Wednesday we had a lovely lazy morning. We slept in and then made out way out to the coast for Forth of July craziness. When we arrived in Pismo Beach, it seemed the local authorities had nearly every public parking lot closed off. Dumb. So we joined the thousands of other Bakersfield and Fresno residents in driving around for nearly an hour trying to find a place to park.

Finally, we went way up into the hills to park. This is where we parked. It was nearly 2 p.m. and I was starving. It was taking FOREVER to get around and with all the people and the no parking and the craziness I was starting to wonder why we even go there every Fourth of July. We were both getting really grumpy with each other, me especially because I can't function when I am starving.

I was determined to eat some Splash Café clam chowder. So we walked all the way down to the beach and got in a short line. We enjoyed some chowder in bread bowls. It was really thick though, thicker than I remember and it didn't sit well on my sensitive stomach. So I was disappointed again.

We walked around a little and went into some shell and gift shops. We totally found some really cute stuff for our house for way cheap! I am so excited. Most of the stuff I liked was from Pottery Barn and of course they mark up stuff to no end.

Check out my savings:
• Ships Wheel at Pottery Barn $199, in Pismo $37
• Decorative Sea Shells at Pottery Barn $14-19, in Pismo $2-9

And we got a really cute lighthouse for pretty cheap too.

So that pretty much made the trip worth it.

Next we met up with Stephen's cousin Jon and his wife Morgan in Santa Maria. We relaxed for a little while and then we hunted down some Mexican food. After we finished eating we headed back to Pismo Beach for the fireworks display. We parked in Grover and then walked down the beach. We finally ran into our friends Brady and Jennifer through the aid of modern cell phone technology.

It was really foggy. So we kept walking until we could make out the pier. We were pretty close. It was still really foggy though so we couldn't see like half the fireworks. There were plenty of people shooting off illegal ones, but it wasn't nearly as crazy as last year. It was still a good show though.

After the show we walked back to our cars and we stopped for some yummy dessert on the way home. It was nice to just go back to Morgan and Jon's instead of driving all the way back to Bakersfield. We had a nice slow morning the next day and we even visited a yarn and fabric store in Santa Maria. Everything in the store was 20% off, but because I went way over budget last weekend on my shopping trip with Megan and Brooke to Fresno, I wasn't really allowed to buy anything. I did convince Stephen to let me buy one book though so I can use up that Manos already!