Too much fun (week two)

Sorry for the long posts, I'd promise not to do it again but I know better than that.  I procrastinate way too much.  We had another fun week with Jeremy before he had to leave.

Monday October 8th- we went fishing. We had booked a sport fishing trip but didn't really get that. What we got was great for the kids though so we didn't complain. They took us to a beach called playa Costa Blanca, it was a beautiful beach that I'd heard of but hadn't visited yet because you can't get there by car. We snorkeled for a while and then headed back for fishing. They had pretty ghetto fishing poles for us to use but it worked well for the kids, Carter was first to pull in a fish, Grandma followed shortly after. Then Logan pulled two in at a time!! In the end everyone was able to catch at least one fish except Camryn who did not have much luck that day, but still had a great time.

Tuesday October 9th- we stayed home this day. All the kids went to pottery class that afternoon and the adults tried to catch up on some work and sleep. That night Jeremy and I went out on a date. October is the slow season here in San Juan so the first two places we tried to go to were closed but the third one was open, we enjoyed another great meal on the beach for about 25 dollars.

Wednesday October 10th- we hit the road again and headed to Granada. Once again we took our tour guide, Irlanda. She helped us find Granada, then helped us find our hotel where we checked in. The boys favorite part of the hotel was the huge chess set that was in the courtyard. We put our stuff in our rooms and headed out to see the town. Once to the main square we found a couple horse drawn carts to take us for a tour of the town. It was definitely the best way to see the beautiful colonial architecture and hear about the city. They dropped us off at an amazing restaurant for lunch. We went back to the hotel, hit the pool then the girls went out for a little shopping. I didn't love the shopping in Granada, more tourists means higher prices and we didn't end up buying anything, but we still had a great time.

Thursday October 11th- we went on a boat tour of the islands in Lake Nicaragua. There are a total of 365 islands, some large some very little. We all decided owning an island there would be pretty amazing. Our favorite island was monkey island. We went close and threw the monkeys some bananas we had bought, one monkey named Lucy was even allowed to come on the boat and get her own bananas. She was so cute, I definitely wanted to take her home with me. After Monkey island we stopped at another island that had a local family. They lived in some huts there and fished early in the morning, taking their catch into town by 6:00 to sell to the restaurants, they also grew crops there. The family consisted of a grandma who had 18 kids and over 40 grandkids, most of them living right there with her still. They were a beautiful, hard working family. We ended the tour at a restaurant and had another great meal, after that we headed back to the hotel and picked up our car and headed home.

Friday October 12th- we spent another day at home. The kids had drawing class that afternoon and we spent some more time in the pool. We shopped for Camryn's birthday bash. I went to a lady's house to order a cake. I told her that I had a daughter that I needed a cake for her birthday. She asked her age and I said 13, she said "three?", I said "thirteen" then I told her that she liked horses, she got all excited and said "Ponies?" and I nodded. The next day when i went to pick up the cake I had Camryn with me, when she saw Camryn she got a worried look on her face and brought out a cake with a pony on it. It was more appropriate for a three year old, I quickly told her that it was great and we loved it. I think she wondered what kind of a 13 year old would like a my little pony cake but Cam was just fine with it and it tasted really good so that's the most important thing.

Saturday October 13th- the big birthday, I have a teenager :( We had a great day. That morning we woke up and opened the few presents that she had, Logan had made her a card, Grandma had brought her a gift as well as a few cards from friends and family at home.  We had decided that we wanted to give her an "adventure" for her birthday instead of stuff.  First off we went zip-lining. We invited Camryn's new friend Molly to come with us. She's an awesome girl, she's fluent in Spanish, English and Italian. We're super excited to get to know her better. The Canopy tour was awesome, we all enjoyed it, even Logan went without any hesitation and loved every minute. After the zip-lining we went to lunch and then Camryn and I went to get massages. After the massages we hurried home to get ready for the party. We had invited some of our friends including Julie and her family, Kelly and her family and Irlanda and her family. We ate, talked, broke open a pinata and then Camryn ended the night by playing volleyball with Sergio (Irlanda's son) and Shirley (Irlanda's neice). I think getting to play a little volleyball was Camryn's favorite part of the day so we have already planned to get together with them later this week for an actual game on the beach. She's already mastered the art of being a teenager, including the eye roll (she's had that one down for a while thanks to Aunt Noelle :), the dodging pictures maneuvre, the pouty face, I'm hoping since she's had these pretty well mastered she will move on to the next stage of life quickly????  actually, she's still pretty sweet, as far as teenagers go so I guess I shouldn't complain too much.

Sunday October 14th- we went to church in Rivas. It was fast and testimony meeting, and Logan wanted to bare his testimony and asked me to come with him. I was forced with a hard decision- do I bare my testimony in English or try in spanish. I decided to try in spanish, it was very short and very broken but I was able to say a few basic things and I felt good about it. In sunday school and relief society I actually understood some of the lessons given. It was the first time that I was able to follow along and understand quite a bit of the lessons, it definitely made me realize that my spanish is coming along.

This morning Jeremy left us :( It was a sad day. Logan cried quite a bit. Our lives will be more boring again, which might be ok for a while since we've fallen quite a bit behind in school and work. we have four weeks until Grandpa and Jeff and Carol come, we're starting the count down again.

