Our summer

Well we start school back up on Tuesday, August 23.  You would think I was dreading it, but I actually have been anticipating it for most of the summer.  Summer is our least favorite season.  I just feel so counterproductive at this time because of how hot it is and how we don’t take advantage of summer classes.  (At Georgia Southern, summer classes were abbreviated versions of a semester’s workload; I took classes every summer in college.  At Southeastern, they jam it all into two week sessions.  All that work along with Carter asking for chocolate milk for the billionth time would probably cause us to spontaneously combust, and we really don’t need Housing to slap us with a cleanup fee.) The only nice part of summer was that we had a lot of time off to act like twelve year olds.  Swimming, sidewalk chalk drawing, reading what we wanted to read for a change…

Now the whole summer wasn’t all Billy Madison.  (We did tear up some Snack-Pack.)  So let’s catch up with some highlights!

Storybird.com is an amazing concept.  You basically create an online book using a large library of submitted artwork.  Pick your photos, write your story, and publish it.  Ta-daa, it’s available for the Storybird community to view and share.  I learned about it at the library since they’re running a contest through August where people can upload their Storybird stories to the WCPLS Facebook page.  Did I submit one?  No.  I got one page done.  If you have a lot of time to kill and don’t mind sorting through artwork to fit your story, it can be fun.  I don’t have that time especially ever since we went down to 3GB per month with Verizon.  Maybe when we’re out of seminary, we’ll treat ourselves and move back up to 5GB.

I have six years of Spanish classes under my belt and a Cuban father, so you would think I am totally fluent in Spanish.  Well, minus 10 points for you because I’m not.  I know God can use me with this skill in our ever changing world, so I started reading Madrigal’s Magic Key to Spanish.  It’s amazing how a book that was originally published in 1951 (I have the 1989 edition) can make learning Spanish easy compared to learning it in a classroom setting throughout the 90’s.  I like how Margarita Madrigal starts off with past tense verb conjugation versus present tense conjugation (how I learned in school), and she uses a lot of word and sentence drills.  It’s one of the best-selling books for learning Spanish on Amazon, so I figured I’d try it.  So far, so good.  One side note:  the illustrations are done by Andy Warhol…and they’re horrible.

My mom stopped by to see us in early July.  It was so good to see her!  I love having visitors (hint, hint).  Last time she came it was right after New Year’s, so it was nice to have her here when it looks so dramatically different.  I wish we had more time, but I had some good laughs with her.

I thought with how chaotic life was last school year that I would look at finally getting a mentor from Southeastern’s Women’s Life office.  I have already been blessed by her wise words and godly spirit.  I’m excited to have her as a guide and friend this school year.

We moved to The Summit’s North Raleigh campus.  I really didn’t want to make the move from Brier Creek South, but we knew we really needed to worship in our community and wanted to get hooked up with a small group with kids around Carter’s age in our area…and the gas was killing us!  We are really happy that we made the change and look forward to growing with North Raleigh.

Clint got the opportunity to preach at our former church in Georgia, The Church at Godley Station, at the end of July.  He tackled the faith alone vs. faith with works issue using James 2.  Using God’s word, he did a great job in showing the importance of faith in Christ alone but what we are also expected to do with our faith.  It was and always will be amazing to have a front row seat to how God is using my awesome husband.

The McCulloughs are known for being painfully behind with technology.  Nifty gadgets and the latest electronics are never on our wish lists.  (I am often quoted saying:  “I don’t need a stickin’ GPS.  I am the GPS.”)  Well, hate to admit it, but we now own something starting with an “I”, our IPad!  Like everyone else, we love it.  It was especially nice to get it during tax-free weekend and with Clint’s 10% Walmart discount.

We read The Hunger Games trilogy.  I liked it a lot but that ending…for real?!.  I definitely enjoyed it more than Twilight; The Hunger Games has so much more grit and important themes than what Bella and Edward bring to the table.  Now Clint and I can’t wait for the first movie in March.  (Yes, Clint, like a lot of guys it seems, got into it too.)  Sometimes totally out of context, we’ll ask each other how we think the movie will portray a particular scene in the book or will try to figure out where exactly the 13 districts of Panem are on a United States map.  Big dorks.

Well that’s most of this summer.  And now what we are looking forward to:

I’m taking Great Commission Studies and Counseling Parents and Children this semester.  I’ve already started reading for these classes (two-three weeks into each syllabus—go me!), and I’m really looking forward to learning more in these areas.  Clint is taking English Comp II, History of Ideas III, Evangelism, and Hermeneutics which means he won’t have a life at all for the next four months.

On September 18, The Summit is having all of its campuses meet together for worship at the Durham Bulls stadium.  I don’t know why I’m so excited for this, but I just think it’s awesome to have so many Christ followers in one place that don’t normally meet but share the common beliefs that our church does.

I’m looking forward to finishing up Beth Moore’s Paul study.  I have to say that I wasn’t a big Beth Moore fan before, but I specifically liked how this study on Paul was broken down.  I learned a lot about a man that is so often misrepresented, and it has impacted my faith significantly.

Carter’s birthday is on September 29, and, as always, we are super excited!  Our boy is turning three!  What are we going to do?  Go to the zoo?  Bounce house extravaganza?  Just do a small party with cake?  The latter probably.

I plan on perfecting my photography skills so that I can post some decent “A Day in Pictures” posts.  I try to be artsy, but my pictures look like I’m using a random option on my camera like “Fireworks” or “Pets in Motion”.  Oh well…

Finally, a date night is so overdue.  We really need to have one soon.  And I mean a real one, not one where we walk around the mall and eat at Subway.  (I have to admit that even sounds like a treat.)

That’s it.  Hopefully, I won’t go off the deep end and lose my motivation to update the blog again.  McCullough out.