Sarah Mable, Miraculously, Brings All Our Belongings From Arizona, and Ensuing Adventures

One of our best friends, Sarah Mable Jensen, lovingly and miraculously, helped us order a U-haul truck and with Amanda Ferguson, packed all of our things to do an eight hour plus trip to California to bring all our belongings from AZ. This was very important to me because, since I only drive a small Corolla, I have anxiety driving large trucks large distances (ie. just the drive from Chandler to Apache Junction which was only about 30 miles brought me some anxiety). So, when I brought this concern to Sarah in council, we decided to ask some people for help, and Sarah Mable came to mind. And she willingly accepted.

So, on Tuesday, she packed up our stuff, with the help of Amanda Ferguson in an hour and a half, with only one glass casualty, and on Wednesday, she took the 8+ hour trip to Santa Maria, CA. When she got here, we did our unpacking of our stuff into another U-haul storage of the same size, in another hour and a half, and funnily, we had to drive to Guadalupe, of all places, because I had a new piano student that evening. While I was at that appointment, they picked up some Mexican food, and we came home and ate and read scriptures with Arno, and then called it a night.

After some early morning activities, we went to go eat some foods with Santa Maria style Tri-tip at Jack's. Then we went to go pick up some great local strawberries from Little Pete's produce stand. All of which we ate on our day trip.

We were able to take a trip to Solvang, the Danish capital of the world. We took this picture in front of the statue of Hans Christian Anderson. Then we took her to the Hans Christan Anderson Museum. We learned a lot of information about him and his life. 

We then went to an antique store, where we discovered a really old organ and talked about the phrase and technique of pulling out the stops. We saw a really long antique couch, as well as a dining room set.

We picked up a Polish Kielbasa sausage, pretzel, and Aebleskiver (pancake/donut dessert) to eat.

We were able to take a trip to Pismo Beach and got some nutella and chocolate croissants at Dolce. We then walked on the Pismo Beach Pier. We peered over the ocean and people watched as people got into and out of the water. We walked to the end of the pier and sat down overlooking the ocean and we were in deep conversation. So much so that a fisherman that stood next to us overheard the things we were talking about and had some things to say. It was quite funny. His name was Anthony the Fisherman.

We saw this truck that reminded us of David and Kirsten because of the initials on the side (DKT).

We left to go to Walmart and pick up food items for our "bonfire" on Grover Beach. Kirsten and David let us use their blankets, chairs, and even 6 logs of firewood for our fire. When we started driving on the beach, we had a minor scare in our little Corolla, because the car seemed to get stuck in the sand. We prayed about what to do and with Sarah Mable's help, we were able to push the car out of the sand and on to more compact sand.

Sarah dug a hole in the ground for our fire and Sarah and I tried to start the fire. It was slow going and took us more than a half hour, and even after that, it was not setting. A family that was near us was about to leave and called out to us to see if we wanted to use their fire, which we were happy to use and for the miraculousness of being able to use it. Sarah didn't want to move firepits, so she picked up the shovel and started lifting the wood and coals to our fire, which was a considerable distance away. I remarked to Sarah Mable that she has to be extremely careful doing so. After that, we were able to have a fire and relax by going on the beach and enjoying our time in the water.

We ate hotdogs on buns and smores. Then we had some riveting conversation for a while. We also watched the sunset on the beach. I then broke out the Ukulele and we started singing songs. Sarah went to go walk on the beach. And when she came back, I sang her the Elvis Presley song Love Me Tender, which was our wedding song (Norah Jones' version). Then we traveled home.

Lastly, we went to the store this morning to pick up some Santa Maria Seasoning for Sarah Mable, which was the type of souvenir that she loves bringing home.

We really enjoyed the visit, and joked around with Sarah that she needs to move here. Of course, that might never happen, but she is always welcome to come visit.