we were excited that it let us get so close to it! The bird on the right (above) was in a different cage and not in the aviary be we thought it was a cool tropical bird. After a while though, we stopped stopping at all the MANY bird cages and it sped up our walk through the park quite a bit!

Okay so the name of this flamingo (yes it IS a flamingo though it's not pink) is an ALMOST flamingo. I thought it was hilarious that was the actual NAME of the flamingo. Not only did they have almost flamingo's but they also had SUPER orange flamingos. The picture on the right shows the contrast of the orange vs the pink flamingo.

Next, we looked at bears!

The sun bears were really cute and just bathin in the sun. On the left was a great shot we got of one of the cubs. The grizzley bears were playful as well, but I would never want to get in the way of THOSE claws!

So I guess San Diego is like the only zoo in the nation to have panda bears. This is because they research and breed them. Above is the mother bear just cilling on a branch. She then climbed down and hung her head over a stone basin. That had the look of a morning after hang over, huh? John caught these shots! Below is her baby cub sound asleep on a branch.

The koala bear was actually pretty boring to watch. The most animated was when some bears ate their ucaliptis leaves. But the signs around them say that it wasn't just because the koalas were chilly that they were all up by their lamps. These lazy bears sleep between 18 and 20 hours a day!

In fact, most of the bears were lazy. the playing cubs (above) were the best action we got from the bears. We did catch a picture of a polar bear stretching, but we were hoping that it would go in the water. It didn't, though I did discover that the zoo feed them CARROTS for snacks!

There was also a whole section of pigs! They smelt and they weren't all that great to look at either. Though I did get a picture of what I thought was maybe the cutest pig and one which was DEFINITELY the ugliest one! (Below)

I don't remember what the "prettier" pig was called, but the ugliest sure was uglier than Pumba on the Lion King! Yes, that's right, I got a picture of a warthog with the crookedest tusks you'll ever see as well!

The camel next to this one (not in the picture) was foamed at the mouth and the white specks that are on the ground and above this camels right eye (left when looking at it) are spit! I heard the saying that camels spit, but I didn't know it was true!

The elephant mesa was one of the most popular attractions here. They had four or five elephants. This is only one of them. We got to see them break sticks with their trunks and use their trunks to cover themselves in dirt. This elephant looked lonely so we took a picture with it!

All the "cats" were in fully enclosed cages or glass dens. The only problem with cages is that when pictures are taken, the focus is automatically on the closest object in the picture, which tends to be the fense. So alas, I put our savy new camera to work and I switched over to the manual focus to focus beyond the fense. I thought I did a pretty good job, but then I downloaded the picture at home. Though you can see the leopard fairly distinct in the back ground, I got AMAZING focus on the flowers, wouldn't you say?!

We were lucky enough to witness the feeding of this grate animals (by the way, for all that know me, this is one of my favorite animal prints). John joked to his parents, that someone had gotten a little close to the cage, but after the San Fran zoo incident with the tiger, the joke probably wasn't that funny! At any rate, the leopard had an ordeal getting this meat through the cage. The feeder had to eventually get it back and throw it in a different section of the cage while the leopard was distracted.

This is a TREE kangaroo. It's a smaller kangaroo that spends the majority of its life in trees. We didn't have the priveledge of seeing the traditional australian kangaroos, but we did get to read about them. Did you know that when a kangaroo is born, it's not fully developed? A couple of months after conceptions, the fetus makes its way from the birth canal to the mother's pouch. There it locks its jaw (that actually isn't fully formed) around the mother's nipple located on the inside of the pouch. There it remains (continually locked to the mother's nipple) until it finishes its development! Didn't know that, huh?

So I have never seen a hienna in real life. They aren't very

attractive!

At anyrate, this was my really REALLY long blog of my day at the zoo. But in my defense, it was a HUGE zoo! But we did make it through the entire thing and then up and drove to Vegas that night to spend the rest of the weekend with my family.