This past weekend was officially our last weekend of the "summer". We spent it delightfully. I'll just touch on the highlights. Saturday evening, we went to a gathering (the term "party" seems so collegiate) of young people who attend our church. It was wonderful. Ironically, we knew only two of these people (whom Josh works with) because the rest go to a different service than we do. (We've been wondering where all the people our age have been!) It was a mint julep party and the hostess made the BEST mint juleps my lips could ever have dreamed of. There was also a nice spread of summery culinary treats. We had such a nice time socializing with everyone that we ended up staying for 4 HOURS, not the 2 we had planned on! We left feeling very hopeful about out expanding social circle here and felt like we found a wonderful group of young Christians with whom we could really be friends. We exchanged some phone numbers before leaving, and so hopefully will pursue those friendships in the months to come.

Yesterday, we enjoyed a nice day of relaxing together. We spent some time at the pool (and I have to say that for the first time in our relationship, I am more tan than Joshua at the end of the summer!) We napped, we ate dinner. Then, we headed over to Michael's Bistro on the corner where we sat out on the balcony and enjoyed a nice evening of talking about what the near future holds for us. It was a conversation we had been putting off for quite sometime, as we are both fairly uncertain as to what we'd like to do next. It was a great evening, and even though we still haven't figured things out, at least we our on the same page and have a more clear understanding of what we each want, separately and together.

Now I have to go get ready for the week to begin. We have orientations all week, receptions, classes, etc. I still need to figure out what I want to say to the incoming students at the department orientation on Thursday. Wish I hadn't committed to that, but it's probably a good thing that I did. I've been getting on and off nausea all morning as I've taken care of various tasks and realized how many more await this week. Stayed tuned for updates on my thesis topic progress, thoughts on a new semester, and occasional sociological musings.