Hey guys, and welcome to the Moms and Mysteries podcast, a true crime podcast featuring myself, Mandy, and my dear friend Melissa. Hi, Melissa.

Hi, Mandy. How are you? I'm doing well. How are you? I'm doing good as well. We are closer and closer to the holidays,

which is still, I know we know how calendars work, guys. We do. We know. But at the same time,

somehow we're still learning. It's still confusing. I still get confused with the time changes.

This is all, like I'm shocked now. The time change, yes. We haven't talked about that yet, I don't think. The time change.

Wow. Okay. Let's go. The fact that it gets dark at 5 p.m. legitimately has ruined every good thing in my life. I just honestly, like, not to be dramatic, but I absolutely hate it. I absolutely hate this time

change. I know I'm getting older. Everyone's getting older. Nobody's getting younger.

But I am affected driving at night. Like it's a little, a little harder for me. But it's always

night now. And so I'm like, how do I? My husband will be like, do you want to go to the grocery store? You want me to grab something? And I'm like, absolutely not. I cannot see. I need you and your glasses to go do it. I know. Well, and we were talking about even trying to find a time to record, you know, the podcast. And I was saying to you, I've been so frustrated lately because, you know,

I love to take my little mental health walk either in the morning or sometimes I take it in the evening, especially if I can't do it in the morning, then I will put it off and try to do it later, you know, at the end of the day. But now I was telling you I feel so like frazzled because I basically have to go take my walk, like right when I bring my kids home from school, like at four in the

afternoon, because... like frazzled because I basically have to go take my walk like right when I bring my kids home

from school like at four in the afternoon because at 530 the sun is setting so I can't it's just

thrown me all off my entire schedule and then I'm just ready for bed like by 6 p.m. I'm like how is it

not 10 o'clock? I'm just I'm ready to go crawl in bed and not hear or speak to anyone, you know, but you can't do that when you have kids who are like trying to do homework at that hour. It's literally the worst. It's literally the worst. I know. It really does affect moods. And I, I always, like when we get to this time of year, I'm always thinking about people that live in areas where it is dark, like, all the time and stuff. And I commend you because it really affects my mood and my ability to do things. I'm done. When the sun sets, so do I. I am over it. If you've got questions, they wait till tomorrow. I really, I say that. That's not true. But I don't, I don't want to be doing things. Right. I feel like I would be not happy about it. Like you were saying, though, in places like that have extremes as far as like the, you know, night and days. Even in like, you know, Alaska. I feel like I would hate it also in reverse, though. I wouldn't want it to be daylight, like 20 hours a day any more than I would want it to be dark that often. You know, I feel like, no, I don't like that. I have a sleep mask now, which I'm showing you with my hands on this screen, but it's changed my life. It really does help me sleep. And I never thought it would, and I'm obsessed with it. I remember you mentioning that. I'm curious. I guess I don't know. I feel like I'm not bothered by light when I'm sleeping. Is that like the main thing or is it supposed to be like a comfort thing? Oh my gosh. That'd be sad. It could be a comfort thing. But really it does block out all the light. So I'm not distracted, like looking at things in my room too, which isn't really a thing, but sometimes I do, where my kids are like walking in the hallway. If I have an earbud in, I can't hear them. And I can't see the light. So then I'm not like a great, when are they going back to bed or do they get a snack or what happened. I'm just

oblivious. Right. You're like, do whatever you want. I can't see or hear you. Yeah, so that's really how I live my life now. But yeah, I would say, I would recommend looking into them. You might have to try a couple, but I mean, for me, it's great. Yeah. But I don't know how we got there. Yeah, I think I have one actually, a sleep mask. I think one of our sponsors from a while back, they sent a sleep mask along with the sheets that we got from them, and I stuck it in my nightstand and I've never really tried it, but I do have one. So maybe I will, maybe I'll give it a go. Yeah. Give it a whirl. Yeah. All right. Well, let's get into the story that we have this week. It is a very complex and very interesting story. I feel like I'm still not entirely sure what I think about what happened here. And I know you said that you had some thoughts too, so I'm anxious to talk about

them at the end. We didn't share our thoughts with each other yet. So when we get to the end,

I'm excited to hear what you think happened in this story. On a quiet afternoon in January of 2007,

residents in the rural town of Lawrence, Michigan, noticed smoke rising from the home of Todd

and Linda Sturmer. By 3.23 p.m., neighbors were calling 911 to report that the home was being

quickly overtaken by flames and to send help as quickly as possible. Among the first to arrive was a neighbor

named Mike and his girlfriend Connie. They had seen the

smoke and they immediately drove up the long driveway that led to the Sturmer home. As they got

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