Chris's grandfather John Murphy passed away last week. His memorial services are today and tomorrow in New Hampshire. Chris has traveled to represent our family. We wish we all could have gone to pay our respects but last minute air travel is not cheap. We are so fortunate that Chris was able to travel and visit with John a few months back with his health was in a better state.

Here is the link to his obituary.http://www.conwaydailysun.com/index.php/community/obituaries/95300-john-n-murphy

John was a funny and opinionated man with a colorful mouth (compare to Utah folks). Every time we visited or he visited it seemed there was always a great take away story.

I first met John during my first visit to Chris's home town (big news which was published in the local paper). We sat in his home, I recall, and looked through photos. My goal was to find photos of Chris as a baby but I came across the gem above and promptly had to snap of a photo of it. In the photo John is on the left and Tom is on the right. Tom must of only been in high school at the time. The story, per John (as I remember it), is that he and his son Tom were on a business trip to Pennsylvania. While there they came across a protest about women working. The opportunity was too great to pass up and they quickly "took part" in the protest capturing a picture to take home to his razz his wife. She worked. This is the humor I will remember John for.

One time, over Thanksgiving, I made sweet potato casserole with marshmallows. When he saw it he bluntly asked "what in the hell is this?" I told him it was a family recipe and it was delicious. He was skeptical but ended up having a couple of servings so he must of liked it. At the time I was mortified but now, knowing John, it's quite funny. He had such a great smile and a wonderful laugh. We will miss him.

Here are a few of my favorite pictures of John.

Enjoy your next journey Grampy John. Much love.