"We would play in the orchards, chase jackrabbits—we always thought we could catch them—and just sit up in the cherry trees," Baxter said. "It doesn't get much better than that as a kid."

They played all over Sunnyvale, but they grew up in a house along Fremont Avenue, just southwest of Fremont High School. They put in long work days every summer helping their father pick, dry, slice, pit and sell—from a stand set up outside their home—the cornucopia of items they grew.

The house—built in 1925—and land was owned by William Carrillo, who made a name for himself in Sunnyvale as a talented farmer, a gracious host and hard-working father. In front of the house, he sold fresh produce, greeted passing Fremont High School students and watched his beloved Sunnyvale grow from a town of blossoms and trees into the heart of high-tech Silicon Valley.

The family sold the house and the land it sits on to developers on Jan. 31. The last they heard the land was being divided into three lots for three homes. And while family members all acknowledge that they're losing a part of their heritage, they also say that Sunnyvale as a whole will lose part of its history when the house is torn down and converted into new homes.

During Sunnyvale's agricultural days, Carrillo earned a living tending other farms in the area and sold his own produce on the side. The stand outside their house gave his children a steady summer job, taught them good work ethics and kept them in touch with the Sunnyvale community around them. It also became an attraction for their extended famil, who was spread out around the South Bay at the time.

"I don't think he realized it, but it kept us close," Carrillo said. "It was like a little family reunion every summer."

From what the daughters remember, their father—at one time—sold apricots, cherries, tomatoes, green beans, walnuts, bell peppers, fava beans, plums, white corn, cucumber, kumquats and one-pound avocados that their dogs used to play with like footballs.

"For a lot of people, it was a sign of Sunnyvale, and for people to see it torn down will be like losing a part of Sunnyvale," Denise Barnes, one of Carrillo's granddaughters, said. "I think it would have been neat if there was someone who wanted to put the time in to make the house look like it used to."

When the land is converted it will end 80 years of tradition in Sunnyvale on a lot that became famous locally for its plethora of fresh produce and warm company.

That tradition was apparent last month, when the family held weekend estate sales to clear the house of Carrillo's collected treasures. It's with a mix of confusion and love that his family recounts his habit of collecting seemingly useless items like the bunch of wood doors he didn't need. His daughters attribute it the hard financial times faced by their father and his family which taught them the value of items.

"Everything he had he used until its deathbed because he didn't want to be wasteful," Baxter said.

His collection gave all the visitors to the estate sale something to buy to remind them of the house.

Carrillo's granddaughter Clarice Barnes, 25, said they had all ages at the sales, including elderly residents of Sunnyvale who used to buy fruit at the house and Fremont High School students who wanted a part of the house they passed by every week.

"They would buy something little because they said that they had to have a part of the old house," said Barnes, who said selling the items is what made her finally realize that an era was ending for her family. "It really didn't hit me until I was there that last weekend and someone wanted to buy my grandparents' bed."

Although they're all going to miss the house, the family has different views on its ending.

"I think it's nice that the property is going to be used in a more useful way," Baxter said. "There aren't any orchards anymore, and so that house and the little cabin in the back, seem lost to the city."

The house—like the orchards—is a vestige of a past Sunnyvale.

Carrillo's granddaughters—who still look at the house fondly as "Grandpa's house," and used the estate sale as an excuse to explore closets and parts of the house that were once off-limits to them—say they wish the house had been preserved and kept for its historical significance.

But the entire family agrees that—regardless of future use—Fremont Avenue, and Sunnyvale as a whole, isn't going to look the same without the house standing proudly on its tiny plot of land.

"That house is all I know. When I drive by and don't see it, when it's knocked down, I'm going to be sad," Vickie Carrillo said.