When, Oh Lord, can we go?

Sometimes it is so hard to wait on timing. Joshua and I love our church, I love my classes, and we love getting to know people in the area. And yet sometimes it's so hard to wait until we can leave the country again. I have to remind myself that this is a time of preparation, of equipping, and that we do not need to be hasty. I know our time will come. We just don't know when, either. Which makes plans interesting.
Do we find another house to rent and just make do until we know where we are going? Do we buy a house and hope that we are here long enough to make sense of the investment? Do I even get a license to counsel in the state of Texas?

At least we do know that God always provides and that He will again. He will provide answers when answers are due.

"For my thoughts are not your thoughts neither are my ways your ways," declares the Lord. "As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts."

Santa Fe pictures

Hi Friends! As promised long ago, here are some pictures from our visit to Santa Fe.


This is my grandmother and me at the outdoor market Saturday morning. We went shopping for some fresh veggies and to look around at all the neat things there.




I thought this was a nice picture of the two of us. Josh is wearing a sweatshirt because during our time there it was surprisingly chilly!



This is a view of my grandmother's porch so you can see a bit of her house. It's a beautiful house with a beautiful view of the city from up above.





And this is our new house in Santa Fe! Haha! Just kidding.










A beautiful Santa Fe sunset....






What a great vacation!

Whew!

Howdy all! Everything is going well with us...just really busy! School is great and we like our classes but they keep us hitting the books (or in Joshua's case, building models) most of our free time.
Over Labor Day weekend we went to Santa Fe, NM to visit my grandmother. We had a great time. I'll post some pictures soon. We ran all over, looked at art galleries, saw a ballet and a flamenco show (which was awesome!), and got to see some other of her favorite things. And we had a break from the heat--the temperature was in the 50s and 60s there!
This past weekend we just hung out with friends and tried to get some homework done. On Saturday I watched my first ever UT football game when they were not playing A&M. And they lost.
=)
I've got to get back to learning statistics...not my fave! I'll post more when I get a chance.

Rollerblading fun

I just wanted to share a couple of pictures from our most recent activities with Sammy. He is quite the rollerblading buddy!
He runs full speed and pulls Joshua along after him!
It's so fun!

School Days!

School has started again! Sarah had her first day of classes on Thursday, August 24th and Joshua started on the following Monday. So we both have a week under our belts and are diving in!

Sarah is taking 10 hours again and will have lots of reading this semester. But her classes are really good. She is taking Counseling Theory, Abnormal Psychology, Spiritual Formations, and Statistics (bleh).
She is still on staff at the church.

(First day of school pic!)




Joshua has 12 hours. He has a studio, a class on acoustics and lighting, and practicum--which means he gets credit for working at his job.
He is still working for the same architectural firm and learning a lot through that experience.

(First day of school pic!)




We'll have more stories as the semester moves on!

God's creation

Hello all! This past weekend Joshua and I went to see Body Worlds3, an exhibit at the Houston Museum of Natural Science. My parents recommended that we see it, so we drove down and stayed with them for a night and went into town to see the exhibit. Wow! It was incredible! This exhibit showcases the anatomy of human bodies using real bodies that have been treated with a plastification process. Now before you get grossed out, understand that really the organs and bodies don't look real anymore...I had to keep telling myself that they weren't plastic models. It really wasn't gross at all.
Joshua and I loved realizing again how intricate, complex, and amazing our bodies are. What a creation by the Master Creator! I have always loved anatomy and seeing how everything works together. I mean, it's amazing how many muscles are in your neck alone! And your hands, don't get me started! It's so cool!

"Oh Lord, you have searched me and you know me...For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I am wonderfully and fearfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well."
Psalm 139: 1, 13, 14

Two Years Later

Now that I have found the camera cable I can update with pictures. July 24th was our two year anniversary. We celebrated the Friday before by staying in San Antonio near the Riverwalk. We took time to "Remember the Alamo" and relax walking up and down the river.







Once upon a time...

2 Years later...

We had a great time! Can you believe it's been two years? Sometimes it feels like much longer...sometimes I can't believe time has flown by so fast! =) Glad y'all have been along for the ride. =)

Random Pictures

Here are some pictures from the 4th of July. We hung out with Joshua's friend Wesley and we took these pictures at Sonic with Wesley's camera.



Sammy has found a new buddy!










Sonic...always good for a few laughs.

Viva Mexico!

I know, I know it's been forever since we've posted something! But we were on a mission trip to Mexico for a week. So now I will share some pictures and stories from the incredible trip. We went to Monterrey, Mexico, a city surrounded by mountains. We drove there from Kerrville, Texas with a youth team from Westwood ministries.

We got to do many different forms of ministry while we were there. We painted the inside of a church and played with the kids there at the church. We lead the worship service that Sunday at the church; Joshua and I lead the music in Spanish and Mark gave a message. We had a fellowship with some of the ministers' kids of that church. We got to buy food and toiletries and distribute them to families living in the city dump.
(Here is the truck full of bags to distribute)





Then we got to visit an orphanage and play with the kids.



Here is Kelsie playing with some of the kids at the orphanage after we painted their faces.





It was an amazing trip and we are so thankful to have been able to be a part of what God is doing in Monterrey. Please pray for these kids and the families we worked with, that the seeds that were planted will take root and grow. Pray that Monterrey will become a city of the Lord.

Happy 4th of July

Sammy and I wanted to take this opportunity to wish everyone a happy 4th of July. We had a great day celebrating and getting to spend the day with Joshua. Usually he is at work, but yesterday we got to have him home again.
We went over to a coworker's house to grill with him and his wife and new baby boy. Sammy came and entertained everyone in the backyard. He played soccer, fetch-the-tennis-ball, and his version of frisbee, which is where he waits until the frisbee hits the ground, grabs it, and runs off to chew it.
Then we watched a movie with one of our friends from A&M and watched fireworks. But I'll write more about that when I post a pic from the adventure.

