Pura Vida!

Let me rush through the last couple of months.

First, the baby was born a few days after my birthday post. Details are on Sara's blog.

Second, I did receive my 3/3 in Spanish in March.

Third, we moved to Costa Rica (that brings us up to last week).

Everything went smoothly with the move. We even got to spend about a week in Texas visiting with friends on our way south. It was fun to see everyone we've been missing, and be at our church.

We've been in country for a few days now. It really is beautiful. There are mountains in virtually every direction, and we some great views from near our house. Also, I love waking up every morning to a tropical breeze and palm trees outside the window. That, however, will probably stop when we get our air conditioner in the bedroom. It is quite humid here, if not very hot.

We are at the beginning of the rainy season, so it has rained every day we've been here for between 2-5 hours. The sun always shines in the morning, and the rain always comes in the afternoon. Speaking of the sun, it rises at 5:00. We've been adjusting our schedule to go to bed and get up earlier because of this.

Being here without a car is difficult; we don't have any other embassy families within walking distance and feel bad relying so much on our sponsors for rides. No estimate on when our wheels will arrive, but our initial shipment of stuff (UAB) is already here. Fortunately I can use motor pool to get to and from work for a while.

Our house is nice (if a little overwhelming). Malachi says his favorite part of the house is the yard, but I think he likes all of it. He's never had so much space to run.

On Sunday we took a walk into the nearby downtown area. Not a lot was open on Sunday morning, but once we got to the central plaza (where the Catholic church is located), it was pretty busy. After we got passed by horses and ox carts, Malachi remarked, "Costa Rica is very different." We were all sweaty (and a little sunburned) when we got back, so Malachi enjoyed playing in the sprinkler for a while. In the afternoon our sponsor took me shopping.

Overall, the city is quite small. Driving isn’t nearly as bad as many have made it out to be. Of course at this point I’ve only been riding… The embassy is very close to stores like Hiper Mas (Walmart..no, really), a Home Depot clone, malls, restaurants, etc. There's even a brand new IMAX theater here--hopefully we can go see Iron Man there.

Once we have internet at home (coming soon) we can start to post some pictures of our life here.