This year we visited my brother, Danny and family for Thanksgiving. By visit, I mean mooched off of. I felt guilty, but I quickly got over it. Dinner was great and family was fun. Poppa Dee is visiting (mooching) there, too. We were able to get Poppa Dee to the golf course to watch us play nine holes. Sorry, no pictures of us on the golf course, but I did bring the camera. Here are a few pictures. You'll notice a strage couple of pictures of a science experiment Cara performed. (If you add 5 Mentos to a 2 liter bottle of Coca Cola, you'll get a fountain! Do a search of Coca Cola and Mentos and you'll see a great video of two guys who set up over 200 bottles of Coke and Mentos fountains in a domino-like sequence.)

We are certainly grateful for many blessing this year. We have had a year of good health. We remain employed and fiscally solvent. We have a new granddaughter, Emma. Our church has a new (and wonderful) pastor ending a time of tribulation. My wife remains married to me (willingly) after 31 years. God is good, indeed.

It's been seven years since Divya adopted us as her family. The Sunday before Thanksgiving is our official "Gotcha Day" celebration. Unlike birthdays, we count the day of arrival as number one, so that one plus seven years equals Gotcha Day number 8 for us in November, 2006. For the past few years, I've had a work related conference in Chicago on Gotcha weekend. This year was no different. Divya and Jeni came to Chicago, overnighted in a hotel with me, and celebrated Gotcha Day by going to the American Girl store. Here are a few pictures of their experience. We also watched the video of her arrival seven years ago. It's been quite an adventure.

I've been remiss at making entries of late. I'll add a few brief entries today. This first shows a few pictures of Divya in her soccer tee shirt. She played her second season, and remains the littlest girl on the team. She played most positions - including forward, which was a challenge for a short stuff. The season was fun, and we all enjoyed the games.