We hope everyone is doing great, enjoying the fall weather, and that you're all watching extra football games for us! This update is all about the great country of the United States of America. We got to head back for a while again at the end of August. As always, it was awesome to see our family again! We enjoyed seeing all of our friends that we got to see too! We got there late on a Wednesday night, I worked the next day, then headed out to Opelika, AL for my annual Fantasy Football Draft and Golf Fest weekend. As the weekend came to a close, we had done some damage (and I don't mean to the golf carts - well...) - we took down 102 holes of golf! I know, you're thinking that 102 holes in four days is insane - well, you are correct - we were so exhausted after this weekend - physically and mentally. On the second day I almost gave out on hole number four of our second round of 18 - jetlag had caught up with me and the sun had drained the last little bit that I had left - it was tough to finish out the day.

We had our draft one night and played a Texas Hold 'Em tournament on the other - congratulations to Smitty for winning the Hold 'Em tourney - do you remember winning it? For those of you who play fantasy football, I had the first pick and took Priest Holmes - that about sums up my team - the rest of my players aren't that great.

The picture on the left is my fantasy football group - guys, I can't tell you how great it was to get to spend that weekend with all of you. My golf team, the Flatbellies, finally brought a little competition this year - we ended up with a tie - we should be able to bring home the gold next year.

While I was away that weekend, Jill spent lots of time with her mom - I'm sure you can see the pattern by now - shopping and eating. The picture to the right shows Jill and her mom before going out for her birthday dinner. Happy birthday Jackie! It meant a lot to Jill for her to be home for her mom's birthday.

We finally got to see a couple of the new recent additions to the world. To the left, we're with Bill, Melissa, and their new daughter Mary Ashlee. To the right, Jill is with Brandi and her new little boy Kenton Thomas. It was great to see all of you - your babies sure are cute!

Our nephew Landon is talking more and more - and Billy is busy at quarterback on his football team. Our other nephew Reilly just had a birthday too - happy birthday Reilly. He and his sister Kelsey are busy growing up and going to school.

The next weekend we headed down to Tuscaloosa for my 10-year Pi Kapp Pledge Class Reunion - I can't believe it's been 10 years since we pledged - it was great to see all of you guys - I don't think many of you have changed that much! Check out the picture of all of us at the fraternity house. Kathleen got to come down with us as well - notice the picture of her and Jill below.

We got to go to the first Alabama game of the season - it was awesome to make it to the season opener - unfortunately, we won't be back for anymore games this year. That's going to be tough.

We had a great time tailgating with usual tailgate crowd - we'll certainly miss hanging out on the Quad all year long. See the picture to the left - these guys are nuts - I think they tailgated for 8 hours that day! Jacob and Christie got to bring Kaitlin down for her first Bama game - she looked so good in her crimson and white cheerleading outfit - sorry Jacob, but I think she's already found her college. It's always great to see a Bama victory live in Bryant Denny!

Before we flew back, Jill got to see quite a few of the dancers she used to teach. She said that it was great to see everyone and spend time with you all! Speaking of flying back, we usually have some kind of issue when flying overseas - you know what I mean if you've been reading all of the updates - if you haven't read them all, you can still go check out the other updates here. Our flight over was perfect - on time, plenty of time to catch our connector, and no lost luggage. The flight back was on time as well - plenty of time to catch our connector in ATL. We get out on the runway on time - we've finally done it - we're actually going to have a smooth set of flights overseas (as long as our luggage shows up when we land, but it should since we landed in ATL on time). We are screaming down the runway for takeoff - oh yeah - it's finally happened - a set of smooth overseas flights - here comes lift off - eeeeeerrrrrcccchhhh!!! The pilot slams on the brakes - no kidding - the first thing that comes to our minds is that we're about to hit another plane - we finally come to a stop.

Now we're thinking that we're about to see a bunch of police surround our plane because a terrorist is on board. The pilot announces that some kind of warning light came on so we have to go back to the gate to get it checked out - we're still thinking that it could be a cover-up for the police to show up and surround our plane. It turns out to be some kind of engine problem - we wait on the plane for about an hour and half while they fix it - we get in line to take off again - of course we're a little uneasy now - since our plane has problems - we'll be worried about it the whole way back - we start to take off again - same thing - brakes slam on and we head back to the gate - we ended up having to change planes before we finally took off about four and a half hours after the original flight time - at least we got to change planes though! So once again, no perfect set of flights overseas - maybe it will finally happen in December. Our fingers will be crossed.

We subscribed to Yahoo Sports when we got back - this way we can listen to all college games and we even get video feeds for some. We even get "Hey Coach" on Thursday nights - it just starts at midnight over here - but we can always just listen to it the next day. We have satellite TV, so we get the Jefferson Pilot football games - I never thought I'd be so glad for Bama to have the early game on JP. We have also found a sports bar that plays a couple of the college games - we went and saw the Miss St. / Auburn and Michigan / Notre Dame games this past weekend. We were going to listen to the Bama game today instead of last night (since it started at 2:00AM), but I had work calls all night so we went ahead and listened to it while I worked. We could hear the fans singing Rammer Jammer over the live internet feed - so here we are, 4000 miles away at 5:00AM singing along - our neighbors are confused, but they'll get used to it! One last thing on football - every Sunday, we get one early and one afternoon NFL game on our satellite TV - even though it's just two games, I'm still excited about this - I didn't think we'd get any. We just miss the Sunday and Monday night games.

Don't forget to check out our updated pictures (London, family, and friends). Kathleen is our next visitor - we're looking forward to it - have a safe flight! It was GREAT to see everyone during our trip home! Again, I'd like to thank Steve for getting me home this trip - I'm so glad I didn't have to miss out on all of the good times! Until next time, we love and miss you all! Take care and God bless!