THE WOOD CLAN MEETS THE TORIVIO TRIBE

We ended off last post with a picture of the Torivio Tribe. We were so happy to finally meet them!

Pat has been a follower for a few years now and had offered for us to stop by on our way through Moriarty last year. Sadly, his kids were sick at the time so we didn't visit. 

Knowing fairly early on that we would be passing back through Moriarty, I let Pat know - hoping that this time it would work out. 

We are happy to meet friends that we have made through our blog and are happy to accept such a gracious invitation to stop by and visit for a few days.

I did take a lot of pictures while we were there but not the first day - we were much too busy visiting at first.

The next morning we were invited to McCall's Pumpkin Patch by Josh - Pat and Pam's eldest son which is sixteen and works at the Patch. We wanted to pay ourselves but he wasn't going to hear any of that - his gift to us. 

So generous.

Pat was nice enough to drop us off. The Pumpkin Patch was actually only open to the public on the weekends - this was a weekday when the Patch is reserved for school groups. It was busy though.

The first thing we did was take a hayride out to the pumpkin patch. Each person is able to choose one pumpkin. Since we had to carry them around we choose a medium sized one to pass on to the Torivio kids and we took a second smaller one for Cassia to decorate.

Once off the hayride, Cassia was pretty excited to go see the animals.

This was pretty neat - a large spider web.

And of course we went through the corn maze - the first time for the three of us!

Then to the corn bin. We thought it was sand until we got closer. Pretty neat idea - playing in corn kernels.

While Cassia did that - Derek learned to make a corn husk doll. 

 After all that we went back to see Josh. If you can believe - now he insisted on buying us lunch! It was very very very good - especially the green chile stew. Cassia is holding Derek's completed corn husk doll. A nice keep sake.

Our first visit to a pumpkin patch - we had a great time! 

Thanks again Josh - your generosity was amazing. What goes around comes around - we'll get you back for that one day.

Later that evening - the Torivio's treated us to a BBQ. There's Pat on the right cooking up a storm. I've never seen so much food on a BBQ before - guess that happens when you are starting with a family of 10 and then adding the visitors!

Always a lot of activity going on with such a large family. Being such a small family, we really enjoyed being ensconced in all the excitement and activity.

The next morning we checked to see how many of us could visit in the van - NINE!

A nice picture of James and Jeremiah.

And three of the five girls - Mary, Madison and Mackenzie.

You can imagine that Cassia was on cloud nine with all the kids and someone else's toys.

A group picture before we left - with me instead of Pam and still missing Josh. Rest of us are Pat, Me, Molly, James, Madison, Mary, Mackenzie, JJ, Meagan, Derek and Cas.

Thanks again Torivio Tribe - we had a great time! We'll be back!

As I have mentioned before - traveling is great - seeing beautiful places is great - but really - meeting and visiting with people - such as the Torivio Family is what makes it worthwhile. 

We were all sad!

From Moriarty we headed east to Clines Corner and then south on the 285 - our destination for the day was Bottomless Lakes State Park - just east of Roswell.

A very lonesome couple of hours. We made it to Roswell by late afternoon. Following a stop for groceries and gas we continued to the Park. If you are wondering why we didn't stop in Roswell it's because we were here back in 2011.

Arriving just as the sun was setting.

A nice - albeit narrow - drive to get to the Lea Lake Campground.

Nice to be back in a New Mexico State Park! I'll have more pictures next post.

Our visitor that evening - which didn't last long with Rufus around!

So, that was our time in Moriarty. Now one of our favourite annual stops.

I'm closing in on our posts - only a few more to go to catch up.

As mentioned last night - we are in Texas. 

Today we had our new fuel pump installed at the Ford Dealership in Kerrville. From there we headed to Laredo where we are now spending the night. 

We have completed our shopping and will be ready to cross the border into Mexico tomorrow along with Chris - and head to his place south of Monterrey. 

We go on and on about wanting heat - well - we've got it. But with over a year of cooler temps we are really feeling it. We'll need some adjustment time……

Hasta luego - nos vemos en México!

Teresa

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