Hope you have a great 5th of July, too! =)

Baseball!

VS.

This past weekend Joshua's parents came in town and took us to a baseball game. The Rangers were playing the Astros. What rivalry! =) It was our first time to go to the ballpark since we've been here and my first time ever here in Arlington. We had a lot of fun!

Being from Houston, I was rooting for the 'Stros, but they lost. Unfortunately they has several bad plays in the field. Just not their night. Ah, well.

Busy Life

I apologize to those who have been checking this blog and found nothing new posted in a long, long time. I've been so busy with school and work! This was my first summer class ever and I had no idea how fast they move! But the class was great and I loved it. It was a class on group dynamics and we did a lot of work in groups to experience dynamics in groups. Anyways - between reading 30-40 pages every day, writing several papers and assignments and keeping up with my work for my jobs, I did not get time to update this site.

Here is what has been going on:

I turned 23 on June 4th! My parents and brother came up to visit and celebrate with me, which was way fun. Over the course of the weekend and the week I got 4 cakes! Sunday night Josh and my friends surprised me with a birthday celebration at Cheddars. So fun!
(I don't have any pics yet from that weekend because my mom took all the pics. I'll post them when I get them.)

For my birthday present my parents took us to Niagara Falls! My aunt and grandmother came too. We went to Toronto first and got to see the city from the CN Tower, which is so way cool!

This is the view from the CN Tower. We got to each lunch up there. The restaurant slowly revolves so you get to see the whole city and Lake Ontario.








Then we drove to Niagara Falls and got to stay in a hotel that overlooked the Canadian Horseshoe falls. The waterfalls are so incredible!
This was the view from our hotel room!
We had so much fun! We took a boat ride right up to the falls. It's amazing how much water is flowing so fast!


These are the American Falls-->






What an incredible trip! If you have not been, totally go to Niagara! And make sure you see it from the Canadian side!

More to come later!

We're still here!

I know, I know, what is wrong with me that I haven't posted anything in a while? Well, lots has happened, but we lost our camera cable and were unable to download pictures. Finally a nice lady in the photo department of Wal-Mart sold me another cable. Woohoo!

So, let's see....where to begin?

I'll start from where we left off...
(These will be posted backwards so that when you read them it will be in chronological order...tricky, huh?) =)

Dallas and Cheesecake

Before Joshua headed back to work full-time, we took an afternoon to head into Dallas. We visited a couple museums and then went to the Cheesecake Factory (the real reason for the trip!). It was everything I thought it would be! =)

We visited the Nasher museum in Dallas and there was an exhibit about the architect who designed the building. Pretty cool display. I had to pry Joshua away after spending 45 minutes looking at models and sketches and drawings.

Brittany's Wedding

The next day we headed to Jacksonville, Texas for my friend Brittany's wedding. We had the rehearsal and dinner on Thursday. We didn't really know anyone else in the wedding, so we spent the dinner talking to the music pastor and his wife. They are neat people. We stayed that night in Longview with my college roommate, Kristen, and her husband. It was so good to see her again after a whole year! The wedding was Friday night and everything went wonderfully. Brittany was absolutely beautiful!


We had a great time. And we are glad that we are on this side of the wedding process!

The planes, the planes!

This was our first weekend without any studying or homework! Yay! So we went to the Fort Worth airshow with some friends.

It was fun looking at all the planes and watching them do stunts in the air. My goodness, they are talented pilots!


This was one of my favorites because the propellers looked really cool. The big disc on top is for radar surveillance of ground fighting.






Having a real weekend to just hang out and have fun is so great! =)

We've been hit!

Friday evening we headed out to meet some friends from A&M. We were minding our own business, negotiating the yield-to-merge-into-traffic half-lane, when suddenly...we got rear-ended!


It really wasn't that bad. No one was hurt except our poor truck. The guy who hit us was young and it was his first accident, so he was pretty upset. Unfortunately, because of the way it hit, the tailgate, bumper, and side panel will all have to be replaced.



However, we proceeded to have a wonderful time with our friends. =)

So what do you do on a Sunday night just before Joshua's last final? Watch Lord of the Rings and eat spinach & artichoke dip and s'mores for dinner, of course! =)

At least, that's what we did! One of my friends from seminary has not seen the Lord of the Rings movies, so she came over for movie night and we made s&a dip and a layer dip for dinner, along with some fresh fruit, and ate s'mores for dessert. The movie was a good 3 hours, at least, and we enjoyed every moment of our fun movie night. Of course, we still have 2 more movies in the trilogy to go, so we'll have to come up with other creative ideas for dinner.

All suggestions are welcome!

Finish the race...

Woohoo! Classes for the semester are finished for me! It feels to good to have all of that finished. Don't get me wrong, I loved my classes. But there is just something about crossing that "finish line" each semester that makes you want to get up and shout. Today, however, my body has given out on me and I think a post-semester nap is in order.

Joshua has one final left on Monday. He will start working full time at the architecture firm when I start my summer class at the end of May. Until then he will keep working his part-time schedule so we can have some vacation time to enjoy no homework. Yay!

Now, off to nap...

Joshua's final presentation

On Monday Joshua had his final presentation for his architecture studio class. He had many sleepless and almost sleepless nights to complete this group project. But their hard work payed off and they had a beautiful project to turn in. He invited me to their presentation during their class time and I went as the proud wife, ready to reclaim her husband after the presentations were over. =)

Their project really was one of the best in the class -- decided by a class vote after the presentations. Joshua will no doubt make a wonderful architect. He has the vision and the eye for it, along with the willingness to put in the work needed to get the job done.