Arrived!

Merrilea's mom and dad arrived safely from Pennsylvania via Mumbai. Merrilea and Maria picked them up in Mumbai and traveled by road to Pune, arriving around 3:30AM on Saturday.

Above is Merrilea with one of the many homeschool books Emma and Harold brought with them.
Below...doing family devotions tonight.

More family pics to come in the days ahead!

Thanksgiving

That which I am thankful for:

• Our Great and Wonderful Lord
• A wife who loves me
• Merrilea - a beautiful, good support
• 4 incredible kids
• Maria - a spry teen who never ceases to amaze me
  
• Joseph - a responsible teen who supervises plumbers well
  
• Danielle - a hospitable pre-teen
  
• Nafisa - keeping the comic relief coming
• A place to be in Pune as family
  
• A motorbike to cruise around on and any one of my kids to do it with
  
• A car for those rainy days (months)
• People in our company who help me be better than I am
  
• Friends and colleagues local and not local who are invaluable
• Our church
• Parents and In-laws who support Merrilea and I
• A brother and sister I love dearly
  
• A Godly heritage and upbringing
• Winning Spades with Alan 3 times in a row against Merrilea and Beth
• Good relationships with in-laws
  
• Homemade apple sauce
  
• Coffee
• Appy Fizz (carbonated apple juice)
• Our freedoms guaranteed by the United states Constitution upheld by our legal system
• 1620 when Plymouth was founded (place my folks now live)
  
• 1640 when Braintree was founded (place I grew up)
• Red Sox, Boston College and Patriots are doing so well! It's good to be from "up Nawth!"
  
• Lindt Chocolate
• Music of all kinds (but for bluegrass)
• For Shiloh and the memories and maturity brought on in the late 80's
  
• NPR programming available via the net
• K-Love Internet radio
• Ability to order things online and have them brought over by friends new and old
  
• Eggnog
  
• Lincoln Logs
• Legos
• Soap
• Usually consistent 24-hour broadband internet
• Hot water
• Burger King Whoppers with onion rings
• Dr. Pepper
• Turkey, though I can't remember the taste
  
• And the list goes on . . .
  

Smokey

This time of year in our city of Pune, people burn lots of trash and leaves. (uhm, when doesn't this happen?)
We tried a year ago to move away from this type of thing but we just can't hide from it! At night and at 5am peoples' home fires cause lots of smoke which stays around for hours.

This picture was taken off our bedroom balcony last month. It was a continuation of a fire that was started in the middle of the night. The smoke woke me up and I went out at 2:30 am with a few buckets of water to put it out. The smoke was coming in all our windows facing that area. Since we don't have water from midnight till 4:30AM I couldn't do much.

Goin to Goa

For Danielle's birthday on October 31, we usually try to head to the beach. This year we again went to Goa on an overnight train ride. We stayed on a southern beach (Benaulim Beach) full of waves, sun and sand.



We all rented bikes for under $7 per day. What a blast!



Maria lost her glasses to the waves. Thankfully, her stylish backups were there to save her day.
Joseph was not so lucky. No backups. His glasses were lost to the waves and he was able to get a new pair in 2 days for just over $50!

Maria's hair got wonderfully lightened by the sun!