So Its Been a While....

Its been over a month since our last post and we are sorry about that. However, this post should get you caught up. Life has been amazingly great the past few weeks. So here goes....

Our last post was about March Madness. Well Erin won that. She beat me by four points. So now, I have to go to eat anywhere she wants to go.

The month started out with Nathanial Stockberger's birthday party. He was born on April Fool's day, which makes perfect sense if you know him. Here are a few pics.



As a few of you know we have been training for a 5K. Erin used to really hate running, so this has been very challenging but rewarding for us. We ran the Theta 5K on April 12. I was so impressed with Erin. We did not ever have to stop running and we finished strong. She did so great! If you would have told me when we got married that we would run and entire 5K without stopping, I would not have believed you. Erin has always hating running, but that changed and she did great! Here are a few pics from that experience.




April 12 turned out to be a great day. My (Matt's) parent came into town after our 5K. They didn't know it was Parent's Weekend (which was very ironic), but just came to hang out. I got a REALLY big surprise whenever they got here...

I got my Aggie Ring!!

I lost my other one whenever we first moved into our house. I thought it was gone forever (well, that ring still is), but now I have another one. I will be really careful not to lose this one.

We then went to Brenham and looked at Jeeps (for my Dad), and got an old door to make a headboard. We are still in the process of making the headboard, but look for pictures here soon. It was a really great weekend.

The next weekend was Living Hope's Community Picnic. We decided that this would be our ministry week activity for our HOPE group. It was amazing! The mix of ages and races was truly a picture of the Body of Christ. I cannot even begin to explain how amazed I was with everything that was going on at the park. I hope events like that continue and expand with our church (and any other church for that matter).

Little did we know, but that was the beginning of an amazing day for us. We went to the Saturday night service as usual, but God had some really exciting things planned for us that night. During the worship time, I (Matt) started to look over the bulletin and pray over the questions printed on it. Here are the questions:

Do you sacrifice your life in devotion to believers? (Time, talents, treasures)
Do you prioritize other in the church over yourself?
Is your love self-centered or Christ-centerd?
How ready are you to give up everything for Christ and the Church?
Be honest, what do non-believers see are your greatest love?

As I read over these questions, God began to change my heart and my thinking on a lot of things. The first was Erin. She has been trying to get a teaching job since the beginning of this year. Her degree is in Education and we really felt like she was suppose to teach, but God changed that. It was very clear to me that night that Erin was NOT suppose to be teaching. It wasn't like we had thought about this for a long time or considered all the pros and cons. It was like God said, "No teaching", and we said "OK". It makes sense now, in hindsight, that not teaching is the best decision for so many reasons. We really love having people over, and we probably couldn't do that as much if she was teaching. We couldn't spend all the quality time together like we do now. The list could go on. Basically, the decision lifted a weight off our shoulders, and we truly believe this is what God wants for us.

The day wasn't over yet. We then when to Island Party with the Bacaks. We got to hang out backstage, and have a really good time. I saw many of my friends I hadn't seen in a while, and it was just really great. It was a great day!

That gets us to this past week.

Our best friends, the Vanns, had their first child this week!!! Eden Elaine arrived on Thursday! It is so amazing to see something you have been praying for come to reality. The baby is adorable (as to be expected, have you seen Nick and Carissa? I mean seriously, how could it NOT be cute?!). I am still in a little bit of shock that my best friend is a dad. He will be a great dad, and Carissa will be the best mom ever. They are going to be great parents. I cannot wait to see what God has in store for Eden. Here are some pics:




That was a lot to get caught up on. I probably left something out somewhere...but oh well. We are really looking forward to this summer and everything God has planned for us!!