Adoption Approval

Today we received a call from our case worker Shannon that we are approved for adoption! We are looking forward to adopting and adding a child to our family. Now the searching and waiting. It will all happen in its own due time, and of course we'll need to do our part too to find that special someone.

If you hear of someone that is looking for a home for their baby or child, we have one here under our humble roof! We are planning to create pass along cards in the next little while. They are like business cards and the hope is that they will fall into the right hands as they foray out into the world with the help of friends and family. If you want to have some to give out when the moment arises, let us know! You can add a comment to this post or email us or give us a ring.

Six Great Years... and counting!

This is Daniel writing. This November 16th will be our sixth anniversary. I can't believe how fast the time goes by! We celebrated by having a special dinner at one of our favorite restaurants here in Salt Lake, Tiburon Fine Dining (www.tiburonslc.com). It doesn't look like much from outside, but this was our third time and yet again it was a marvelous experience. That's sort of a miracle for us to go to a restaurant three times and not have a bad experience at least one of them. And for the prices, it seems that we'd set our standards a little higher. It is expensive, but that's why we save it for special occasions like this. And it still meets what you'd expect for a pricey meal.


Honestly, I am not a food critic and I don't make a habit of writing for the food column. But they prove that food can be an art. The scallops on the right were our appetizer. Indeed they were as good as they look here. Like butter, the searing adding just a hint of smoky goodness. They always have a marvelous salad with many flavors that just work, but at the same time are unique, not just salt, like ranch dressing... The entrees are amazing, prepared to perfection. I had beef Wellington. I was full but forced myself to eat it all anyway. Joanna had some amazing portion of halibut. They were served with spaghetti squash and beans/spinach. They give you sorbet to cleanse your palate before the main course.

One thing I really enjoyed was that we were there for almost two hours but never ran out of things to talk about. Work, visiting teaching, friends, politics, extended family stuff, funny stories. That's the best thing about being married is having my best friend always around.

It is a little discouraging not to have any kids around yet after six years, but we still have a good enjoyable life. I like my job, Joanna takes great care of us and gives of herself to the ward and community. No need to pout, we are just going to soak up the freedom for as long as we can. We have all the paperwork in for adoption, we are waiting on final approval. Then we will be officially able to adopt! We're excited to participate in this method of building a family.

So on to the seventh year, I expect it will be a great one. I love you Joanna!

Amy is married!

This is Daniel writing. I am thrilled with this news: my sister Amy got married on Friday!

So Ben got married, then six years later I got married, then six years later Amy gets married. We just needed to be patient, right? Well, she was beautiful in her wedding dress and seemed very happy. Kevin was beaming as well, and it was good to see him, he's a great guy. I enjoyed his family as well, they are all great folks, and it was nice to meet his brothers. The temple ceremony was in the morning at about 9:45 AM in the Salt Lake Temple.

Kevin Player and Amy Gowans. They were an adorable couple. I took pictures outside the temple, candids and things, that I had developed in the afternoon and displayed at the reception. It was fun, and the weather was beautiful! I used dad's new SLR camera and the pictures turned out great. Later there was a luncheon at Christopher's restaurant. I enjoyed the comments from the parents, often along the lines of "why didn't they get together sooner, and I am glad they saw the light." My mom cried very nicely. She's so big hearted. My younger brother Adam got up to give her a hug when she started crying, it was great.

Here's some photos from the event. Amy and Kevin, Kevin's party, Kevin's beaming parents, Amy's beaming parents, Amy's party, and Amy and Kevin again, looking great!





























After the luncheon, Joanna and I dropped the lucky couple off at the conference center to get their car and we took off to develop some pictures to show at the reception. We went to Sam's Club but their one hour photo was down. There was a Kodak picture center that prints pictures from memory cards, but someone was using it. So we took off to Super Target but soon found they didn't even have a one hour photo! We were about to run off again, but time was getting short. Around the corner in the Target we found one of the Kodak photo centers, and it served us well. We printed some very nice photos (the couple was wonderfully photogenic) and headed to the reception center. We were the first there and waited maybe a half hour or so.

Here's some more fun pictures. Left, Bridal of the lovely bride. Middle, Groomal of the lovely groom. On the right, a somewhat out of focus picture of the marvelous cake and couple!















Soon everyone arrived and we posed for more pictures in the reception center, in a beautiful greenhouse. It was really nostalgic, if sometimes a bit awkward (I don't get to socialize that much) to see so many old family friends.. We saw maybe 10 or so couples from the ward I grew up in. That was nice, and it was fun to chat with them. The line consisted of Amy, Kevin, and their parents. It was pretty much full of people from 7 until 9.

Eventually we saw off the happy couple! They went on a short mini-moon before heading back to Kansas. They'll have an open house there this next weekend. Then Kevin's final semester for his masters in Electrical Engineering will be in India! That will be a real adventure, and I look forward to hearing about it.

The bottom has fallen out

Well, it happened. I was determined that I wouldn't get emotional, I wouldn't over-react to this credit crisis thing. I should have understood that everyone else would overreact. There hasn't been a drop like this since the .com bust. Maybe it will get worse.

The pain isn't even that bad for me, I only lose maybe 10-20 thousand bucks in my 401K. Some people, those nearing retirement, may be in a real world of hurt. I'd have lost more if I didn't move about half of it toward the end of last year into money markets.

Truly, the financial foolishness of this decade has been beyond stunning. When I see this stock market crash and look back (you know hindsight) it seems so obvious, so inevitable.

The national debt clock recently ran out of digits, we hit $10 trillion and it had to drop the dollar sign.

I like to be happy, I like to keep a positive attitude.

But I just spent the last 10 minutes at work sitting at my desk just grief stricken with a sense of the loss at the reality of the economic situation before the world.

Things are going to change. But even with the desire strong, I think many have lost even the ability or capacity to make proper financial choices. My hope, my desire to not over-react has left my retirement account as yet another casualty. But the real casualties will be much more fierce.

I hope people can change, will change as a result of this.

The Great Wall of Sunhurst

As of September 30th we completed sifting soil in the back yard. What a load off! We are so grateful for the many helping hands that brought about this completion. Pictures from last year show the Gowans' family helping and this year some great help from others such as friends and ward members. Grandpa Gowans kindly transported the excavator both years - he's the best!

The vision of the wall was never realised to be very difficult until the project began in the summer of 2006. It began with a lot of rocky dirt and many blocks.

Next came the sifter that Daniel built using many materials including the motor for an old treadmill.

Next came building the wall,

which was soon followed by sifting soil for two seasons.

The ending result is quite nice and will be followed by planting a garden and fruit trees next spring.

Now to figure out what to do with the rocks!

An online life begins

The Gowans family, after much poking and prodding, finally create a blog of their own.

Its future unknown, the slate clean, here will be placed events, monologues, and unsolicited comments of our two person family.  To boldly go where millions have gone before.  We promise nothing extraordinary, nothing that hasn't been done before, but it will be us, Daniel and Joanna, which is unique enough!

I, Daniel, work as an engineer.  I do hardware, though the job changes and morphs with time.  I work in the telecommunications world.  I enjoy my job, but I get enough of computers there and you won't often find me in front of one at home unless it is necessary.

Unfortunately, life is too busy for gaming, a past time I once enjoyed.  Now I prefer to do things with Joanna.  Vacations, outdoor activities, yard work, walks, movies, and reading.  Well, I don't LOVE the yard, but I do like doing yard work with Joanna.

I'll let Joanna post her own comments about herself.  This will allow her some modesty, as I would just praise her without restraint, and I am sure she wouldn't want that spread over the world wide web.