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| Samara Beach was a beautiful cove surrounded by coral reef. |
Donovan and I attended classes during the day, one in the
morning and one in the afternoon. We stayed in a homestay home with our Mama
Tica Dona Jenny.
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| Felicity & Dona Jenny hangin' out in the hammock. |
She prepared breakfast and dinner for our family each day,
helped clean the house, and wash the clothes daily. This was a huge help for us
to be able to have the time to attend classes, do homework and study.
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| Intercultura: Our language school |
We both placed in the same level and felt that we progressed well over the course of 3 weeks. The school was literally on the beach allowing us the opportunity to visit the beach daily.
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| The campus was right on the beach. |
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| A view from the campus. |
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| Ready for the beach! |
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| Agua dulce (sweet water = fresh water) from the river runs into the ocean. |
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| Low tide was the perfect time to check out the tide pools. |
We all had a blast surfing, boogie boarding, swimming, walking on the beach
and building sand castles.
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| Catherine and Grace practicing for the real thing. |
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| The girls were so good at surfing! |
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| Donovan taking a surf lesson. |
I decided to take some individual shots since we don't do school pictures. They are all getting so big. Looking at all these pictures reminds me how much God has blessed us with our children.
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| Hannah - 12 |
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| Catherine - 10 |
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| Grace - 7 |
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| Felicity - 5 |
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| Gabriel - 12 months (in October) |
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| The girls being creative with a deck of cards. It's amazing what their imagination does when they have no tv to hold them back. |
We returned to Coopevega with a much larger vocabulary and the ability to speak and understand more Spanish. After language school I was able to hear different accents that I hadn’t even noticed before. We are continuing to practice with each other and our friends and community. We are thankful to be able to better communicate with the people God has sent us to serve. We still have much practice to do but we are encouraged as we press forward in this journey towards becoming bi-lingual!
The day after returning home Donovan was exhausted. We thought it was just the packing, travelling and all the learning and studying. But the next day on my birthday he started to have body aches. After another day he developed a fever and a rash. At that point we researched on the internet and “self-diagnosed” Dengue Fever. Dengue is transmitted by an infected mosquito. We went to the clinic here in town and were told to travel an hour away to Santa Rosa for a blood test. Even though there is a blood test available in the U.S. for Dengue it was not available here. Instead the doctor did a blood panel and looked at things like hemoglobin, white blood cells and platelet count. He confirmed that it was Dengue and told us we would need to return each day for 3 days for the same test. They wanted to make sure his platelet count was getting higher and not going down. For a small % of people Dengue can turn into Dengue hemorrhagic fever which turns dangerous quickly. Since Donovan was feeling very sick and the drive home was an hour away on a very bumpy road we decided to stay at a motel near the clinic and let Donovan rest. His pain, fever and rash went away and he had good readings on his blood tests. We returned home the day before Donovan’s birthday and he continued to rest. It has now been almost a month since he first came down with Dengue and he seems to be back to normal. Praise the Lord!
This experience is yet another reminder to us that we trust all things to the Lord. We are not in control. As missionaries we give everything to God and trust that He knows what we need. To trust in the Lord is a daily habit that we must practice. We are on a lifelong journey of surrender and trust. I am often reminded here in Costa Rica of the prayer of St. Teresa of Avila:
Let nothing disturb you,
Let nothing frighten you,
All things are passing away:
God never changes.
Patience obtains all things
Whoever has God lacks nothing;
God alone suffices.
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