Dog Days Of Summer

The month of May in Arizona was so hot! Half the month the temps reached to over 100 degrees. The month of June was a little cooler because half of its days were under 100 degrees, but now we are into July and it's supposed to be 116 today! I was running some errands today and every time I got in the car I felt like I was melting. The steering wheel is so hot it burns my hands when I touch it and if your not careful buckling your seat belt you might get a second degree burn. To top it all off the air conditioner in my car is not blowing very cold air so it never really cools off!

Last weekend we went backpacking to East Clear Creek to cool off, have fun, catch trout, and cliff jump. We had an awesome time! It rained hard on Friday for several hours so we hung out in our tents reading and sleeping. When the rain finally let up we started a fire but it was very smokey because the wood was so wet. Oh well, it was still warm and we were able to cook over it! While sitting around the fire we played this game where someone chooses a letter of the alphabet and then you take turns naming movies that start with that letter. You get one point for each movie you can name and double or triple points if more that one word starts with the letter. If the letter is M and your movie was Maid in Manhattan you would get two points. When no one can think of any more movies with that letter you choose a new letter. If your in the car you can take letters from the license plates around you. It's fun but I am not very good because I just can't seem to think of very many movies!

Here is a car game for you. Write each family members name on a lug nut of the car. Each time you stop the person who's name is on top gets a prize, chooses where to sit in the car, or what kind of music to listen to.

We really haven't done a whole lot this summer. Morgan and I went to girls camp with church,but she came home early because she got sick. Morgan also got to go to cheer camp with her school team. She came home totally worn out but she learned a lot and had tons of fun. They were at the Arizona Grand Resort which is very nice. It has its own water park which they got to use on their last day there. Morgan was so tired she didn't want to stay as late as the other girls so I picked her up early! Denver got to go to Boy Scout camp at camp Geronimo. He had a great time fishing, horseback riding, doing archery and everything else. There was some sort of flu going around the camp because a lot of people got sick! Thankfully Denver didn't get it because it cost three hundred dollars to go. Last year one of the boys got home sick so he went home after just two days and this year he got sick and so he came home early again. They had two other people in their group get sick and have to go home as well. One of the worst was a troop with 25 members and only three didn't get sick. The camp handed out bleach water and had everyone spray down their camp sites. Del and Dillon didn't get to go to any official camps, but I think they had fun last weekend.

I just celebrated my 37th birthday this last week. My Mom took me to see Wicked! It was really good! We didn't get to sit together because it was almost sold out. We tried to win their lottery but we weren't lucky): It' s actually pretty cool. If you lived near the theater you could try to win tickets before every show. They reserve 20 premium tickets and if your name gets drawn you can buy two tickets for twenty five dollars each! Mom had to spend quite a bit more for our seats but it was a lot of fun! Thanks Mom it was an awesome night!

Tomorrow we are having the family over for a swim party to celebrate Susie's birthday and my birthday. I'll try to remember to take pictures so you can see us! Love and miss you all, Monica xoxo