Who turned the Lights Out???? (who, who)

We frequently have the power go out here and it is truly amazing to me how well the girls do with it (now). The evening power outages were a little rough at first but we have worked through a lot of that. For some strange reason kids don't like the dark...hhmmmm? Now it is as though we don't even skip a beat. I have matches in a place where I can easily find in the dark right by some candles. After lighting a couple I go find the girls very own flashlights, NOW it is fun for them.

Anyone who knows me knows I love candles. Here we have candles in every room, but here they are not just for decoration. In the states, candles are for decoration and for fragrance, however, here they are all of those things but also a necessity. Whoohoooo!

The lady that lived in our house before we moved in left a lot of candles and candle holders. She did something that I thought was a great idea that I will pass along. Have you had candles that decoratively were great but you knew as soon as you burned them they would spill wax over everything? Well here's an idea that can even preserve the shape of the pretty candle and save the furniture from being covered in wax. She took square or round decorative candles and burned them enough to melt a hole big enough for a tea light candle to fit inside. So she would just replace the tea lights everytime instead of burning down these beautiful decorative candles. Great idea huh?

Avigail's Teeth

I would say the loss of this set of teeth was not as monumental as the first ones, but it still is very exciting. Avigail nursed the loss of the first one and then I won the award for best mom of the month with the other tooth. A couple days after Avigail took out her tooth, we were playing and my shoulder hit her mouth and out popped her tooth. And I mean popped out! You can see the video of the loss of the first one below. She is getting so big!

Holding Tight to God's Hand

Lately I have been fascinated by how Ella holds my hand when we are walking. I mean she really holds it! When we are walking on the street, or walking somewhere she is obviously not very comfortable, or sometimes just in our house she will actually take her other and push my hand harder around hers. And sometimes say, "tighter mommy". If I have a itch on my nose and my other hand is not available I try to release my hand from the clutches of this cute little girl, but she won't let go, she holds tighter. I have to explain, "sweety, I have an itch, I need to let go for just a second." Only then will she let go.

If only I would hold God's hand this tight! One thing that I have noticed while holding either my girls hands, I am able to guide them quite easily as long as they are listening (with my tugs, or squeezes). They have gotten really good at following commands through hand squeezes. Another thing I am able to do, is detect when they are falling and pull my arm up to keep them from falling completely. I'm sure all parents are familar with that action. Those are all good reasons for me to hold tight to God's hand...

See God in Everything

I was reading an entry from Streams in the Desert and in my current struggles came across something that I obviously needed.

"See God in everything and God will calm and color all that thou dost see! It may be that the circumstances of our sorrows will not be removed, their condition will remain unchanged; but if Christ, as Lord and Master of our life, is brought into our grief and gloom, He will compass us about with songs of deliverance. To see Him, and to be sure that His wisdom cannot err, His power cannot fail, His love can never change; to know that even His direst dealings with us are for our deepest spiritual gain, is to be able to say, in the midst of bereavement, sorrow, pain and loss, 'The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.'"

I have been really having a hard time with my friends being gone. And really missing the fellowship that school brought in our lives. But, I was reminded when I read this that God IS in everything; I just need to look for Him.
Job 1:21 ... the LORD gave, and the LORD hath taken away; (and most importantly, STILL) blessed be the name of the LORD.

My Family

What a gift to have such a picture! I don't remember a time when I have had a picture with my siblings and mom.

We visited my family in Colorado this August. And were able to have family pictures taken. I feel so blessed to have such an awesome family.

Spoons anyone????

We just started our first week of school in our last trimester of language school. We never know who we will get for a teacher and for obvious reasons we (or I) worry about getting one verses the other. When I found out who I had for teachers I was very excited. My language teacher is named Alejandra and my grammar teacher is named Jonesi. Well my first day in Language was very interesting. The teacher introduced herself and told us a little about herself. And then said okay let's go outside, so we follow her to the kitchen where she got four spoons and a glass of water. She said okay we are going to play a game. She handed each of us a spoon and she put water in the spoon and told us to put the back end of the spoon in our mouth. Then we were to walk down the sidewalk trying not to spill the water.... I was first and was so impressed with myself and how I didn't spill one drop and how balanced and athletic I am...But in the back of my mind I was thinking what in the world does this have to do with learning spanish? I would quickly find out that it had everything to do with learning spanish or at least the experience or process of learning Spanish. And there was no room for my being soooo proud of myself.

We all went back to the classroom and she asked what we thought of the activity. She asked if we thought it was a race or competition. There were varying responses from everyone. Then she asked while you were walking, did you notice the little bird that was hopping around on the ground? Did you notice the color of the flowers on the path? Do you remember who was in front or behind you? Oh my goodness! No, no, no and no! Shame on me! She went on to say this is how most students look at their year here in this school, only noticing what is in their spoon. Giving no thought whatsoever to what is happening around them.

