This is a picture of our wonderful daughter, Eriko. She first came to us as an exchange student from Japan in 1989. There was a bit of confusion about her status. We understood "exchange" to mean a trade. For some reason, the exchange program thought it only meant a temporary loan. Even though we offered to send them any number of kids from our local juvenile detention facility, they insisted we had to give Eriko back at the end of the year!

Anyway, Eriko, pictured here with her husband, Hiromasa, has remained in our hearts and thoughts. She comes over at least once a year to visit with us and the entire family looks excitedly forward to these visits. Since her high school senior year with us, Eriko has gone on to earn her bachelor's degree and master's degree in computer information systems. Besides being both beautiful and kind, she is also one very intelligent young lady. We're so happy that she has become part of our family.

The below is a picture of Eriko in her kimono for her graduation from high school in Japan.

We hope to soon get a picture of Hiro and Eriko from their wedding and I'll post it here. The ceremony was Christian style (but a lot of the ladies wore kimonos)and Karen, Shannon, and I had the great good pleasure of going to Tokyo and attending the wedding and reception. Other than the fact that I had to give a speech at the reception, it was a fantastic experience. Everyone in Japan treated us fantastically. A great country and a great people. And Eriko's parents are probably the greatest among all those people!!