But no photos to prove it

Yesterday was crazy. Kim picked me up sometime in the late morning along with my food and other stuff I was toting to the location of our festivities. She already had three kids, a friend from Dresden and all of their food with her. We were met at the building by another family and later by the folks who had to take public transportation.

We started cooking immediately with the goal of dinner at 2:00, but it became clear pretty soon that we weren't going to make our scheduled meal time. Even though we had several ovens, the ovens here are tiny, so most of the time we could only cook one dish at a time. And at one point we managed to trip a breaker that affected only the microwave and oven, so we didn't notice it for a good half hour. I knew there was a problem when I opened the oven and wasn't greeted by a hot blast of air. But despite the set backs, we eventually finished cooking everything and the meal was delicious. I would love to show you a picture of the spread at this point, but I was too exhausted and hungry to bother with a camera. Suffice it to say, it was your traditional Thanksgiving fare.

After dinner, we had a devo and then an auction. Several families donated items (mostly food) from the U.S. and we auctioned them off with the proceeds going to a good cause. It was a lot of fun -- especially when the kids started in on the bidding. They are quite competitive!

All in all, it was a pretty chaotic day, but it was worth all of the trouble.