I have been so guilty of being so focused on my spanish and learning that I haven't taken time to enjoy all the things that are in my path, while they are in my path. I have been so humbled by this exercise. I was immediately impressed with the teacher and her approach to teaching. It was a great lesson for me to not be overly focused on what is in front of me, missing all the other things that are there.

Coincidence??

One of my favorite things about our house is our little garden in the back of our house. It is really tiny but just perfect for us. We have a fountain, wind chime and a hummingbird feeder. I love sitting and listening to the water trickling in the fountain, and when there is a breeze listening to the wind chime and watching the hummingbird's eat from the feeder.

We have learned that hummingbird's are very territorial. So most likely the bird or birds we have in our yard are the same one's day after day. One morning I was reading my Bible by the window that looks outside into the garden and I saw a hummingbird hovering around the feeder, but there wasn't any food (which I will explain why later). Whether planned or not, I don't know...the hummingbird flew to the edge of the window and landed. With it's long beak taps on the window. I have no idea if this little guy was trying to tell me something...but I got up and filled the feeder.

Our feeder drains rather quickly lately because we have had bats discover the sweet nectar. That's right bats!!!! If I leave the feeder out over night it will be drained by morning. One night we were sitting in the living room and there must have been 5 or 6 bats flying in our backyard. Yikes!!!! I have to remember to bring in the feeder before the sun goes down or I have to reach outside when they could be possibly flying around. Oh wow...that is truly enough motivation to get before the sun goes down.

Great Visit

We had the blessing of having our first visitor. My mom came for a visit for 2 weeks that turned into almost 3. She had plans of returning this past Sunday, but unfortunately she had problems with her back that would not allow for returning to the States. Praise the Lord we have a good Chiropractor that was able to help her, and my mom was able to return the following Wednesday.

We had a wonderful time with my mom. The girls loved having her here and were sad to see her go.

Sweet little one

Sweet little one that isn't so little anymore. Ella is changing so much. She has a wonderful personality, and is really funny. But, whenever she does something funny and I laugh she will say "mom, I"m not funny". It's hard for her to understand that I'm not laughing at her in a negative way. I haven't figured out how to encourage her sense of humor, without her feeling like I'm laughing at her. I hope that makes sense.

Explosion

Avigail has lately had a Spanish explosion. She has amazed us with her spanish lately. She was praying the other day and I was blown away by how well she was speaking. After she finished praying I was almost tempted to ask how she used some of words in her prayer. These are the same things I am trying to learn how to use in a sentence. Notice the key words, "trying". I haven't wrapped my brain around how to plug these things in yet. Notice also the key word "yet". I am confident it will come, but not quite yet. Kids obviously are sponges.

Sweet friends

This is a sweet little friend of Ella. Her name is Audrey McClain. We blessed that the McClain family will actually stay in Costa Rica as missionaries. So we won't have to say good-bye just yet.

Surprise Birthday Party

We pulled off a surprise Birthday party for the girls in February. They were truly surprised. We had a great time with friends. We had a princess piñata, of course! It always surprises me that little girls who play "princess" all the time, have no problem smacking the face of a beautiful image of a princess in hopes of the getting the candy. The girls really seemed to enjoy their party.

School in Progress

I wanted to update you on my classes and answered prayer. As you have probably read I have 2 hours of Grammar and 2 hours of Language this trimester. Last trimester in my grammar class I had a Great teacher, but one thing that was really hard for me was the amount of homework I was given. The practice is always really good, but it was really hard to finish all the homework and still maintain home life. However this trimester praise the Lord I have much less homework. And as a result I am able to spend more quality time with the girls in the afternoons.

Another praise is that I am understanding things much more quickly and easily this trimester. I know the only way to explain this is people are praying and God is answering. Thank you for those of you have prayed. The difference of this trimester from last not only benefits me, it benefits Ryan and the girls and most importantly my relationship with the Lord. Thank you again for praying.

David and Golaith

Avigail, Ella and I were talking about the David and Golaith and like most kids they are very familiar with theVeggieTales version. I said, "now you do know that Golaith was not really a Pickle, and Avigail intelligiently said, "of course I know that"....pause, pause. During this pause, I am thinking phew we have not influenced our children into thinking Golaith was a giant pickle. When all of a sudden Avigail says, "he was a cucumber." My side still hurts from laughing so hard.

Classes

I want to update all of you of my classes, but there is so much to try to communicate. Like a typical woman, I could easily jump all over the place to tell the story, so I will try my best to be clear (in case there is a man reading this…)

I approached this trimester with a lot of fear. I liken this trimester to childbirth the second time. Now hold on, I’ll explain more. With Avigail’s birth, I was really excited but really had no idea what to expect. With Ella, I knew it was going to be hard and how much pain there would be. The first trimester of language school, I really didn’t know what to expect and I was excited. And the second trimester, I know how hard it was so I’m bracing myself. The blessing that childbirth brought was incredible, one trimester of language school has brought incredible blessing as well. It is pain with great purpose, just like childbirth!

