148 Spanish Verbs

I am so excited!!!  Cohen and I just counted up how many verbs I have been working on over the break and came up to a grand number of 148!!!  I can hardly believe it :-)  I have to give most of the credit to the Lord for giving me the ability to retain all these new words and I also have to thank Cohen for quizzing me over these past two weeks.  I couldn't have done it without help, that's for sure!

 

148 down and many more to go, but hey, that's a good start!  Please continue to pray for us as we start back to school this coming Tuesday, September 2nd.  We have heard that this next trimester is going to be harder. 

 

We love all of you and we thank you so much for your prayers and love.  God bless all of you and happy labor day!!!

 

Sweet Pics and Baby Kisses

This blog is mostly just sweet pictures, but also I wanted to share something cute with you that happened yesterday when I was playing in the tent with the kids . . .

 

Levi has discovered how to kiss and lately he has been doing it quite a lot.  It is so cute; he puckers up his little lips a bit and comes at you with a "mmmmm" sound.  Adorable!  Well I was piled up in the tent with all three little ones and we were having a good time and then Levi started wanting to give everyone kisses.  Kisses all around for everyone.  It was a sweet moment and Samuel and Iva even joined in.  It was Iva's turn and Levi leaned in with open mouth and Iva said, "not tongue!"  It was hilarious!  She knew how it was supposed to be done, and open mouth was not it :-)

 

There is never a dull moment in the Ezelle home :-)

 

"Wissen! Wissen!"

We have been potty training Iva for about a week now and she has really been doing great! Today she stayed dry all day!!! She still isn't telling us when she needs to go, but every time we take her she goes and she gets excited about it. She is learning what all this is about and that she gets a treat when she succeeds :-) A little motivation never hurts anyone!

One thing that she has been saying lately is just adorable! To try to get her to focus on her task, I have been getting real quiet when I sit her on the potty and I say, "listen, Iva, listen". Trying to get her to listen for the tee tee in the potty. Now every time she sits down, she gets real quiet, puts her hand on her cheek and says, "Wissen, Wissen". I love it! She is so adorable! I love you Little Miss Iva Dough Bug :-) I am so proud of you!

Getting Independant

Our little baby is growing up so fast; he's not a baby anymore :-(  He is almost 16 months and such a joy.  He has been taking the spoon out of my hand lately trying to feed himself so I let him at it :-)  You can tell he just feels so big when he gets to do it.  Way to go Levi; you did a great job!!  We can see it all over your face :-)

Park Time

The kids having a little fun at the park across the street from our house.

Good Times!

What joy the Lord has given us through our children!  We laugh on a daily basis!  Thank you Father for Your many blessings!!

For Jenny

Thank you Jenny for the hand-me-down Batman flops :-)  I use to always think that Elijah was always so cute in them and now I get to think the same thing about Levi.  There is something about chubby little baby feet in teeny tiny shoes!  We miss and love you guys!  You are a blessing!

Camera Fun

Samuel, Iva and I had a little fun with the camera one night before bed.  I love these guys!

Old Fashioned Bath

Our new way of bathing the children!  Hey, they love it and it is easier on us; why didn't we think of this 4 months ago :-)  Aren't they cute!!!

Saying Goodbye to Our Friends

I haven't done a great job of taking pics of our friends and our kids friends since we have been here at language school, but I do have a few that I can share with you.  These pics are of just a few of some of the kids classmates who left at the end of this tri.  Making friends here has been great but it is sad to say goodbye after only 4 months.  It is also exciting to know that the families of these little ones are going to where the Lord wants them to serve.  It is bitter sweet being here at language school, but that is part of being in the body of Christ and praise the Lord for it because He gets all the glory!! 

 

Aren't these little faces adorable!!!

Last Day of My 1st Trimester

Well, this past Wednesday was my last day of my 1st trimester in Spanish language school.  It is going to be nice to have a two week break, but I am glad that we still have 2 more trimesters to go before we are done because I still have a long way to go before I can even clearly speak to someone in Spanish.

