Volcan Irazu

The crater lake at the top of Irazu Volcano (they say the sulfur makes it that color)

Hola! I haven't blogged in a week and a half, so I'm coming with some fun stories and good pictures. Things have been good and busy. Since I blogged last there have definitely been some developments. Here is the basic rundown. I went to Volcan Irazu this past weekend. It was really neat. It's right outside San Jose and is active but rarely gets any action. Last time it "blew" ashes and things was when Kennedy was visiting in Costa Rica.

This is at the highest point at the volcano. It's a little hard to tell,

but we are looking down on the clouds.

Anyway, what else...My basketball team is looking good and I've been trying to work them a little harder than last year. Lol I love hearing a bunch of high school boys whine about defensive drills and how "hard" two practices a week are. Pathetic :). We had an outbreak of "piojos" (lice) this week at school. That was fun, especially since I was deamed as one of the "lice checkers" for the school. Que guacala (disgusting). I also loved waking up like 19 times last night after nightmares about having lice. ugh. Next, Kate and I bought tickets to go to Nicaragua with some missionaries here. We're going to tour around and also see a ministry that deals with sexually abused women. I'm so excited to see that...God continues to pursue my heart and remind me that someday I will be working with this. We were also able to meet our friend, Jared, that we met this summer this week. He is living and doing ministry on the beach and was telling us about how God has worked on his heart dealing with human trafficking. Can't wait to see how we can partner together in that someday! We also started our teacher Bible study this week. I'm excited to help lead and hopefully help our staff overcome cultural differences through studying the word. Please pray for me as I try to lead and teach in Spanish. Speaking of that, I do have a major praise. God allowed me to have the opportunity to translate from English to Spanish for an hour on Friday night. Not saying that to brag, but to let you know that God is answering prayers and blessing me with a desire of my heart, to speak Spanish. That being said, I'm continually humbled and reminded that I have a long way to go. For example, the other day I called my Tico uncle a chicken rather than a picky eater. Pollo=chicken, polo=picky...whatever. :) and...hmm. Oh one of my best friends had a baby in the U.S. I was sad that I can't meet her yet...but so happy for Britt and Sam. And there's the summary. I know it's really random and all over the place, but to avoid writing a book and to let you know what's going on, there it is. To end a random post, here is another random recent picture we took of a bug we found.

Saving changes to life

Kate, Andrew, and me on Costa Rican Independence Day. I made Skyline for us since Andrew is from Cincinnati too :).

My friend Greg and my Tica sister Maria Jose

Well school is well underway and things are going well. I love having a little bit more time on my hands doing just special education this year. I love working with a lot of different teachers and a lot of different grades. I feel like I am so much more confident and comfortable this year. I love it. It's been great getting to know other teachers better this year.

These are some of my friends at our coordinator dinner.

In fact, I feel like Kate and I have made so many more friends this year already. We've made some great gringo and tico friends. I love it because we've been going out a lot more already and we're not feeling so caged in or lonely. I'm really thankful for that answer to prayer. Tonight we went over to Courtney and Erin's and had a cookout for CR independence day. We ate cheeseburgers though (in honor of all the American holidays that we have missed recently). This blog isn't going to be long, but I am just writing to say thank you for your prayers. God has been blessing me a lot and I just can't even describe the peace that I have in my heart about how this is exactly where I am supposed to be right now.

Greg modeling the mullet wig...which of course somehow made it down to CR. :)

I'll leave you with a funny picture that seemed ironic to me. So I typed up this list of life goals and prayers and different things on a word document and titled it "life". When I finished, this little box popped up and it just struck me how funny it seemed. Yah there have been a lot of changes in my life... a lot of unexpected twists and turns...a lot of things I never would have planned. Yet, I wouldn't change them for the world. So in light of that and in light of all of I've learned...I clicked yes on that changes to life question. How could you say no to the best adventure ever with the love of your life who planned it out before time began???

What is it?

