Whirlwind of a life

Pura vida? Well you can go ahead and just toss that phrase! Our "pure life," laid back life is catching up with us. Someone put it in a pan with shallow water and steamed it, vaporized it away. This is the first time I've had internet access in a week. Not that I mind, but I'm sure you eventually get tired of checking my blog every so often just to find that the poison frog is still at the top of the page. Anyways, a speed typed version of what's been going on: We got back from North Carolina and the mother of my Honduran family, Tessa Hidalgo de Garcia came to visit us along with a cousin of hers that lives in the northern part of this country. She came for the graduation of her oldest son, Rogelio, who just finished grad school in the capital and decided to skip down our way for a couple of days to marvel at our life and surroundings. Unfortunately for them, it rained the whole time. Actually, it poured most of their time here but we still had a great time cooking Honduran food every day, talking, and laughing about past adventures we experienced together, and simply enjoying each other's company. We rented a car (thank goodness because the truck has been complaining lately) and drove back to the capital together for Rogelio's graduation and to pick up Jason's parents and his sister Jill from the airport. This was Jason's and my first time navigating around the capital and let me tell you, it's scary to say the least. Jason realized that in order to keep your car intact you might as well break all of the traffic rules and join the rest of the driving maniacs. It worked and we were fine, though Mrs. Ann, his mom, had saucer eyes during most of the driving. We packed up and brought them all down to our little town and had a blast of a time. We started off by going on a horse back tour through the jungle and on the beach. Why we would start the week on a horse and bruise our rumps for the rest of the week, I don't know but we did and it was incredibly fun. We saw a group of black howler monkeys up in the jungle trees and a few of their babies were swinging around. We also saw some white faced monkeys, a first for me in the wild. When we got to the beach I coaxed my horse into galloping. It took him a while and he trotted for most of it (which if you've ever been on a trotting horse before you would know how um, let's say, unpleasant that part is) but when he finally felt free he galloped beautifully and it's one of the coolest feelings I've ever felt. It was AMAAAZING! It felt like I was riding on air. Agh! I wish you could experience it too! We beach bummed a lot, ate out a lot, laughed a lot, slept a little and just had an out right good ole' time. Another first for Jason and me was that we went on a zipline tour. Talk about scary at first but once I got strapped on the zip contraption and knew I was going to fly tons of feet above the jungle I was ok. Ha! I really thought I would be scared but it wasn't so. We visited a couple of waterfalls too. At one of them I climbed some slippery rocks and jumped into the pool of water surrounding the fall. Stupid me disregarded that the recent downpours of rain we've had lately made the falls incredibly powerful and once I hit the water the current started dragging me back and down toward the break of the fall. I'll admit I panicked a little, alright a lot and swam like a mad woman but Mr. Randy, who had also been dragged down coached me back to the rocks. Whew! Ahahaha. The cold water felt soooo good and cooled us off for a while. One other adventure of note was a river or swamp or whatever it was tour we took called "Sierpe" meaning "serpent." The guide was smart and told us what everything was and offered cool information concerning everything we saw. You could basically point at anything or creature and he could tell you what it was. I believed him too. He wasn't one of those who would make something up. The neatest thing we saw by FAR was some Scarlet Macaws that flew right over us and landed in some trees to squabble at each other. Apparently they are monogamous and stick with their partners for life. The female seemed to be ticked off at her man and kept screeching at him. He flew away long enough to make her miss him but once he came back they made up and posed for us. This picture was taken through a telescope. I've seen captured Macaws before but never wild ones so it was well worth the tour. Spending time with all of these loved ones was a blessing indeed. The Lord has seen fit to allow these events to take place in our lives and for that we are grateful. Thank you Father for bringing us so much joy! Jill left Thursday and Mr. Randy and Mrs. Ann took off today so we are slowly returning to what we consider normalcy. It's a bittersweet emotion. It's nice to get back to doing what we do but it's sad to part from those we love so much. Oh well. I guess it's one of those things we'll never understand. I'm going to let this post sit for a few days and give you all a chance to catch up a bit but I will be posting soon again. I have more pictures than I know what to do with! I hope some of you will write us in return and let us know how YOU are doing and update us on your goings about, the turns of your heart and the thoughts in your mind. I would dearly love to know. Be blessed and refreshed in God's presence today. Toodles!