I must say that Nicaragua is definitely starting to feel like home. We've met so many amazing people, both locals and expats. I'm already starting to feel like our time is not going to be enough, and yet I'm WAY excited to get home and see everyone again. We will definitely be coming back to Nicaragua, probably just for short periods of time to visit, but we will be back.

TOO much fun (week one)

Jeremy and Grandma arrived Wednesday October 3rd, we haven't stopped having fun since so I haven't found time to blog so you get a catch up post.

Wednesday October 3rd- We expected them between 2:30 and 3:00 so when someone knocked on the door at 2:00 we were surprised. We had decorated the house that morning with balloons and a sign welcoming them. It was an awesome reunion, the kids quickly showed them around our place and helped them get settled in. That day when the lady came to clean our house I told her that my husband was coming, so she left these cute swans on our bed :)

We had planned on going to the beach to watch the sunset that night but it was cloudy and threatening to rain so we decided to grab some dinner in town and come home and hit the pool instead.

Thursday October 4th- we hung out at home and went into town to show them around. Jeremy had been here once before but now that we are "locals" we could show him all the cool places we've found.

Friday October 5th- we headed to Ometepe. We took Irlanda to be our tour guide and help us navigate our way around. When we got to the ferry we found out that the one that you can take a car on was broken so we had to change our plans. We booked a shuttle on the island and left our car behind, it turned out to be even better because we could all sit back and not worry about where we were going. We saw some of the island, had some lunch and then stopped at Ojo de agua, a beautiful lagoon with mineral rich water. We swam for a bit and then headed back to the ferry. The ferry was my least favorite part of the day, both ways I got a little sea sick, Logan was nice to sit and rub my back though.

Saturday October 6th- we went to Hermosa beach and rented some surf boards for the day. We all took our turn with them (except Grandma- next time.) And we all enjoyed the hammocks some too. Logan found a cute little friend who would talk and talk and talk and he didn't care the Logan couldn't understand a word he was saying. After Hermosa we went back to San Juan del Sur and booked a tour to see the Turtles that night. Camryn, my mom and I went to playa La Flor that evening when the sea turtles come in to see them. We saw huge turtles and a few little baby ones, some of the adult ones were laying eggs and you could actually watch them lay them, they each lay between 80 and 100 eggs, burry them in the sand and 45-50 days later the baby turtles climb out of the sand and make their way to the water. It was way cool to see, we just wished it would happen in the day so you could see better but they said during the day there's not really much to see there because they're all out in the ocean.

Sunday October 7th- we spent the day at home listening to conference and catching up on our siestas. Palermo has a live band at the pool every Sunday that we can hear perfectly from our back yard so we spent a lot of time in the hammocks listening to the music.  What a great week we had, and we had another fun one planned!

A normal day in NIcaragua

I started this post a week ago but haven't had time to finish it due to the exciting week we've had with Jeremy and Grandma here, I was going to skip it and just move on to the exciting things that we've done all week but decided to finish it.  We've not really had any "normal" days since they got here and we have another week full of fun planned this week, but before that these were some of the things we did in our day to day life.

Until we got our car last week it was a normal thing for us to call a taxi two or three times per day to get us where we needed to go.  Palermo has a shuttle on the hour so we'd usually take it into town and then get a taxi to bring us home.  One of our favorite taxi drivers is named Clemente, he speaks a little English- which is good and bad.  When I'm with him he wants to practice his English, but I always want to practice my Spanish so we end up doing a lot of SpEnglish and we're able to communicate.  We've met several other taxi drivers (Ebmor, Erasmo, Juan are a few of our favorites) but I didn't get pictures of them, below is a picture of Clemente

 

There are quite a few more taxi drivers that we have not officially met but most know us and that we live in Palermo.  Logan is sort of famous down town, as we walk around everyone smiles and waves to him.  This guy always comes over to him and tries to pick him up showing how hard it is cause he's so big.  In Nicaragua, people like kids to be on the chunky side and so Logan is very popular around here.  Everyone just calls him gordito, which translates to fat kid, but it is an edearing term here and not meant to be mean at all.  Many others know him by his nickname "Osito" which translates to little bear.  he's always happy to tell people "me llamo Logan, mi apodo es Osito."

 

 

Twice a week Logan goes to an American school here called San Juan del Sur Day school.  He absolutely loves it and has made lots of friends there.

We go shopping almost every day.  One of our favorite stores is in the middle of town called Sanchez.

Right next to Sanchez is the Central Market, it has a variety of things from vegetables, fruit, tortillas, pinatas, etc.  Carter even found a sling shot that he just had to have this week, for 20 cordobas (just less than $1.00) I let him have it.

We often get lunch while we're in town.  Here we are at a local taco shop, Camryn, Logan and I enjoyed our tacos-

While Carter chose not to eat because he was afraid it would have gross green things.

 

 

Once a week we take our Laundry here to have it washed

 

Mora is the sweetest ever.  I've only been there a couple of times, and yet she acts like we're old friends.  Last time she insisted I take several lemons and limes from her trees because she has mucho.  She has very little and yet what she has she wants to share.

 

We almost always end the day with a trip to the pool, sometimes it's the second or third time that day.  Logan has completely mastered swimming.

And unfortunately I still have to do some work, although the amount of work has decreased significantly, and my office has improved drastically.

 

So there's our day to day.  Next post will include some not so day-to-day stuff, showing all the fun that we've had this week with Dad and Grandma.