 

Next trimester is going to be really tough in a lot of ways, but with the Lord's help Cohen and I will make it through successfully and give all the glory to the Lord who held us up all along the way.  Not only will the language learning get more difficult next tri, but Cohen and I are going to have more responsibilities next tri as well; we are both going to be on the student council.  Cohen is going to be the 2nd Trimester Rep and I am going to be the Kinder Rep.  Wow!  I believe the next tri will be challenging and stretching a bit, especially for me, but I also believe that it will be a blessing and a time of growth for us both.  We can do all things through Christ who strengthens us!  Now, if only I can remind myself of that when it gets hard :-)

The Poas Volcano and The Doka Coffee Estate

Yesterday, we visited two very neat places; the Poas Volcano and the Doka Coffee Estate/Plantation. Our trip started at about 6:30 a.m. as we headed toward the Poas Volcano along with several other language school students and some very special guests as well, Cohen's Dad and Mom :-)

We stopped for breakfast at a very beautiful place called Fredo Fresas and it was oh so good! We had a traditional Tico (Costa Rican) breakfast of Gallo Pinto (rice and beans), scrambled eggs, cooked banana, a slice of Costa Rican cheese and a slice of bread. Of course we had coffee and also we had some sort of strawberry drink (hence the name of the restaurant "Fredo Fresas" a fresa is a strawberry). The food was delicious and that strawberry drink was soooooooo good! I could have stayed there and drank a couple more before we left, but didn't have time :-( Levi loved it too! Here is a pic of him slurping down a whole glass full. This was his first time to successfully use a straw; way to go big boy!!

We got to see a couple of craters at the volcano. Wow, God is so big!! We got to see some really beautiful and amazing things that God created. Thank you Father for allowing us a little glimpse of your power and beauty. The pics probably don't do it much justice, but wow, it was beautiful. The weather was nice and chilly and we were up in the clouds. What an experience! You could even smell the sulfur coming from the crater.

Here are some more snapshots taken around the volcano.



The coffee plantation was pretty neat too. The only down fall was that it started raining just after we arrived there, but that didn't hinder us too much. Before we started our tour, we were able to eat our lunch there. We had more traditional Costa Rican food, but don't ask me to name them all because I'm really not sure, but it sure was "delicioso"! Here is a pic of my spread.

Here are some more pics from our tour. We actually didn't get to see as much as we would have liked to because of the rain, but we still got to see quite a bit.

Parque La Paz

Last Saturday we went with some good friends of ours, Steve and Diane, to Parque La Paz for a picnic and some fun times. It was a beautiful day and we all had a great time. You can tell from the pics and the videos that we enjoyed ourselves.

Check out that view!

Here Diane was paying to be able to use the restroom and have some toilet paper :-) It was 150 Colones (about 30 cents U.S.) That's different, huh? At least the restroom was nice and clean.


Here is a little video of Samuel and I sliding down the big hill at the park. I was convinced that I was going to have bruses the next day :-)



We did OK, but this is how it is supposed to be done. This was just a random local family that obviously knew what they were doing :-)



Here are some more pics from our day at the park.

Gauanacaste

On July 25, the people of Costa Rica celebrated the Annexation of the District of Nicoya, or the "Annexation of Gauanacaste." Unfortunately I don't know a lot of the history behind this day, but some teachers and a few students at the language school put together a traditional dance and shared it with us. Here are a few videos for you to enjoy :-)

Check Us Out!

How cute are we! (Of course Mommy just had to take a picture!)

Break-time/Potty-time

We are going to (Lord willing) finish our 1st trimester of language school in about 2 weeks and we will then have about a 2 week break :-) Yea!!! We are so looking forward to a break, but wait . . . we actually have a big mission ahead of us during the break, POTTY TRAINING little Miss Iva!

Iva is about 2 1/2 and "we" think she is ready, but I guess we will just have to wait and see. It is near impossible to work on potty training while we are in school everyday so we thought the break would be a good time to have a little potty training bootcamp so to speak :-)

We recently purchased a used potty chair from another family here and the first night I pulled it out and cleaned it up Iva (and Samuel) were both so interested that they just had to check it out right away :-)

Right there in the kitchen Iva "sat" on her new potty chair for the very first time. Samuel was so thrilled about it too that he said, "Mommy, take a picture of both of us!" So of course I took him up on his offer :-)

A little later, Samuel actually had some business that he needed to take care of and of course Iva had to see if she could do some business too. She basically just got some practice sitting, but they were just too cute not to snap a little picture of both of them on their potties. (This should be a fun picture to pull out when they are older and have little ones of their own!)