secrets, secrets...

Once upon a time....

Two people fell madly in love.

They were perfect for each other....

So they got hitched.

A bit over a year and a half later, they graduated.

Shortly after...

Their biggest hope and wish came true.

The due date is approximately January 9, 2011, so I'm 12 weeks along. Wahoo! I have a lime sized human squirming around in my belly!

our house is so hot....

Our house is so hot that Scott went and dumped water on his head and stood in front of a fan...

Our house is so hot the butter sitting on the counter no longer has a nice square shape...it's completely melted on the plate...

Our house is so hot it was 85 degrees last night and only cooled down to 80 degrees by morning...

Our house is so hot it's 85 degrees outside now and that's cooler than inside....

Our house is so hot that we're excited to move to a hotter, more humid and miserable summer place than here BECAUSE it has A/C...

Our house is so hot we find any excuse to leave so we can drive with the A/C blasting and arrive somewhere else that is air conditioned...

Our house is so hot we went shopping as our date night because stores are cold...

I think it's around 75-78 degrees downstairs right now. And that's not good for me, if ya know what I mean ;-)

healthy food! yum!

So I'm really trying to make a huge effort to be more healthy with meals, cooking and eating in general. I've gained some weight in the past month or so and I definitely don't like it! So, the past couple days have been fabulous! I have to share the delicious things we've been eating. (thanks mom!)

Lunch:

bruschetta with humus on a whole wheat pita (bruschetta is just chopped roma tomatoes, chopped olives, chopped onion, garlic, salt and pepper, a tiny olive oil and a tiny balsamic vinegar, oh and a little fresh basil.)

Dinner:

Zupa's (I couldn't eat anything else...)

Lunch:

bruschetta again (yum!)

Dinner:

a "flat, round" egg with two pieces of canadian bacon stuffed in a whole wheat pita

Breakfast:

scrambled eggs with milk, cheese, bacon bits, zucchini, and peppers in a whole wheat pita

Lunch:

Salad with shrimp, croutons, bacon bits, cashews, tomatoes, cucumber, zucchini, olives, green onion, apple, peppers, feta cheese, and I'm not sure what else. SO yummy! Add a little caeser dressing and it's delicious.

I've been loving it and it's been fun to eat, not sure about Scott. He'll eat it but he says he doesn't want to be healthy. lol. I'll train him ;-) I got him to eat zucchini hidden in the salad! hehe. Now my sister Shayla is over and suggested making german pancakes....hmmm... :-)

I'm baaaack

Here are pics! Check out how shaded it is where we live! I haven't seen the inside, so hopefully it works outs. :-) I'm very confident it will.

My cute kindergarteners on the last day.

The entrance to our building. Our walk way is the "bridge" on the right.

The forest in our backyard. Look how close the trees are to the balcony!

Our walkway to our apt! We're 1405. The 2nd window up is ours.

Well, after a week spent in Kansas I'm back in Utah.

It was nice to see my family, but I really missed Scott alot! So I'm very happy to be back with him living our little life.

Today so far I had my first Mary Kay class! (it went well! They actually bought stuff too :-)) Then I came home and made a healthy lunch of bruschetta and humus on a whole wheat pita, then Scott and I washed our cars! It's SO nice to be out of the humidity. It feels way less hot here than Kansas. So it was lovely washing the cars. Now he's doing some other car thing and I'm updating this.

I must say, I absolutely love coming home to a very clean house (partly because it was appraised last week). It felt really huge and spacious and un-cluttered, which was nice. And still is. I'm afraid our place in St. Louis is going to feel very claustrophobic for awhile. We live in 1800 square feet and will be moving to 960 square feet. Yikes!

Oh well. Life is good and happy. :-) Pics as soon as I load them on the computer!

Ode to Jose

Dear Jose Peppers,

You are amazing. I love you. You are my most favorite mexican restaurant ever. I love how fast the service is. But even more, I love the free chips and salsa. Your chips are so perfectly thin, flaky, crispy and right amount of salt. Your salsa is chunky and smooth at the same time. Not too sweet, tangy, spicy or salty. Quite perfect actually.

But most of all, I love your Espinaca. It is the perfect blend of melted, creamy cheese with spinach and salsa mixed in. It also has the perfect level of spicyness. Combined with your perfect chips, it is something I could eat forever and be happy with.

Also, your Monterrey Chicken is very delicious, but smaller than usual. That would be the only change I would request. The Chicken Avocado enchilada's are quite tasty too. And the beans and rice you serve on the side are much better than any other mexican I've had. You know how to add the perfect spices and flavors to make them delicious.

Last of all, I love how I can't touch the plates because they're so hot. And I love that the food is the same way. It's so hot I can barely eat it. Thank you for making me so happy and satisfied in my tummy. I love you and wish you could move to St. Louis with me.

love,
karissa

good news!

We found a place in St. Louis! Manchester actually...but close to school!

Mom and I headed out Wednesday afternoon and after about 3 1/2 hours we arrived in Chesterfield. From about 2:30-5:30 we saw 6 places! That's a ton. I found one I liked quite a bit but didn't feel settled.

