Austin and Lubbock

Alexa making cookies on our first morning in Austin.  Cookies were for the fundraiser that evening.  

Making appetizers.  Elisa, Alex's sister, is a big gourmet cook - so is her husband, Nick.  So they gave us really cool recipes and were kind enough to get them from the local food market.  This is sweet potato "balls" with coconut fritters.  Tasty!

Elisa and Alexa.  Those two women know Alex the best!  

The cookies came out great!  I'm sure you can figure out why we gave them shapes of kids :)

Tuesday evening fundraiser at Nick and Elisa's home in Austin.  This is the business cards that we passed out.  

Alex giving out the presentation.

Fielding questions

The awesome Austin group who came to the presentation.  A nice mixture of professionals, students, and visitors.  

Wednesday morning.  Prepping food for the big Thanksgiving feast!  Alex is peeling butternut squash.  

Nick, Elisa's husband - holding some kind of vegetable.  Try and identify it!  

Mexican train!  It was just the five of us on Wednesday.  Thursday is when the family would come for Thanksgiving.

The guests have arrived!  This is Ryan Bunge, Alex's brother-in-law.  He will be staying in Romania for five years with Alex's sister, Allison to work with orphans.  They were classmates/roommates at Sunset Int'l Bible Institute.  

Good ol times.  Jose is sitting, while Sean is on the right.  He lives with Nick and Elisa.  

Alexa and Alex decided to shoot pictures paparazzi style just as they came out of the door.  Funny reactions.

Jose likes the flashes of the camera!  

Someone's picture shy.  Or not?

Nick gives a pretty good show.  

We all went out to eat on Friday night.  We, for some reason, never took pictures of our thanksgiving dinner!  We were too busy eating!!!  This is downtown Austin, on Congress Street.  The capitol is in the distance.  

Very delicious.  Greek burger.  

The family!  We all had a lot of fun together.  Front row, from left:  Alex, Alexa, Jose, Nick.  Back row, from left: Sean, Elisa, Heather (Alex's sister), Ryan, Allison (Alex's sister), and Kathi (Alex's mom)

Identify them yourself!  

Mama's boy

12:03 am - and Alexa doesn't want a picture taken of her!   

The morning after.  Early Saturday morning we set off to go to Lubbock, Texas.  Red Bull, a gift from Sean, was a nice help!  

Alexa doesn't drink red bull, so she listens to her iPod instead!  She loves that thing.  

When you see the plains, windmills, and great blue skies, you know you are in West Texas

That's an oil drilling thing in the distance.  

A little pick-me-up for the last two hours of the drive.  

Sunsets are the best in West Texas because of the great sky.  

Sunday morning.  The church at Lubbock is listening to Alex teach Bible class.  This church is where Alex and Alexa went to Bible school - Sunset International Bible Institute.    

The sermon - preachin' about the mission trip.  

After church, we went up to the "Flag Room" so we could have a potluck.  This is where the morning chapel for Bible school meets every morning.  

amen to that!  

At the halls of Sunset, there are pictures of every graduating class.  This is a picture of the pictures of Alex and Alexa when they graduated.  They weren't married at the time so Alexa is known as Gulka!  Notice Allison on the right of Alex, and Brian Baell (minister at Phoenix church) next to Allison.  Jerome Dupuis, the guy below Alex, was also his roommate at Sunset for two years.  Conor Fox is just a good classmate :)  

Our hosts in Lubbock!  Hollis and Ernestine Maynard.  Hollis is a teacher at Sunset and taught many of our classes.  We miss them already!  

next destination:  Joplin, Missouri (Ozark Christian College)