el Día de los Niños

Last week, we celebrated a fun Costa Rican holiday, el Día de los Niños (Children's Day).  On this day, children receive gifts, get special treats and are able to participate in fun activities at school, around town, or at church.  Our church had a Children's Day party.  There was a performance, singing, games, and lots of treats (more than we let Timmy eat!).  It was really fun to watch the kids having a blast.  These photos will give you a bit of an idea of what the celebration looked like:

Our friend, Marifer, leading a game...

... singing and dancing with streamers...

... watching a performance...

... playing games...

... Timmy enjoying his first ice cream cone...

Introducing our new interns!

"Meet" our new interns:

From left to right: Alfonso, from Mexico (now Texas), Jess from Washington (now Florida), David from Georgia, Bethany from Arizona, and Erika from Minnesota

It's hard to believe that our new interns have already been here for a month!  They went through a week of orientation with us when they first got here, then really enjoyed their two weeks of language school, have gotten settled into life with their host families, and are now going on their project trips.  David and Erika are getting back from Guatemala today, Alfonso will go to Honduras with Dan next week, and Bethany and Jess (a long-term volunteer who went through orientation with the interns) will be going to Honduras the following week.

We started up this term's Bible study last week.  It is such a joy to have the interns in our home each week to study the Word together and to hold each other accountable to the applications we make through our study.  This term we will be studying John 13-17, and I'm really looking forward to focusing on these words of Christ over the next couple of months.  Please pray for Dan to have wisdom as he facilitates this study, and pray for all of us to have our hearts molded more into Christ's likeness through what we learn.

craziness and peace

Today, I found myself taking a big breath, fighting back a few tears, and hoping for things to calm down - to just calm down.  It's a frequent feeling for me here, but this was the first day I'd gotten to that point since our latest visit back to the States.  The past week has been crazy for us. 

Part of it was a good craziness; our new set of interns arrived last Monday!  Intern orientation week is always one of the busiest in a term for us, so last week we were constantly on the go from one training session or event to the next.  Dan led training sessions in the office every day, and planned a lot of activities to help the new interns get to know Costa Rican culture and Atenas.  We had two new interns and a new volunteer staying with us at the beginning of the week, and then every day from Wednesday to Saturday, we had groups of people in our home for everything from a lunch with the interns to a movie night, pizza with our whole team, cultural and language acquisition training sessions, and a painting project!  In the midst of this, I had a crazy allergy attack and was having more contractions that I felt comfortable with and Timmy wasn't feeling well with diarrhea, so an unexpected trip to San José to see our doctors had to be squeezed in (we're all ok, by the way).  I needed to take it easy because of the contractions, which is always hard to do because of the extra work housekeeping is here, but the added hosting of events made it even harder.  The week was made more complicated by our car being in the shop the whole week; we're hoping we'll get it back today. 

The craziness culminated with Sunday's event, which was definitely not a good craziness.  I will write in more detail about this icing on the cake soon, but, basically, our house was broken into and our laptop and our digital camera were stolen.  There are so many emotions that come with this - anger at the injustice of it, frustration that maybe we could have done something to make our home more secure, fear that the thief will return, sadness of the loss of the secure feeling we've had living in this house...  We are thankful that more wasn't taken and that no one was hurt, but we are still struggling a little with the repercussions of this theft.

So, all of that information brings me back to my place of almost crying and my desire for calm this morning...  As I took that big breath and blinked back the tears, I was reminded that my only true peace is in our Lord, just as my only true place of security, rest, comfort, and joy is in Him.  God has been bringing the last two verses of Psalm 29 to my mind over and over again the past couple of days:

"The Lord is enthroned over the flood; the Lord is enthroned as King forever.  The Lord gives strength to His people; the Lord blesses His people with peace." 

Why do I feel like my world is at all shaken by one crazy week, by one bad event?  The Lord is always on His throne and everything is governed by His sovereignty.  Praise Him!  Please join with us praying for our strength and our peace.

Photo Friday: Happy boy

As much as Timmy misses his abuelitos (grandparents), he's happy to be back in the familiarity of our home in Costa Rica.  We all are.

¡Feliz Día de la Madre!

Just a few days after arriving back in Atenas, we celebrated Mother's Day, which is on August 15th in Latin America.  It's a very big holiday here; mothers are really revered in this culture and families do their best to make their mother, aunts, and grandmothers feel very special on this day.  We saw a lot of people walking through town with flowers and cakes for their mothers and the cemetery was filled with flowers people were taking to mothers' graves.

I went to a Mother's Day party with church friends on the 14th.  It was a sweet time of praise and worship, a lunch, a devotional and a gift exchange.  It was fun for me to catch up with these dear ladies after being gone for a month.  At church on Sunday, they called all the mothers to the front of the sanctuary to thank us and to sing a special song for us.  I was greeted over and over with "¡Feliz día!" (happy day).  And, Timmy presented me with a very sweet card that he, Daddy and his little friend Maria José made me for during Sunday School.  After church, Dan and Timmy treated me to a fun lunch at a little café, followed by a walk in Atenas' central park. 

This year was an especially special Mother's Day for me, since this year I'm a mother of two!  I am pretty sure that everyone who reads this blog already knows our fun news, but I've never made an official announcement on the blog.  Our baby GIRL is due November 28th and we are so very excited.  In some ways, it's hard for me to believe that I'm already almost 26 weeks along; at the same time, I can't wait for the next several months to go by so I can hold my little girl in my arms.  We came home with a bassinet and lots of pink clothes, and just can't wait to put our baby in them! 

Towards the beginning of the year, we were praying hard for a second child, and are so thankful for the blessing of this pregnancy.  We have been praying for a safe, healthy pregnancy, a healthy, full-term baby, and no bed rest for Mommy like we experienced in my first pregnancy.  Please join us praising God for the blessing of our little girl, and in praying for health and protection throughout the rest of the pregnancy.  Thank you!

We're back!

We were in the States for the past month visiting family and friends, and just returned to Costa Rica less than a week ago.  We had a wonderful time visiting 4 different states and getting caught up with people (and eating lots of good American food!).  As always, it was sad to leave when our time in the States was up.  Saying good-bye is hard, especially when we know it will be a long time before we see people again.  I definitely felt like I left home when we came back last week, but now that we are back in Atenas, I feel like I'm home as well. Two homes, two lives...  It's easy for me to dwell on it being hard to leave, but I'm so thankful to be here again.  It's been good to visit with some of our teammates, to get caught up with Tico friends, and to worship with our Tico church family yesterday.

We've been working hard to get settled back into our house and work.  Our new group of interns arrive next week, so there is a lot to do this week!