Halloween Greeting 2017

The kids worked hard on their costumes this year!  Blossom made a peacock costume and Reed was Agent Pleakley as part of a Lilo & Stitch group costume.
Here's my creative kids:

Here's Reed's whole crew before they headed out:

A Colorado Ending to the Big Trip

Looks like I never finished up posting about our big trip!  There were some hiccups in our plan, but we made it back all in one piece and can't wait for another adventure.

On our way home from Oregon, we decided to spend a few days in Colorado.  Immediately when we crossed the Colorado state line, the darn transmission in the van broke ... again!  Yes, the new one :(  We had the van towed to Durango.  We didn't know this at first, but in the end it took 3.5 weeks to fix because of the warranty.  We made the best of our time and rented a car and camped around the state.

First, we visited my beautiful old stomping grounds of Durango.  We met up with friends and took a great day trip up to Silverton.

 

The hike was long and steep and little Blossom was a trooper and went right along with it!  We were even rewarded with a double rainbow on our way out!

After Durango, we camped in Pagosa Springs for a couple days, enjoying the hikes and hot springs.

Next, we headed up to Bobby's old stomping grounds of Nederland, just over the mountain from Boulder.  It was fun meeting all his old friends and exploring the sweet little town.

We were so excited (and a little freaked out) that a mama and baby moose decided to join us while we kayaked one morning

After a couple days in Nederland, we crossed the Rockies and went into the Western Slope of Colorado to a tiny town called Crawford.  An old friend of mine lived there and it was fantastic catching up with him and exploring this little gem of a town.  It was adjacent to an amazing National Park called Black Canyon of the Gunnison.  Very cool corner of the earth!

From Crawford, we headed South back to Durango.  Our van was not quite ready yet (that's really the story of those 3.5 weeks!), so we went back to Pagosa for a little more camping.  We spent some time tubing on the river and Blossom made her own creature comforts in the campground.

We finally got the van back and headed straight home!  Only days away from started classes for nursing, I was pretty anxious to get home.  It was a good way to get some real closure on our trip.  Though in hindsight, if I had known the repair would have taken so long, I would have honestly just rented a uhaul and towed the van back to Asheville for repairs.  I did love our Colorado leg of the trip though!