What Have We Been Up To?

Valentines Day

This valentines day, Samantha and I stayed in and made a home made pizza and salad. It was nice just being able to be stay home and have a sweet date night.

After enjoying our pizza and salad, we settled in to watch the season premere of 19 Kids and Counting.

I am amazed at how some of the sweetest times of our marriage have been around what some would call "boring".

I will never get past the feeling of walking in our house, and hearing the words "Hi Honey, welcome home!"

Yup life is good!

Had our One Year Wedding Anniversary!

Can you believe that its already been a year? We had a lot of fun on our anniversary. We were able to relive the day of our wedding in several ways.

Dinner at cracker-barrel!

Had fun at a Gas station/deli/grocery store/bakery called
Latitudes

We stayed at the same hotel as on our wedding day!

 We shared the top tier of our wedding cake! It was surprisingly good, no freezer burn.

The in the morning we had a wonderful breakfast!

Baby is Growing

As for the progress of our baby and mama. Well they are doing good. Mama morning sickness has finally gone away,which is making things a lot more fun.

We also get to find out what we are having tomorrow!

What do you think it will be? BOY? GIRL?

Each time we see the image of our little baby, it sends chills up my spine. It makes the whole thing more real. As I look at Samantha and the changes that are happening to her I realize there is a baby in her. But when I see the images, the realization goes from, "a baby" to "our baby".

What a blessing and what a great responsibility. I am truly humbled.

I am so in love with Samantha!

Who's Ready for A Baby? WE ARE!

We would like to introduce baby Sandoval.

Yup! We have been holding on to the news that we are expecting a baby. The expected due date is August 20th.

After the miscarriage of our first little one, we were very reluctant to make a public announcement. It was pretty hard to have different  people who hadn't heard, say "How the baby doing?" A simple innocent question, that brought back painful memories. 


So this time around, we have waited till the 2nd trimester. We wanted to be a little more "out of the woods" before we told too many people. Of course our parents and immediate family knew, but for the most part we kept it to ourselves. Although we did put it on the prayer list as an "Unspoken Request". ;-)


We would also ask that you would pray for our little baby as it continues to grow. Pray that every aspect of this pregnancy will go smoothly.  As for Samantha she is still experiencing some morning sickness, but we hope it to subside soon.


We know that God is in control of everything, and we have put both our trust and confidence in His omnipotence and omniscience. Knowing that He does ALL things well!

John and Wanda Casias - Graduated to Heaven

In a recent, shocking set of circumstances a missionary couple that were very close to Samantha and I as well as our home church were murdered on the mission field. The details are still coming in. But one thing we know is that Mexico lost some amazing warriors for Christ, and Heaven gained some faithful warriors.

Our prayers go out to their family. Brother John would always say, "I am safer in the Mexico in the Perfect will of God, than back home out of the will of God." We know that God is in control and that God does all things well and perfect. One thing is for sure they are walking on streets of gold!

Please pray for the Salvation of who ever is responsible for this, we know that is what John and Wanda would want. They loved souls, and they loved their people in Mexico. Please pray for souls to saved as a result.

Some of the best memories we have of Bro John and Wanda were at Apache Creek Deaf and Youth Ranch. Dr. James Wilkins was having a discipleship camp and they were able to make it.

While they were there, Mrs Casias wanted to try out the Gyro. The following pictures are her.

http://www.the33tv.com/news/kdaf-texas-missionaries-killed-in-mexico-20120201,0,4207061.story

http://abcnews.go.com/International/texas-missionaries-killed-mexico-knew-danger-church-friend/story?id=15499053#.TytnSGNWrAA

http://www.connectamarillo.com/news/story.aspx?id=715232#.TytofWNWrAA

North Texas Missionaries Murdered in Mexico: MyFoxDFW.com

Heartland Baptist Bible College - Home Missions Conference

Heartland Baptist Bible College, Church planting and Home Missions Conference.

This past week I was privileged enough to be able to travel to Oklahoma City, to attend the Church Planting and Home Missions Conference. This is by far one of the most exciting meetings. It is truly amazing how much money is donated to help missionaries and church planters.

From the very start you can feel the presence of God. There is a very unselfish atmosphere, as hundreds of Pastors or church representatives, and individuals, sacrificially give to meet the needs of those who presented.

An added blessing is the music!

Witness 2012 

Witness 2012 - 2 

A special guest that you may or may not know was the blue grass band Southern Raised. I first heard of them from the show, 19 kids and counting. One of the Bates boys (Zach) is courting one of the ladies (Sarah) in the group.

The Wednesday night services were held at Southwest Baptist Church. The preaching here was powerful.

Hoboken is where the Cake Boss is filmed

For some reason there were thousands of black birds about a block from our hotel. They would be gone in the morning and reappear in the night.

The Gator Place - Trappers

One night we were driving around and looking for a place to eat, and we came across Trappers. It looked pretty interesting so we decided to stop.

I got a place of pop corn shrimp. While Bro Abel ordered some real genuine Alligator. It was pretty good stuff.

This is Alligator, its not too bad, tastes like chicken... 

The Large Cross, outside of Amarillo Texas

One of the "must see" stops along the way, is this huge cross, located just outside of Amarillo Texas. It can be seen from miles away. It was created by some catholics and has a lot of their doctrine throughout.

There is a life size "station of the cross" all around the cross.

Some other places we stopped

The Jesus IS Lord Truckstop, in Amarillo

A must stop if you are driving through Amarillo, is the Jesus is Lord Travel Center. It is very much in a lot of ways a typical gas station/truck stop. But it is very different also.

All over this place there are scriptures and Bible references. This was truly refreshing. I will proudly support this establishment!

Many of the Psalms, in the widows.

This is something you hardly ever see.

"In the Lord Jesus Christ we trust, everyone else must pre-pay."

We were able to leave some "Drama at the Cross" books here for  people to take for free

This is a good verse for the soda section!

All in all it was a great time, But the whole time I was there, it felt like something was missing! MY WIFE! 

Unfortunately Samantha was not able to make it this time around, but I hope to take her with me next time! It will so much more fun to have my family with me!