We spent the night at Lambert's (THANK YOU!) and had tons of fun talking and searching more places. I had about 10 to go to Thursday. We left around 10:15 am to search.

1st stop was to visit Kathryn and the kids. It was fun! Her kids are SO dang cute! And Cameron is so happy and smiley. On the way my mom made the GPS upset....

"recalculation..." "recalculation..." "observe speed limit." "observe speed limit."

HAHAHA! We laughed for awhile.

After the we drove around and stopped at a bunch more places. Finally around 4:30 we decided on one place (after consulting Scott of course) and went to fill out paperwork. It's a little more expensive than we were hoping but not by much. 2 bed, 2 bath, washer dryer, storage closest, balcony, etc.

Not to mention the location is beautiful! It's totally nestled up a hill through a residential neighborhood tucked away in a forest. Our backyard is literally a forest and totally shaded so we'll miss the late sun. yay! It's also very quiet and away from traffic and cars. I'm very excited about it! I'll definitely feel safe walking around without Scott. And it's in Manchester so it's close to everything and about 10 or 12 minutes from Logan. WAHOOO!!!

So now we're back. What a fun, busy, fast, and cool road trip with mom. I will post pictures as soon as I get back to Utah!

p.s. Chesterfield and the Logan campus is so incredibly beautiful. I've never seen so many huge trees, rolling hills, and gorgeous open fields. Ahhh! :-)

crazy Dodds weekend!

What a crazy weekend!!!

Friday we had lots of rain and super cold weather. Mom and Dad Dodds, Susan and Debbie and Angie all came down from Idaho for the weekend. Friday night we had a way fun girls night/bridal shower for Susan! We went to Los Hermanos and then back to Carrie's for make overs. Poor Carrie was having horrible contractions the whole night so I'm not sure how much fun she had... But the rest of us had a blast!

Saturday Scott and I played a pick up soccer game with a bunch of friends and guys we didn't know. It was SO fun! And SO awesome to be back on the field again. I loved it. Afterward we cleaned up and watched the USA/England game. Lucky for us the England goalie had grease on his hands so we tied it up.

That afternoon Carrie had her baby. She's beautiful! We didn't get to see them until about 7:30 that night. After we went and said farewell to Becky and her family. They're moving to Australia for 3 years, so it was a little sad to say goodbye. At least we know they'll be coming back. I feel like they just barely moved here!

Scott's family has alot going on these days. A new baby, a move to Australia, a wedding for the youngest girl, a move to Arkansas, a move to St Louis, and I'm not sure what else. It's crazy!

Sunday was nice. We gave an awesome lesson in sunday school. After church we ate some food and watched Germany completely crush Australia 4-0. It was pretty crazy. Then we visited with Scott's mom for awhile, totally cleaned and organized the basement, ate a yummy dinner and visited some more before bed.

Today I'm leaving for Kansas. I'm really really excited! I can't wait to see my family, eat some Jose Peppers and Oklahoma Joe's and check out St Louis for a couple days. The only problem?

I hate flying.

For some reason it scares the crap out of me. I hate it. I get so panicky and anxious and nervous. It's awful. I'm gonna have Scott give me a blessing before we leave to calm my nerves. My imagination is just TOO good. (and crazy too!) It'll be good though.

And that's all folks!

ramblings

Last night I had the most terrible dream that I accidently gave all my Nutter Butters away!

I had brought them for lunch at school and kids started coming in, so I decided to be nice and give them some. In my dream I had two packages and there were supposed to be less than 20 kids. Well, as I started passing them out, more and more kids just appeared! Then, they were all gone and I was devastated. So sad.

Also, last night our power went out. AGAIN. We counted this as the 5th time it's happened since we moved in. I've never had the power go out so many times. It's crazy. Not sure what the deal is with the neighborhood. Although, we did hear some popping/bang noise just before so we wondered if it was a transformer box.

Sometimes I absolutely love being really color coordinated. Today? Black pants, white shirt with red tank, new white tennis shoes with red accents. Plus I also love wearing my hair in one of those sports headband things. I think it's cute. So does Scott.

Last night we danced together. It was amazing. I miss it.

mindless nothings

I'm finding it weird at the moment that when I really want to write something intelligent, entertaining and cool here, I have nothing coming to mind.

I did start summer school this week. It's so chill. I love it.

I also love being a teacher.

I can't imagine myself doing anything else.

I'm gonna brag for 2 seconds about my perfect job. 8-11 am, Monday-Thursday, less than 15 kids, I get to do whatever I want with them as long as it includes reading. I also get paid an hourly sum that is more than any other hourly wage I've worked for before.

And I get to wear whatever I want. Shorts and flip flops? yes. :-)

(of course I still look somewhat professional. Come on people, who do you think i am?)

Monday. Kansas. 7 days. :-)

I'm not smart enough for a smartphone

So Scott and I FINALLY got new phones yesterday! We've had the same old clunkers since our wedding almost 2 years ago, and you know how fast technology changes. Not too mention at the time we were poor so we got the crappy free phones that come with a new plan.

