Just Peachy

My father has an odd fascination with peaches.  They are his favorite fruit, and during peach season, he becomes a little strangely obsessed with them.  Not just any peach will do--he wants fresh-picked peaches from the orchards in Palisade, Colorado, and he buys them by the boxful.  We are talking 25-pound boxes, and he burns through one in a week (with a little help from his sons-in-law and daughters).  He has been known to get home late from work and eat three or four peaches for dinner.

He talks about peaches all the time ("Girls, have you tried peaches with vanilla Greek yogurt?  I swear it tastes just like dessert!" I have heard him say this about 50 times this summer), and he's even been known to talk to them.  The other night, he was lovingly gazing into his box of fresh Palisade peaches, touching each one to see if they were ripe, and saying, in a mock Gollum voice from Lord of the Rings, "These peaches are very precious to me.  I think I will save you for my breakfast in the morning." Hilarious.

When we were little girls, my dad played a game with us called "Rotten Peach."  He would come to tuck us into bed at night, and he would pretend we were peaches and start gnawing on our arms.  Then he would shout, "This peach is rotten!!" and dramatically pretend to spit us out.  We would be giggling uncontrollably at this point, and he would yell, "Put this peach down the garbage disposal!" and pick us up out of bed, toss us on the floor, and start spinning our bodies around in wild circles.

It was the best game ever.  (And I'm sure Mom really appreciated the way that he "calmed us down" before bed.)

Apparently my dad's love of peaches is hereditary because when Ryan and I recently took a trip to Grand Junction, Colorado, both my dad and my grandpa insisted that we buy them a 25-pound box of peaches from the roadside stands there.

Noah had a great time picking out the peaches for his Bapa and his Grampy:

"These are perfect.  I'll take 50-pounds, please."

Just because our son is adopted doesn't mean he isn't going to inherit this Westover love of peaches from his great grandpa and grandpa.  Nurture is just as powerful as nature, and Bapa has been sure to feed his grandson plenty of peaches this summer.  Noah loves them.  In fact, at the Palisade Peach Festival, Noah walked around the fair with an entire peach jammed in his mouth and plenty of juice running down his chubby cheeks and hands.  It was quite a darling sight to behold:

We are so glad we got to spend a weekend in Grand Junction with Ryan's brothers and their wives, and not just for the delicious peaches.  Those Nielsons are the best company!  We just wish the rest of the family could've joined us.  Grand Junction is almost exactly four hours from Provo (where Ryan's brothers live) and four hours from Denver (where we live), so we decided to meet there for the weekend.  My aunt and uncle were kind enough to let us stay at their house and swim in their pool, so it was just a perfect weekend of relaxing, swimming, hiking, talking, and of course, peach-eating.  I think we should make it an annual tradition.

All in all, it's been a peachy summer, and we are excited for September with its changing leaves and cooler weather.  I don't know if Dad will be able to survive until next year's peach season...but I guess he will have to try.