Summer Recap

Our seasons are not determined by the calendar but by semesters. Yesterday was Phil’s 1st day back in school, which means the summer is officially over. To recap, our summer was really busy, but we were blessed in so many ways. We took as many service opportunities as we possibly could this summer since our participation is limited during the school year. We volunteered for the KSBJ Share-a-thon (answered phones & took donations for the local all-listener supported Christian radio station), Extreme Makeover Home Edition (the awesome ABC TV show that built a home for an awesome family in Houston), Houston Project (evangelized in neighborhoods & taught the adult Spanish-speaking women about Jesus at a week-long vacation Bible school for a less fortunate area of Houston), and moved furniture and pulled-up carpet (so much carpet!!!!) at our church for the renovation of the children’s area. Serving others is something that we love to do and has become such an important activity in our lives and we were so blessed by participating this summer.
We were also blessed to take a few trips this summer. We started by visiting Austin and the capital building, as well as Lake Travis. This was our second trip to Lake Travis, but it still shocks me to think that we’re still in Texas when we go there. Also, after 3 years in TX we finally made it to a beach! I love living this close to the beach; if it were up to me we would be there every weekend. On our last trip to the beach, we were out to dinner and got seated next to a woman sitting alone. Before she left, she came to our table and told us that we reminded her of her and her recently deceased husband when they were young. We could see that she was troubled and realized that we had the perfect opportunity to witness to her. It was a great reminder that every opportunity and every encounter we have in our lives is a chance to lead someone to Christ…even when you’re on vacation. In addition, it was another reminder that you never know when you’re last day on earth will be, so love the Lord and love others as much as you can. I doubt that we were as much of a blessing to the restaurant lady as she was to us.

Austin Lake Travis

Surfside

We were also blessed with a new nephew in early June. Let me tell you, Elijah is a cutie and growing so fast! We’re so anxious to meet him in December. My sister got to visit us in June and we had a blast. It will be hard to wait until Christmas to see her too. In the kitchen this summer I cooked a lot of CHICKEN! I haven’t started on any new recipes from my cookbook club, but I have still tried several new recipes (most of which were based on chicken); in the fall I will probably jump into the new cookbook. This summer I tried my hand at cake decorating, but I am not good at all. Right now it’s embarrassing, but I hope to get better during the fall. Phil and I took a painting class at the beginning of August and here is the picture of our class. Amongst all the fun activities this summer, Phil aced his class and I taught 2 courses. We had an end-of-semester celebration dinner at Smith & Wollensky. It was our first time there, but I loved it. The food was so delicious and we even splurged for dessert; wow, yum-o!

We had an action-packed summer filled with blessings & we are certainly looking forward to the fall! Happy Fall Hawley blog readers!