Well, we decided to change our plan a little and upgrade to new phones. So, we found some at the T-mobile store. The lady totally talked them up and said how awesome they are (she's right), but they were $45 each!

I didn't wanna pay that much, so I said "hmm, well, I like them alot but I just wonder if I can find them cheaper somewhere else..."

I think she really wanted to make a sale because she came back pretty quick with a "I'll give em to you free. Pay the 100 bucks today and send in the 100 dollar rebate to get it back."

So we got em!

Nokia Neuron 5230. I guess they're supposed to be pretty dang cool phones. We also got a phone 1st, data 2nd internet deal so I have internet on mine. Scott didn't want it since he has an i-touch and can get wi-fi.

Funny thing is, I have no idea how to use a touch screen. And it's totally different. I could not figure it out yesterday! It took like 10 minutes to write and send a 4 word text. Wow. I've gotten used to it more though, and I can at least text if nothing else! :-)

Summer school starts tomorrow! I'm glad I'll have something to do but that it's only M-Th 8-11 am. I still have time for other stuff. Which is good because I haven't done ANY packing or cleaning and in my mind and on my calendar, June is almost over! Ah!

Kansas next week. YES!

Edit:

I'm totally laughing because I just checked out the weather and we're under a Severe Thunderstorm Warning. Yet, the storm cell is quite north and moving east, northeast. I think Utah is funny. If it actually hits us, that would be pretty cool! But, I have lots of doubts. I also think it's funny that they issue a warning that big (it extends down to Provo too) for a cell that looks pretty tiny. Oh Utah... :-)

st louis...

I realized today....

My perfect weather situation would be 70-75 and sunny with a thunderstorm at least twice a week.

Do you know of such a place?

It's only 80 degrees today but I feel like I"m melting!!

I now know without a doubt that A/C and a pool in St. Louis is absolutely MANDATORY! Otherwise I might actually melt into a puddle....

Insurance sucks

I need to vent.

NEVER EVER EVER EVER EVER EVER EVER get short term insurance!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This is what happened.

We thought it was a "great deal" to get this short term insurance to transition us from BYU to my school's insurance. When you think insurance is a "great deal" don't buy.

We paid about $320 for Jan-April to have insurance. Great deal, right? NO. We didn't have any need to use it until April when I was feeling so horribly sick and needing meds for a sinus infection. So I went to the Instacare.

I walked out with $65 of prescriptions and a good feeling. That was until the pharmacy got ahold of the insurance and said they didn't cover prescriptions. Great. Okay. Out 60 bucks, I can deal.

Then I figured insurance had covered the visit and everything was taken care of until I got a bill on MAY 22 (over a month after the visit) saying I owed $150. WHAT??

Insurance paid nothing. So I called them.

"This insurance does not kick in and pay until the $1000 deductible has been reached. Then it pays 80/20 up to $5000. But it doesn't cover anything lower than that. Oh, and it also does NOT cover doctors visits."

Somewhere, somehow, some communication had been lost because I had NO idea. Had I known I would not have gone to the doctor.

hopefully now my school's insurance will not cause any problems and will carry us until we have to change AGAIN in August. Ugh. Shoot me now. I hate insurance.

glee

Last night I finally got to watch Glee again. I was reminded of how much I love that show only to be brutally slapped in the face with the upcoming announcement that next week is the SEASON FINALE! What happened? It started like two weeks ago! Oh well I guess. Hopefully they come out with another season.

Best quote from last nights show:

"I want him to be eaten by a lion." -Rachel

Drama Queen? Yes. I laughed my guts out.

summer?

I love that it's summer!

Although I must admit, it doesn't quite feel like summer outside yet. It's still too chilly for summer I think. But I won't complain because I know when it starts getting really hot I'll wish it were cooler. Especially because we have no air conditioning. At least we sleep in the basement. :-)

So far I have accomplished alot since school got out. Here's my list:

1. Drove up the canyon to Aspen Grove by myself!!

2. Slept in til 8:15

3. Bought a new swim suit (oh how i've needed one!)

4. Started water aerobics with Emily! (pool+working out+Emily=AMAZINGNESS)

5. Bought 2 new summer candles from Bath & Body (Caribbean escape is amazing)

6. Had a BBQ and made Kabobs on Memorial Day

7. Went fishing in Provo river. I mostly watched and hoped a fish would be caught.

8. Got my hair highlighted for the first time since October. Oh, and it took less than 2 hours! That's an amazing feat. Plus I love it.

9. Cut Scott's hair

That's really all I can think of right now. I know I'll be adding more to this list as the summer goes on. I just feel really excited about life today! It's really nice.

Now if I could just get my house cleaned, laundry done, junk de-cluttered, drawers and table re-finished, storage room organized, find a place in St. Louis, start Mary Kay, get a job in St. Louis, book a moving truck and pack the house I think I'd be good!

Quote of the day: "You're more expensive when you're not working" -Scott

Gosh I love that man :-)