So...I'm loving this picture because from on top, you can't tell what it is...it looks like a plant. But if you look at it from the side, you can tell it's a catepillar. It's really spikey and I'm pretty sure it's the poisonous kind or at least just hurt bad if the spikes get stuck in you (obviously). Kinda interesting huh?

Well everything is good here. We're in to our second week of school and so far, so good. I'm loving a little bit of breathing room without teaching kindergarten. Sometimes I feel like a slacker b/c I'm not always running around like crazy...but part of me is thinking that God is answering my prayers in being a little bit more calmed down after that first year of teaching. Let's see what else has happened. I'm about to start coaching basketball again. My team is looking a little small, but that doens't mean anything. I watched the costa rica vs. mexico soccer game on Saturday with Ticos...it was not good. After much cursing, they finally decided to turn it off and play guitar hero...which I totally rocked. lol never played before and I loved it...especially when I was singing on the rock band one. For those of you that know my singing talents, you would agree ;). I mean there is nothing like singing Michael Jackson's "Beat It" song in a latino accent. And that's about it. I guess I'll leave you with one cool thing in regards to my last post (which by the way, thanks for all the cool comments and messages about it). God led me to this great verse in Psalm 45: "Listen, O daughter, consider and give ear: forget your perople and your father's house. The King is enthralled by your beauty; honor Him for He is your Lord." I seriously can't think of any bigger of a self-esteem boost than knowing that the God of the universe is enthralled with me...this whole subject is just rocking my life :).

The perfect wedding :)

The last couple of weeks have been great :). We had orientation last week, which went really well...minus one little girl puking her guts out within the first twenty minutes the first day. lol such is life. We made it though and we proceeded to our first couple of days of school. I can't believe it's my first week of year 2! Crazy how fast it goes! It's sad seeing my kinders in 1st grade...but also a really good thing!!! We had a good weekend too. There are a new group of language students here too which is really cool. We've made some cool friends. One guy is actually from Cincinnati and knows my dad...which is great, but even better, he shares my appreciation for Skyline. Obviously we're going to have a party. Yumm. Let's see, I went to church for an awesome service, worked at the jail and had a mother's day party for the women there, and went to a jazz club to listen to the best band in CR play. It's been good so far! So my most recent deep thinking comes in this form (it's been a while since I've preached). The perfect wedding. So coming back I was slightly worried about being lonely here due to all the changes. Plus, having all my friends be married or getting married has been a big change for me. I prayed about this and God has just totally blown me away with His love. The best news I've heard is that He created us and therefore knows exactly how to meet our deepest needs. Needs that no one else can meet. He knows us better than anyone else and it's great. He is our perfect life partner. As others may come and go, friends may move away, spouses may not live up to the dream or pass away, etc....but God, He just remains, just as faithful as ever. This is what I picture: a perfect guy. Anything you could possibly want in you spouse. Someone faithful, kind, sensitive, strong, provides for you, knows you deeply, cares for you, protects you, has grace on you, patient, has a good sense of humor, makes great plans, loves you deeply, surprises you with little things, helps you through hard things, there to talk whenever you need Him, good with kids (lol), never fails, the list could go on and on. I just see Him standing before me, all I could ever want and the best news is, is that He wants me. He is WAY out of my league, yet He is pursuing me. He wants me with all of His heart. I'm totally not good enough, but He thinks I'm beautiful. I can just see me walking down this aisle in dirty rags and as I get halfway down I transform into a beautiful bride, all decked out and beautiful. But that's not why He's smiling, He's smiling and crying because He knows who I have become on the inside...He loves me for who He's made me become. For this beautiful and new creation in Him. And it's not like He just asking me to love Him. He died in my place to show me how much He meant it...because there is no better way to show love than to lay down your life for a friend. I mean, just think about it, this perfect life partner who can meet every need is just presenting himself before me...someone who can fill me and love me without fault, and here I am searching for other things to love me. Don't get me wrong, I totally appreciate friends and marriage, but man, what are we missing by looking for Christ's love in imperfect people. As I finally get to the altar, I can see the scars in His brow and feel the scars on His hands. That was for me, for this. And how easy for me...I can be His, if I just say yes to His love. Oh I might have to sacrifice some things, He might carry me to another country or whatever it may be, but there He is holding my hand. It doesn't get better than that. How blessed we are to have this available and to truly understand what this means. Very cool. Psalm 90:14 "Satisfy us in the morning with your steadfast love, so that we may rejoice and be glad all our days."