The first couple of days were not very good. It was obvious that I hadn’t practiced during the break as much as I needed to. I really felt that I was in the wrong class, because it seemed I wasn’t at the same place in understanding as other students. So I prayed that God would make it clear what I should do. I wanted to be in the right class to learn the best. I talked with the director and she said that she wasn’t going to move me, because of how well I had done last trimester. She told me to wait a week or two and if it was still the same then we would talk about it. But she said she would be surprised if I didn’t start doing well. What??? Oh yeah that’s right, I prayed that God would make it clear where He wanted me. He made it clear.

Praise God things are clicking much more now. Someone is praying!!!!!!!!!!! Thank you. The other blessing is that I don’t have as much homework as last trimester. Last trimester I had up to ten pages a night. Now….I have 2!!!! That is much less overwhelming.

Prayer for Next Trimester

At times through this last trimester I was definitely "entangled with the affairs of (learning of Spanish) this life". It was difficult to balance my roles *Child of God, *Wife, *Mom, and * Learner. These are my priorities, but they have at times shifted in importance.

It's a terrible and yet a good thing to want to do well at being a "learner" We are told all our lives that we need to get good grades, unfornately that voice still speaks very loudly. I have done well in my classes as far as grades are concerned, but truly I have caught the coat tails of the other students. I don't learn quickly, but I eventually get it, it just takes a lot more time for me. I pray quite often for my learning to come quicker, but I have a strong feeling God wants to teach me through it. Ryan reminded me that God was the one who gave me my learning style, and so with that being said I need to learn to be grateful for what God has given.

My specific prayer requests:

~ I desperately wish to have a balance with my roles as a Child of the King, Wife, Mom and Learner
~ That I would not be "entangled" with the pressure and load of all the roles.

Thank you for your willingness to pray.

Hi, My Name is Keeley

Wow, it's been so long since I've written I thought I would reintroduce myself. So sorry it has been so long. Really I think I just came up for air in the last 2 days. Hold on to your hats and I'll share what has been going on the last 4 weeks or so...

It seemed like in my Grammar class our teacher was on the fast track and so I had a great deal of homework and had no time for anything but family and homework. Then....

December 7th -14th, I had 5 tests (in one week) I don't even think I had that many in one week in college.
December 14th, we moved to another house.
December 15th, - we helped our neighbors move to La Cruz, Costa Rica (6 hours away).
December 16th - we travelled to Nicaragua to renew our visas. (see Ryan's blog about our crazy experience)

December 22nd, I have enjoyed a relaxing day. I am getting more and more settled in our new home. And the best part about today was my new nephew being born! My sister Juli had Trey Joshua at 10:15 am. Praise the Lord!

I'm CCCCCCCCCooold!!!!!!!

What????? Can you believe it's "cold" here? I have been wearing sweaters and sleeping with blankets. Really in Kansas City or Colorado 60 degrees would be very comfortable but here...it's really chilly. I can't believe that I'm wearing sweatshirts and sweaters in Costa Rica. I'm sure glad I brought a few long sleeve shirts. I guess in a month or so it will get much warmer. The rain stops and the sun comes out all the time. I can't wait. I sure miss the sun. There's a spiritual picture in there somewhere, eh?

Learning 3 Languages

Yes, I said 3. Not only am I learning Spanish as a second language and I am learning Canadian. I have 3 people from Canada in my classes. And actually all of them are becoming really good friends of ours But I am noticing something that keeps coming out of my mouth as a result of being around them. It's a 2 letter word that can used all the time if want. It's a great word, "eh"? It's a great day, "eh"? It's a little cool, "eh"? Endless options, "eh"?

(p.s. the 3rd language is English, I have found out from my grammar in Spanish how much I am learning about English grammar. I must have missed a few days in my grammar classes in English)

To the Beach, To the Beach, To the Beach

We had a great opportunity to get away this past weekend. We went with four other couples from school to the Pacific Ocean. The resort we went to was all inclusive and had a private beach, great swimming pools for the girls. Three great meals a day with the monkeys right at our side.

We unforntunately found out the hard way how powerful the sun is here in Costa Rica. We all got burned. I forgot to put sunscreen on my lips, which is always a recipe for fever blisters. Ryan and the girls were lobsters on their bodies. So next time we will use SPF 50 and REAPPLY! Poor things!

We had a great time at the beach. But the girls had much more fun at the swimming pool. They had 2 kid pools that were just perfect for our girls. The weather was just perfect the whole time we were there.

I included the pictures of our trip. Enjoy! Click here