Clothes are Now Optional!

If you hadn't heard, we're having a bit of a heat wave here in Santa Maria. I shouldn't complain because I am always saying that we need a little more heat here, but this is too much. It got up to 108 degrees yesterday, around 100 degrees the day before I don't remember how hot on Tuesday. Luckily, the weather channel says it will only get to about 100 today.

We have exausted all of our options. We went to the movie theater Tuesday, pool Wednesday, beach Thursday and Costco and Walmart yesterday. "What's that?" you may be asking, "Why Costco and Walmart?" Because they have air conditioning. For those of you unfamiliar, Santa Maria doesn't have AC because 99.9% of the time we don't need it. Usually if it gets a little on the warm side, you just head to the beach. That didn't work this week because there was no ocean breeze and it was still over 90 degrees there.

Yesterday, we spent the morning, as long as we could stand, in the house before it warmed up too much. Then we headed to Walmart where we walked around for a couple of hours. Then on to Costco. The best part was the cold room where they keep the fruits and veggies. Usually we avoid that area at all costs because it is freezing. We walked through several times yesterday, bought a frozen yogurt and pigged out on samples. I was a little sad when we had seen everything there was to see and had to go home. Luckily there is always water. We ran through the sprinklers and sprayed each other with the squirt bottle. Fun family times.

Today we are off to the ward hoe down. Don't worry, I'll have the kids put on some clothes before we go, but for now we are just trying to stay cool.

Here's a Little Sneak Peek...

Tyson is giving his very first talk in primary tomorrow. He has done a couple of scriptures, but this is the big time with a talk. He has been practicing all week so that he won't have a melt down if things don't go perfectly. I told him if he could do it all by himself, that we would record it and put it on the computer. That got him into it. So, without further ado, HERE'S TYSON!

Sweet Santa Maria

I have decided that this is the best part of living in Santa Maria...the strawberries. A friend from the ward clued me into the secret of "Jam Berries!" The strawberry stands sell their berries that are apparently a little older at about half the price. I say "apparently" because I got three full flats, my friend got three flats and between the two of them, we found 2 bad berries! They were some of the best strawberries I have ever had. Yummy!

It was almost a shame to moosh them all up and make jam out of them. We did it anyway. Yesterday was my first jam making experience (besides helping cut up plums for my mom and dad...I wasn't too involved in that...didn't learn a thing). We started at about 9:30 in the morning and didn't finish until 5:oo last night. It was really fun, though. We made regular, some with less sugar, and some with no sugar, just Splenda). The less sugar version is my favorite. As you can see, I made enough to last a while and still had half a flat of strawberries left over.

This was an eye-opening experience for me. I learned that making Strawberry jam is about the easiest thing ever to do. I thought it was going to be hard. It was so easy that this morning, I decided to make a batch of boysenberry jam too...just for the heck of it. Any how...whenever I am really productive, I like to share it with everyone. Hope all is well with you all! Hasta!

We're a REALLY close family!

We have a little tradition in our family...Each morning, when Tyson wakes up, he comes and climbs into bed with me because I don't want to get up until I absolutely have to. Dal is usually already up and getting ready for work. When Kelsie wakes up, Dallan grabs her and she joins Tyson and me in my bed. For some reason, they have to share MY pillow. Even though, Dal is already up when they get into bed with me, they scrunch in close so that I am practically falling off the bed. The rest of the bed is not good enough I guess. In fact, no matter how close to me Tyson is when she gets there, Kelsie will wiggle her way between us so that she is in HER SPOT. Dal got a picture of it the other day and I thought it was pretty funny. I am sure that many of you have experienced the same kind of thing. Other than me getting the boot off the edge, it is a good tradition. (Pardon the AWFUL sheets...the ones that match are getting old so I had to pull out some we got for our wedding until I get some new ones.)