Alec ..

..was looking at the blog with Samantha a few nights ago and noted that there was nothing here about his homecoming.  That reflects solely on how spasmodically I blog - and not at all on how happy we were to have him home.  Here are the photos to prove it:

There was a line for a hug, the order of which was carefully worked out in the car on the way to airport! As you can see I got the first turn.

Then Roger, and on down through the family, then Lee and Joan and David and Beth and Daniel, Monica, Simone, Robert and Samuel.

It's not an easy thing to get a photo of all of us - but this isn't bad. (Kathleen was working - she met Alec for the first time that night.)

We took him to the beach the second weekend he was home. 

Before his mission, Alec had a hankering for a surf board but pragmatism won out and he waited till he got home - but not for long.

There are no photos of Alec on his surf board - too far out - but Roger took Louisa and Max out for a try on Mitchie's surfboard.

It seems like he's been home forever now (and that almost true - this was at the end of November last year!) - but a mission sure does take a long time.  Good as a mission is, we're glad to have him home.