The earth declaes the glory of God!

I just had to update my "hot tub" blog after the spectacular job that God is doing in painting our landscape here in East Texas. We don't generally have the beautiful fall colors that you in the northern and eastern parts of our countries get...BUT GOD... this year.. .I guess maybe due to the drought we are having...the landscape is beautiful. Our view from the hot tub are spectacular. The top picture and here again...was a view from our front door yesterday when the sun was brilliantly highlighting the oaks in the front yard. God..you are awesome!

A Month of Thanksgiving

Oh Give thanks unto the Lord for He is good! His goodness does abound to us daily and we are reminded of so many things for which we give thanks! Dave and I were sitting in the hot tub the other morning talking about how good God was to prod us into getting this blessing. It was in 1992- Amy and Brian had just taken our ONLY grandchild at the time- Caitlin- and boarded a plane for Spain-to attend a school of YWAM- another step to bring them closer to living their lives in Chad, Africa. I was so grief stricken that I could not return to school to teach my 7th graders World History that day. Dave took me to the mall- where he so graciously bought me 2 dresses and a coat...just trying to cheer me up and soothe my sorrows! While strolling through the mall we happened to stop by a hot tub display. It was fun to look but since Dave would NEVER go in a hot tub at a motel, etc...I knew we could only wish. BUT....out of the blue Dave said...maybe we should buy one! And we did! And so began the HOT TUB adventure which continues to this day. We have had a hot tub in 3 different states- Colorado- Florida and Texas and continue to head out there first thing in the morning to start our day! We talked of all the conversations, blessings, times of prayers, discussions of ALL kinds of things, joys, sorrows, concerns, and the list goes on.We have laughed, cried, shared times with grandchildren...children...friends... We figure we have had over 7,000 HOURS of face to face converstions in our hot tub and are so thankful for the way GOD has blessed us with this!
So...tomorrow we will get up early....get a cup of freshly brewed coffee...and head out to the hot tub to enjoy God's creation and each other!

Lots of water over the dam here...or...not so much

Well, actually our lake is down by about 4 feet so there is NOT much water over the dam at Lake Fork! GOD! We need rain. We did get 4 inches while we were in FL but it did not help the lake much.
Since last post we have gone through the whole episode with Channel 7 in Tyler buying in to many lies about ESOAL. But..to GOD be the GLORY...HE will be glorified in the end!
We spent 10 days in Florida...fun in the sun with Jon, Kelly, Jordan and Matthew and Sam, Lisa, Henry, Jonah and Bridgett. What a blessing to be with our kids on vacation at Destin. We have rented the same house for 3 years so the kids think it is their Florida house...and it is!
God is so good and His mercy endureth forever!
Dave and I went on to the Orlando area and had some business to take care of plus we got to have dinner with my high school friend, Carol Lynn Koneman Fink and her husband Gary and share chemo experiences of the past year. They love the Lord and it was fun sharing the goodness of God with them.
It is good to be home again. No place like home! We are busy with:
yard work- Dave loves the cooler weather for working outside!
Teen Mania- I am working 2 days a week in my mentoring job
MOPS- I have MOPS two mornings a month where I am a mentor mom
Cards- we play Hand and Foot with friends almost weekly
Dance- we dance on Sat. nights occasionally in Big Sandy
Hunting- deer season is open here so Dave and Sam will be hunting their lease this weekend

Family- we get together with them every chance we get! Tonight is dinner and a movie with Sam and Lisa...maybe we will see Secretariat!
Church- we love our church home- Living Waters in Quitman and are now attending a weekly "Flow" group- small group gathering
Tea- I am looking forward to once again hosting my annual "Christmas High Tea" Ya'll come!
Until next time...thanks for stopping by!

ESOAL

David will be a participant this year so the pictures will be quite different!

Esoal begins tomorrow night...tune in to Heath Stoner's trailer club blog for updates!
http://trailerclub.blogspot.com

August Adventures

Over 3 weeks of temps of 100 and we are ready for fall! August has been a busy month- The Gala at Teen Mania marked the end of the year for the August Interns. This banquet is always such fun! Shortly before we left for the Gala I had a Facebook "contest" to vote for which hair I should wear...The red won but Dave preferred the blond. What do you think?




It is always a bitter sweet time since we are saying goodbye to interns we have grown to love throughout the year.

We made a couple of trips to the Dallas area to see the Smith family. Abby is recovering from her broken leg after an accident while lying underneath the trampoline....and we helped Amy get ready for school. It is always fun to see them.
Tori was home baking Bak La Va. She is quite the cook!

We had many days of swimming and fun with Sam and family and Jon and family and several batches of homemade ice cream!

Henry and Jonah really got the hang of catching fish and had a ball!

Teen Mania welcomed the new August class and a few nights later had a baptismal service when 100's of interns chose to be baptized. What an awesome event to witness so many youth dedicating their lives to the Lordship of Jesus Christ!
We brought Jonathan (David's son) home with us for a few days following that service. Cole was scheduled to come too but got sick and had to miss it. We had so much fun spoiling Jay! We had a "Shouldn't weekend"...you shouldn't have to do anything! Shouldn't have to say no to "much". So....Jay had a milkshake for every meal and we did what he wanted...fishing, scrapbooking,
made a space mobile...watched Funniest Home Videos- one show- and just really enjoyed our time with him. It is not often we get a one on one since there are 17 grandchildren!
This week we celebrated Lisa's birthday.

