Well, it's been awhile...

Hilary here to give you a much belated update on how things are going in our lives...

Things have been going just awesomely. After Dan preached his sermon at the church in Cuba, we decided to get involved with their church. We are going to a young adult small group and starting this Wednesday we will be helping with their youth group. It's a bit of a drive, being half an hour away, but totally, totally worth it. Last night's small group was about confronting your fears and not allowing fear to choke out your faith. It was wonderful and uplifting and just... the fellowship was so good. Dan and I have been missing that in our lives.

I have a story, too, about how amazing God is. Even though we knew that going to this church was the right thing to do, we were wondering how we would afford the gas to travel there twice a week. Well, Friday at lunch Dan comes up and shows me the deposit slip from him depositing his paycheck. I looked at it and I was like, this can't possibly be right! Dan says, oh no, that's accurate, my paycheck was $114 this week. And I say... but Dan, this deposit slip says FOUR hundred and fourteen dollars. And he said, yes, the other three hundred came from this. And he handed me a card we had received in the mail. The gist of it is that some people we have never met or even heard of, know who we are and God laid it on their hearts to send us some money to help support our "pursuit and dedication to ministry." What an awesome, awesome God we serve. When I found out about that I just spent the rest of the day in total awe and worshipful reflection. God is so GOOD and we are so blessed!

Sunday Dan and I went to this place called Pumpkinville, which is a huge pumpkin patch / cider press / corn maze / a bunch of other really cool things. We got hot, fresh, literally they made them five seconds before they handed them to us, pumpkin donuts and a gallon of apple cider. We also went through the corn maze and ate delicious barbecue chicken and poked our heads in all the shops and generally had a fantastic time. It's so good to go out on dates and connect and strengthen our marriage. When we were in line for the pumpkin donuts (we had to wait an hour for them but they are sooooo good it was totally worth it) we were behind a couple who were bickering and generally just being annoyed and irritated with each other. It made me very sad for them, and even a little uncomfortable having to stand behind them and listen to them. I hope Dan and I never end up like that. I don't think we could though, because we constantly are working on our marriage... we're never content to let it be but always trying to make it better... the same way as all Christians should be with their faith. In November we are going to a relationship seminar because the school is making it available to student couples for only $10. I hope lots of people take advantage of it. In the past few years God has really given me a heart for hurting people with hurting marriages.

One last note, does anybody have, hiding in a basement or some such place, a card table and a few folding chairs they wouldn't miss for a little while? Our apartment is small and we have no table. We have room for one but it would be better if it was one we could put out of the way when it wasn't in use. If anybody has one they could let us borrow for the year, we'd be very grateful. We'd also need two or four folding chairs. Four would be better but we have desk chairs that could be used for two of the chairs if we only had two folding chairs. If you have one you could share with us, let me know, and perhaps my mom can arrange to bring it to us when she comes to visit in a two and a half weeks.

Love,
Hilary