The Sun is Shining

I think I'll go for a walk outside now

the summer sun's calling my name
(I hear ya now)
I just can't stay inside all day
I gotta get out get me some of those rays
everybody's smilin
sunshine day
everybody's laughin
sunshine day
everybody seems so happy today
it's a sunshine day

~The Brady Bunch~
~It's A Sunshine Day~

Whew! It is HOT outside! Well, at least hotter than I'm used to these days. And I'm still in Juneau, AK, people! Yesterday reached 82 degrees and today was supposed to be hotter, however I haven't checked the temperature yet. Hold on... ok, I just checked and it is hovering around 79 and 80 degrees at the moment. It is supposed to stay lovely through the end of the weekend just not quite as warm. Although I am NOT complaining about it being this warm. I am loving this weather.

My mom would have loved it right now, it's prime conditions for swimming at her favorite beach. Lena Beach is still a place that my family likes to visit, besides being my mom's favorite, we all love it too. You might think that swimming in the ocean on the shores of Alaska sounds ludicrous, but given the right temperature it can be quite welcoming. Too bad I'm stuck at work on the hottest days of our current heat wave. By the time I can make it out to Lena for a swim, it will have cooled down to the low 70s. Which is still nice, just not warm enough to brave the cool water.

I have fond memories of our mom taking my sisters and I out the road to picnic at Lena Beach. We'd go out with a bag of fried chicken and some jojos for a quickie just to enjoy the weather, or we would actually pack up the hotdogs and other prerequisites for a cookout over a fire. A lot of the time we were joined by other family members. Our aunts would go swimming with my mom and us kids. Good times.

The cove that Lena Beach sits around is called Lena Cove and that is the same place that we spread my mom's ashes last September.

It is real tough to concentrate on my job when it is this gorgeous outside. Luckily I have managed to hold off on too much goofing around until now. So my work hasn't suffered...much. lol. It will be nice later on once I'm off as well, and I'm looking forward to our Relay for Life team meeting tonight. We have decided to have it at my aunt's house on her deck in her back yard. So I will get to sit in the sun for a bit before it goes down.

I hope the rest of you are having as great a start as I am to your summer! Below are a couple shots of Lena Beach on a foggy morning. These were taken a couple years ago, I have a few classic pictures of my family at this same spot, but I'm afraid I might end up shot if I post them. So you'll have to make do with these.


~Take care!