..had dinner at David and Beth's and look forward to Saturday to having Josiah and his friends here for his 13th birthday.
and so goes the lives of Dave and Marybeth...Blessed...blessed...blessed!!!!!

Rocky Mountain High

Bear Lake Colorado...4 days of camping in the gorgeous Rocky Mountains with Dave, Sam, Lisa, Henry, Jonah and Bridget!
God is so awesome- His creation so magnificent and His mercies new every morning.
We had a wonderful time in the mountains. All we wanted was "cold" after leaving Texas and we got that! It was 45 at night...perfect for sleeping and nice during the day. Got our fair share of rain but even that was refreshing. Saw a bear in our camp during the day...quite exciting.
We were in a Colorado campground with no electric or water...so Sam rigged up a shower for their family. Only problem...he didn't heat the water QUITE warm enough. Poor kids!
We love cooking out over the campfire and LOVE big fires! We gathered wood and Sam and Henry chopped and sawed and split wood for us so we were never without a fire.
The Great Sand Dunes Natl. park was a day trip where all of Sam's family made it to the top. Dave and I stopped over half way up (didn't want to over do!)( I did not have batteries for my camera the first couple days so no sand dune pictures here...maybe Lisa will post some on her blog!)
We took a hike out of our camp ground up about 1000 feet more- we camped at 10,000 feet- and had beautiful views of the valley where we camped.

Dave and Sam and the boys fished and provided us with a fish dinner right before we packed out early to avoid the afternoon rains.
No trip of the Hasz's is complete without some issue...a flat tire on the way home near Amarillo gave us about a 1.5 hour delay as we limped in to a Walmart for a repair. We went 412 miles without seeing a gas station so stopped by the roadside and pumped up the tire with a bicycle pump until we blew that out! There was a big bolt in the tire...thanks to all the driving through construction zones in TX and New Mexico. Never a dull moment.

The trip was wonderful and we are thankful to God for good health, family that wants us along on their vacations. We played games each night and enjoyed such sweet fellowship with Sam, Lisa and the children. Our God is so good! Thank you God!

The summer roll on!

July 15, 2010

How the summer is flying by! In just a few days we plan to leave on a camping trip with Sam and Lisa and children to Colorado. We would like to spend a few days around the Great Sand Dunes National Monument and the surrounding area. We are looking forward to COOL night- especially since we have no air conditioning! It will be so great to be back in Colorado camping. We are undecided as to whether we will head north to Denver or not. Sam and Lisa have to be back for Sam to work- he cannot be gone on Sunday since that is arrival day for Sky Ranch!

I have felt more and more energized all summer. Dave and I are walking about 3 miles a day-enjoying the early morning time before it is hot- avoiding the pit bulls down the street-basking in God's creation out there! I am working one day a week at Teen Mania- we are enjoying time with our children and grandchildren. God is so awesome and good!

Teen Mania will graduate the August interns on August 7th and get the new class the following week. These are always exciting days around Teen Mania.

Haley and Tori, our granddaughters will leave this week for Baja Mexico for their missions trip. God has given them an awesome opportunity to serve Him in this way. Tori won the trip at a concert they had attended in Dallas- the trip is with Global Expeditions with Teen Mania! Haley decided to cash in her "Ebay parasail savings account" and go with Tori. It should be fun for them! Caitlin is enrolled in 2 college classes this summer and having her first taste of college.

God is continuing to bless us in so many ways. We just want HIM to be glorified in our lives!

To God Be the Glory

Our God is an awesome God! This week we are privileged to celebrate 47 years of God's grace in our lives. It was 47 years a go that we stood before the altar at Bethlehem Lutheran Church in Fort Wayne, Indiana and pledge our "troth" to each other! by HIS grace we are still loving each other and have enjoyed His blessings in our lives- above and beyond what we could have ever asked or thought! Dave is my very best friend, the love of my life, and I couldn't have asked for a better husband and father to my children. I love him so much! Over these years we have come to a deeper understanding of who God is and who each other is. We are blessed.
As if that were not enough for one week...today I got an e mail from my nutritionist. I have worked with Mike and with the medical world in my battle against cancer. It was just 6 months ago today...Christmas day...that I discovered the large lump in my neck which was to be diagnosed several weeks later as Lymphoma cancer. A few weeks a go...after 5 of 6 scheduled chemo treatments, I had a PET scan which declared me Cancer Free. I have been awaiting the results of my blood test from Mike...which came today...and here is what he said...
Well, your reports are completed and attached and all your numbers are improving and at this time I cannot measure any cancer activity. The cancer activities that I could measure after your last chemo treatment are no longer measurable. It would appear at this point that your decision to discontinue the chemo at the time you did was a good choice. PRAISE AND GLORY BE TO OUR GOD WHO IS MY HEALER!
We spent the last couple of days in Little Elm with Amy and family. We met Amy and Brian at PF Changs...used to be our favorite....and had dinner...then spent the night with them...did some handy man jobs for them on Thursday then enjoyed their children and other children from their school in the summer orchestra concert. amazing! Their children are quite the accomplished musicians and we are so proud of them. God is just such an AWESOME GOD! All Praise to HIM!