Women's retreat

This weekend was the women's retreat with my church and it went so well...thank you Jesus! It was three days of all Spanish, so I was a little nervous. Not so much about the Spanish as I was the making friends part. I really only knew one girl and not very well at that. Sometimes when I get nervous, I don't speak very well in Spanish (well, I never speak that well, but worse than usual). My Spanish did fine though. I did find myself rather quiet and just listening...which was so good for me. I found it hard to get a word in sometimes and/or wanted to spare myself the struggle/humiliation of speaking up :). It's hard to understand pretty much everything and then answer like a 2 year old. lol but it went so well. God got my confidence up before I left because the usually semi-crabby lady at the bank smiled at me and told me that I have finally learned Spanish. So I went feeling alittle confident and it was great. I learned a lot, made some new friends and practiced. It was great :) I did say a lot of stupid stuff...but I do that in both languages. The girls thought it was hysterical to teach me new ridiculous words and practice random words they know in English. That's always interesting, especially when they ask me more "colloquial" terms for different body parts. Okay...I'm hesitant to tell you this story, but it made me laugh out loud, so I think I will. So right before a service started, one of my friends was talking about words in English she knew and actually asked me when she should use the word "boobies." I absolutely lost it. That word with a Latino accent in a church service sent me over the edge. I was dying laughing. I told her to practically never use the word. Maybe it's juvenile, but I giggled to myself about that one for a while. Anyway, now that I sound like a middle schooler laughing about saying private words, I'm signing off. Thanks for your prayers regarding the retreat! God bless!

Back for round 2

So I am back in Costa Rica for year 2 of my teaching career :). I am excited to be back after a long trip in the U.S. It was so great to be there and see so many people. It was really refreshing and the perfect amount of time because I actually felt ready to return and get back to a schedule. I was also able to take Hannah up to college with my parents while I was there which was so fun. She is going to Cedarville like I did, so while dropping her off I was able to see a lot of old friends and mentors. She seems to have a good set-up there and is already having fun. I'm a little worried about my parents considering they are empy-nesters now. lol those of you in Cincinnati need to take care of them. Who am I kidding, I'm pretty sure they are going to be throwing a party here soon :). My trip back was eventful but worked out well. There were a lot of delays and I nearly missed my flight to CR, but thanks to the prayers I somehow made it. God also brought along a friend along the way. He was from Spain, so I was able to get my brain back in Spanish mode before I went to see my CR family. So thanks for the prayers and the encouragement from all of you. All is well here and I'm excited to pick up one of the new teachers tonight, Courtney. Then, this weekend, I will be attending a ladies' retreat with my church. Should be interesting considering I only know one girl right now going and I'm going to have to be in Spanish mode all three days. lol so I'm here sending out that prayer request for some diving intervention and supernatural acquisition of Spanish for this weekend (and forever really). We'll see how it goes...I'm sure there will be good stories to show. Stay tuned :)

Summer in the U.S.

My three weeks in the states is over half way over and it has been great so far. I was able to go down to the Outer Banks to visit one of my best friends who is 8 months pregnant with her first child. My family, grandparents, aunt, uncles and cousins were able to go with us...so it was a lot of fun. It was great to be at the beach (and hear people speaking English) and eat good food. Highlights of the trip: seeing Britt's huge stomach, sleeping in the moldy "dungeon" of the big house we all stayed in, relaxing at the beach, watching uncle Rick flip his cayak in the ocean, and hearing everyone in my semi-dysfunctional family ;) state their opinions to everything on earth.