Home again...home again

Not counting hotel time, I figure it is a 17 hour drive to Cortez, CO. We had good traffic both ways.
Earl drove so Jill and I just relaxed...if you know how bad a passeger I am you know that is quite an acomplishment.This was LE's idea. She and Jon flew in to Durango from Seattle. It was good to be there with them. I just did not get a good pic of them. The first morning there we had snow but not enough for a snowman.

It was really good to see Earl's family. Julie, I had not seen in 4 years or met her new, really sweet husband, Bob. All the kids had grown, of course.
The dinner was in the honey house ( where they work on their bee hives etc.) at Earleen and John's. Cherrie had fixed it up so cute with a doily, she had collected, under each glass plate, cute signs, photos, arrangments of all kinds and much much more. It was so fun and cozy.
All the food was perfect. Cherrie is also the family pie maker....are we all lucky! It was so hard to choose. But I have to say that the highlight for our little part of the family was the surprise baby shower for Jill! It was soooo cute the way she planned it. She got all the gifts and had each person present the gift to Jill along with thier suggestion for a girl and boy name. My favorite boy name suggestions were: Optimus Prime, Walker Texas Ranger, Frank the Tank and Winston Samuel...Nobel Prize winner....there were also many names after themselves... My fav girl names were: Princess, JoeJoe, "not this time", Temperence, Pearl, Xena and more names after themselves...We all laughed alot. The thoughtful gifts were so fun too....cute little oneies, soft blanket, lots of things that an experienced mother like Cherrie would know about...like "butt cream" ....who knew?
Then Cherrie had arranged for a photographer to come and get lots of family photos...to top it all off! We were sent on our way with home produced Elk jerky, canned salsa and honey.

Jill went through her basket of baby treasures on the way home, holding small garments up and trying to imagine her baby in them. We all have warm memories that will be with us for awhile.