How did Nasa's Suni and Butch fill nine months in space?
Voting, enjoying Christmas dinner and keeping fit in zero gravity - that's just some of what has kept Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams busy during their prolonged stay on the International Space Station (ISS).
After nine months, the pair are finally making their way home in a SpaceX Dragon capsule.
So what has life been like for the Nasa astronauts orbiting 250 miles (400km) above us, and how have they passed the time?
Astronauts reveal what life is like on ISS – and how they deal with 'space smell'
Of course there was a lot of serious space stuff to keep them occupied.
Suni, 59, and Butch, 62, have been helping ongoing missions at the station with maintenance and experiments, and have conducted spacewalks.
Suni ventured outside in mid-January with fellow astronaut Nick Hague to perform repairs on the craft. She and Butch went out together later in the month.
Their tasks included repairing equipment that governs station orientation, adding light filters on the NICER X-ray telescope, and replacing a reflector device on an international docking adapter.
Butch and Suni have taken the situation in their stride, saying in a news conference in September that they have been trained to "expect the unexpected".
They have definitely had opportunities for reflection about life back home - and for watching a lot of sunrises and sunsets.
As the space station makes 16 orbits of Earth every 24 hours, it travels through 16 sunrises and sunsets, treating those on board to a sunrise or sunset every 45 minutes.
Living with such a unique view of the Earth gives plenty of room for contemplating it, something Suni has acknowledged.
"It opens up the door to making you think a bit differently. It's the one planet we have and we should be taking care of it," she said.
"There are so many people on Earth sending us messages it makes you feel right at home with everybody."
Butch and Suni and the two other Americans who were on board with them, Don Pettit and Nick Hague, each had the opportunity to vote in last year's US election.
"It's a very important duty that we have as citizens," Suni said to reporters.
Butch said Nasa had made it "very easy" for them to be included in elections.
To facilitate their voting, the Mission Control Center in Houston sent ballot papers via encrypted email to the ISS.
The astronauts then filled them out and transmitted them to satellites which relayed them to a ground terminal in New Mexico.
From there, landlines transmitted the ballots to Mission Control, who then electronically sent them to the astronauts' county clerks for filing.
For Butch, the day starts at 04:30, and as for Suni, she makes a slightly kinder 06:30 start.
Both have said they enjoy the two hours or more of exercise they must do daily to combat the loss of bone density from living in space.
"Your joints don't hurt, which is quite nice," Butch has said.
Three different machines help to counter the effect of living in zero gravity.
The Advanced Resistive Exercise Device (ARED) is used for squats, deadlifts, and rows that work all the muscle groups. For treadmills crews must strap in to stop themselves floating away, and there is also a cycle ergometer for endurance training.
At Christmas, astronauts on the International Space Station posted a festive message in which they wished their friends and family on Earth a merry Christmas.
The team dressed in Santa hats and reindeer antlers, throwing the slowly gyrating microphone to each other to speak while candy canes floated around their heads.
It was a chance for the crew to let their hair down, though in Suni's case it was more a case of letting it 'up'. Zero gravity has given her a style that would take a lot of product to achieve on Earth.
To everyone on Earth, Merry Christmas from our @NASA_Astronauts aboard the International @Space_Station. pic.twitter.com/GoOZjXJYLP
— NASA (@NASA) December 23, 2024
One of Butch and Suni's final duties on board the ISS was to make their replacements feel welcome.
On 16 March a SpaceX capsule carrying a new crew arrived at the ISS. It was a deeply significant event for Butch and Suni, as it paved the way for them to come home.
Capturing the excitement, Don Pettit, who will remain on the ISS, posted this video shot through the window of it approaching and docking.
Crew 10 Dragon vehicle arriving! pic.twitter.com/3EZZyZW18b
— Don Pettit (@astro_Pettit) March 16, 2025
Butch rang a ceremonial bell as Suni handed over command to cosmonaut Alexei Ovchinin.
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