Normal Life

Well, I suppose it's time for another update again. Time sure does fly fast!

Just a couple days after my last post, I went to the post office to pick up my ID card.

Here it is!
They didn't have mirrors in the room where I got my picture taken, and that wasn't the most prominent thought in my mind....
:)


Elizabeth, the girl who got baptized (see last post), left to live with her new parents last Friday. I'm so happy for her!

It's been a pretty uneventful couple of weeks... We had a potluck for our pastoral group which was a lot of fun. Mexican food, yum! I got to watch the kids a few different times.

I guess a great theme for the past couple weeks has been a lot of great fellowship with people. I've been able to get to know people more just through spending time with them and chatting at snack table or while drinking coffee and having dessert or eating dinner . Yes, food provides such a great opportunity to talk with people. It's great conversation facilitator!

In other news (as if what I've already said hasn't been random enough)... Do you remember that brochure I was working on a while back? Yes, I know, how much slower could I go. Well, I've been learning Adobe Illustrator for a few weeks, and I finally got a design done in that program. I had been working in Microsoft Publisher before, and I've been learning just how limited that program is. I love Illustrator! Anyways, on Tuesday I presented the new design to Steve, the director of the children's homes, and he said, "I like it!" That is major progress, People! Yay! The main design is finished, and now we'll be working on choosing and editing photos and tweaking the design here and there. You have no idea how good it feels to have such a huge obstacle out of the way! Finishing touches trump main design any day.

It could be totally ready to print in the next couple weeks... if it weren't for the fact that my next two weeks will be filled by helping with two short-term teams that are coming down. So the goal is to be done by Thanksgiving. This has been the equivalent of a semester-long term project, and I'm ready to be done with it. :) The learning curve has been steep, but I have learned A LOT! And the learning isn't done yet. Now if only I can get Steve to pick out those photos.... hmmm...
No, in all reality, he will have to sift through hundreds and hundreds of photos, and with an already full schedule it may take awhile. We'll see...

So, what comes after the brochure, you ask? Great question! Well, I'm always available for babysitting! I seem to be getting pretty skilled at it. :D I do have a few other projects on my list that I'm excited to start. I've also decided to help out at the Children's Homes on Saturdays. My weekends are generally pretty empty, and they can always use extra hands with twenty kids running around. Actually, there are only seventeen right now, but I'm sure those extra spots will be filled up quickly. I'll continue helping with teams at times, but the last two for this year are during the first half of November.

Another project that I hope will be ongoing is going to be a challenge. It will take all the will power I have to do it every week. Ha! What a joke! I'll be baking cookies with the kids every week! The only willpower that will take is the willpower to not eat all the cookie dough before the cookies make it into the oven. mmmmm... yummy...

Making cookies, you say? Why is that so important, and how is that considered work? For these kids, it's all about making memories. And who doesn't remember baking cookies with Mom? Besides that, it's not only a way for them to learn the rudiments of baking, practice there math, and work on fine motor skills, but it's also a way to let them know they're special. I plan on taking just one or two kids at a time to help bake, and that way they get some one-on-one time, something that is hard to come by when the house parents are taking care of twenty kids plus their own kids.

Well, I think that'll do it for this update. I'll just wrap it up with a few
Prayer Requests

-Please pray that there will be no unforeseen glitches in getting the brochure finished and off to production

-With two teams back-to-back, please pray for endurance and strength not only for me, but also for Jonathan (the team coordinator) and for the teams themselves. Those 7-10 days that each team is here can get pretty long.


Thank you for all your support and prayers! I have been so blessed!

Good titles are too hard to think of...

Greetings once again from Costa Rica,

What a packed two weeks it's been! It's hard to believe October is almost halfway over. Where does the time go?

In the last two weeks, I've gotten to experience a typical Costa Rican birthday party, a trip to the beach, a visit with my host family from my last trip here two years ago, a view of immigration from the inside, and a baptism! Birthday parties here are all-out, no holds barred. The one that I went to was for a two year-old, but they thought of everything! And you would think a party for such a young kid would only be a couple hours so he could take a nap, but No Way! This party lasted at least five hours and there were more adults than children in attendance. They served lunch, ice cream, cake, and coffee. And for the kids, there were games, masks, a puppet show, party favors, and of course a piñata because what party is complete without one! The adults enjoyed it as much as, and sometimes more than, the kids. :)

My trip to immigration last Tuesday was both stressful and a relief. There are so many lines for different things and sooo many people! I got there early, and luckily the friend that I brought with me knew which line to stand in. Even so, they wouldn't let us in because I didn't have a voucher for my appointment time, and my name wasn't on the list. Soooo, we went to another area to stand in another line but decided to make a phone call to the lawyer who had been helping me with my application. She sent us to the first line where we told the guy in charge the exact same thing we said the first time, and he finally let us in. Unfortunately I had already missed my appointment time, but the guy who let us in went in the back and talked to someone who let me go back and get my picture taken.... which was the entire reason for the 45 min cab ride there, the confusion, the line switching, the phone call, the waiting, and running the risk of possibly having to do it all over another day because I missed my appointment time... But thankfully we left just 1 hour and 15 minutes from the time we entered. And I get to pick up my cedula later this week. Yay!

There have been a lot of adoptions going on around here lately. Two little girls are now in a hotel with their new Italian parents awaiting their court date to finalize the adoption. One young boy is waiting for his Spanish parents to come get him. One young girl's case is being submitted for possible international adoption (this is a very special case, as she has a very slim chance of adoption because she is turning 10 in November). And the girl I have been helping in her baptism class is leaving us very soon (probably this week!) to go with her new parents who live in Costa Rica. She just got baptized this morning because she will not be around long enough to finish the pre-baptism course, and it's unlikely that her new parents will be bringing her to church.

This past week was a very special week, not because Costa Rica is going to the final qualifier for the World Cup--although that's cool too--but because we had a fantastic team from Kentucky come down. After being here three months, I got a taste of what the long-termers feel when they say that the volunteers who come down are such a blessing. I was truly blessed by this team. Was it their heart for prayer? Their willingness to mingle with the Costa Rican workers during lunch despite the language barrier? Their fun attitude? Their desire to see people passionate for and blessed by God? hmmm... It was some of all of that. They were a breath of fresh air, a burst of excitement in the normal daily routine, a taste of home (even though they were from Kentucky), and a spiritual encouragement.

How blessed I am!

"Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen." Ephesians 3:20-21

Oh! And I can't believe I forgot to mention this: For the past few years, adoptions from Costa Rica to the US had been barred because of US refusal to certain requirements in something called the Hague Convention. I'm happy to report that not only have adoptions re-opened, but four agencies in the US have been approved to handle adoptions out of Costa Rica! Praise God that more children, typically older or special needs, will have a chance to find a real family.

Prayer Requests

-Please pray for the girl, J, who will become extremely hard to place very soon. She is also in need of a very special family who is up to the challenge of her difficult past and independent personality. She needs a lot of love and stability to break through her walls.

-Please also pray for the other adoptions in progress and that God would use these kids to be His witnesses in their new families and new countries.

-Pray for continued humility before God as He teaches and molds me and that He would continue to reveal His purpose for my being here

baptism of a loving and wonderful girl who is getting a new family very soon

this is the girl I babysit once in a while (it wasn't her b-day, but she was there)