March 3, 2014

Life Lately

January and February were good months, busy and full, but a good kind of busy and full.  We tried to take advantage of not having to work on Saturdays as for the next ten months this will be our story. 

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We had fun celebrating Mama Isabella’s 73rd birthday (pictured center) in La Concha.  This festive night included sombrero decorating, enchiladas, piñatas, cake and more.  We are grateful for this family’s friendship to us over the past two years!

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In Nicaragua, it is custom to give everybody a chance at hitting the piñata, from the small kids to the aging folks.  As you can see in the above photo, I was hitting the piñata without my blindfold, but everybody was behind me and had no idea!  The last picture also proves that after the piñata has broke, anyone has rights to the candy.  Kids do not have preference and are often tackled down by the adults in hopes for a handful of sweets.

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We love adding fresh mint to our water, our mojitos and our cooking and just felt like we never had enough.  Our small potted plant was transplanted into a tire and it is growing beautifully!

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We spent a weekend camping at Laguna de Apoyo, a great little spot about an hour from our house.  We relaxed, ate great food and read a lot of books.

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I overcame a big fear of mine and flew on a small twelve-seater plane on the way back from a work trip to Waspam.  You most likely received an e-mail the day before asking for prayers, because I was scared!  I took my meds, prayed a lot and it went okay.  Four things:

  1. I felt like I was in a small mini-van.
  2. The pilots took turns resting/sleeping.  I couldn’t decide if this was a good thing or not.
  3. They put black sun visors up in the windows and literally could not see out.  I know that everything is computer programmed, but I thought they would at least like to see where they were going.
  4. I may have held a stranger’s hand when we landed.

Besides all of that, there were some points when I actually enjoyed looking out the window and seeing the beautiful Nicaraguan landscape.

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In January, we had our MCC Team Meetings and took a trip up the San Ramon where we were able to see some of our partners work in portable water and latrine building.  We also spent a day hiking and playing cards at Selva Negra.

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We have enjoyed hosting and having friends over.  Our relationships here make everything worth it!

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A couple weekends ago we headed down to Costa Rica to visit some friends who moved there last year.  We were able to spend some time with sweet Nayara, her mom and dad on the beautiful beaches of the Nicoya Peninsula.  Our favorite by far was Playa Conchal, what a fabulous place!

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Last weekend we spent a night in Granada at the International Poetry Festival.  It was a lovely evening of poetry reading, most of which we could understand (yeah for making progress!) followed with a concert by the acclaimed Katya Cardenal.

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And lastly, we recently figured how how to utilize group calls on skype and have been loving it!  This call included my siblings, their significant others and my parents.  We have also taken advantage of talking to Kevin’s entire family at the same time as well as grouping skyping with friends.  It is a wonderful resource to have while we are far from home.

To see other Lately posts, check out: December 2013, July 2013, November 2012 and July 2012.

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