Homeward Bound

My Grandpa Buchanan past away last month just before his 90th birthday. We were lucky enough to get to live only 10 minutes from them from the time I was 4 to 16 years old. I have not been back to my hometown of Kelseyville since my senior year of high school so it was mixed emotions of excitement of going home and sadness at the loss of my Grandpa and that life we had there. Granted both my grandpa and us moved away from the lake many years ago but for some reason I felt that since Grandpa was still around so was that part of my life.

We headed back home for the funeral. Luckily Chad and kids got to come too. We took the kids to see the Golden Gate Bridge on the way.

We got to walk under the bridge. It was so loud!

We pulled up to the bridge when it was still dark and got to watch the sun rise!

After we headed to Point Reyes National Seashore and there was so much beautiful scenery we had to stop and take pictures! Living in Arizona really makes you appreciate every little stream and fall leaves!

At Point Reyes the kids earned their Junior Ranger patches and we learned about the native people of Point Reyes.

We stayed at a hotel right on the lake in my home town. It was fun since my whole extended family pretty much filled the entire hotel. All of my siblings were all upstairs with a shared balcony which was fun to put the kids to bed and hang out.

The kids loved the little playground and ping pong table.

And of course the MANY ducks!

Easton was terrified to walk on the docks but we finally convinced him with his death grip on our hands of course.

The funeral was very nice and it was great to be together with so much family. It felt like the old days when we would all get together. We drove past my old house and grandma and Grandpas. It still looked the same as if you could just walk right in and find grandma and grandpa in the living room. I am sure the people living there thought it strange quite a large line of cars was passing there house haha.

We stayed an extra day to walk around the town with Brad and Becca and Craig and Jeanette. Its funny how everything looked pretty ,much the same.

We went to Highland Springs and the kids discovered toolies. They would tie them together to make little boats to float in the water. Easton didn't want to leave he just wanted to play there all day.

Uncle Chad started a leaf fight.

The next day was Sunday so we went to church in my old ward. Since we were driving back that day we decided to just go to sacrament meeting.

It was fun to see a few of the same families there and visit with them before heading home.

New Family Member. Halloween, and Sophie's Birthday

Chad has always loved COE trucks. He has talked about how great it would be to get one and fix it up. Driving back from a campout he saw an old COE Truck for sale on the side of the road. We looked at it and he asked me to call to see how much. We thought there was no way it would be in our price range but might as well check. It was only $2500! and it ran! Sold! We welcomed Truman to our family.

All the boys in our family are in love and its even a dump truck to top it off! William likes to get his hands and everything else dirty.

For Halloween we found some giant pumpkins for the kids to carve.

They were excited for trick or treating. William was content to walk off after the first piece of candy but then realized he could get more so he started to say trick or treat to get more and more candy. People thought he was so cute saying it they would give him even more.

Sophie was an angel, Lydia was a witch, Easton was a K-9 Unit Power Ranger, and William was a dinosaur.

 Sophie turned 9 years old. This year she didn't want a present she just wanted to go clothes shopping. So we got to have a girls night which was really fun. 

For her birthday party she wanted to have a cooking/baking party. First they all made their own little pizzas.

Then they had fun decorating cupcakes to take home and they all turned out really cute!

She planned her party all by herself and did such a great job. Happy Birthday Sophie!