Lucy's New Toy

Yesterday we went searching for a new toy for Lucy and found a great toy store, appropriately called, "TOYS." We walked all over the store and let Lucy check everything out until she picked out this shopping cart. She loves loading it up and pushing it around.

Do we have a 16 month old or a 16 year old?



Here she is "shopping" around.



WARNING!! Care Package Plug: If you happen to be sending us anything in the future, Lucy would love some "items" to put in her shopping cart. A great gift would be some small food boxes, emptied and broken down, that we could reassemble upon arrival and Lucy could "shop" for. Cheap, light, and thin, can't get any easier than that!

Pretend Play

Lucy has really enjoyed playing with her dolls lately and she is starting to understand "pretend play". Here is a short video of Lucy feeding her dolls a "snick" (snack).

Good Morning from Lu

We know this isn't the most flattering picture of Lucy but we thought it was funny. She looks a lot more sleep deprived in this picture than she really is but we are still praying for her naps as she continues to get adjusted to a different pace here in San Jose. Also note her first real wound on her forehead from falling down a hill at the park. You got to be a tough girl to make it here :)

Classes

Typically this blog focuses on Lucy but I thought I would give you a little insight of what our classes are like here in Costa Rica. We are in class from 1:30-4:10 every day. While we are in class Lucy is kept in day care with a dear woman we love named Sonia. Lucy's favorite things at school is the slide, the balls, and walking outside with Sonia. Meanwhile we are studying away in class and making fools of ourselves as we try to learn Spanish :)


This is Lindsey's conversation teacher Francesco. He makes learning a lot of fun by teaching us through dialogs. Every day we have to come prepared to tell the class a story some examples of things we have done: write a recipe in Spanish, tell a story about when you got hurt, and the Parable of the Sower.


This is Lindsey's grammer teacher, Yadira, and Sean's conversation teacher. She is a very sweet and patient woman which we need as we fumble through learning the language.


We give lots of class presentations and this is me giving one about the health problems of Costa Rica.


This is Lindsey's whole class! Its great to be in such small classes because it makes learning so much easier.

El Centro de la Ciudad (Downtown San Jose)

This weekend we toured downtown San Jose. We first had to learn how to take a bus to downtown, which isn't complicated you just have to make sure you get on the right bus. Then once we arrived in downtown we just walked the streets and enjoyed people watching. This was the first time we felt like real tourists here in Costa Rica.


Cam (another MTW missionary headed to Columbia), Zoe (missionary from Atlanta headed to Columbia) and Sean enjoying currios from the street vendor.




Taking a break in the central square.


This central square had lots of birds, it kind of reminded me of Mary Poppins.


Lucy wanted to share her crackers with the birds. They became fast friends.

Fresh Fruits and Vegetables

One of the things that I (Lindsey) loved to do in Charlotte was to go to the Farmer's market every week. I was thrilled to find out that every Saturday in San Jose there is a "feria" where all the local farmers come in town to sell there fruits and vegetables. The produce here is wonderful- I have had the best pineapple and tangerines that I have ever tasted. So my Saturday morning tradition is to walk about a mile to the farmers market and get all that I can carry home. Then I have to bleach the fruits and veggies for about 20 minutes before we can eat them. Here is everything that I got last Saturday and it was all for less than $6, what a deal!

Babies

Lucy has really fallen in love with her baby dolls lately and we even started to give them names.


She likes to pretend to rock and feed her babies.

Fun times with Lu

I will try to post some pictures soon but in the meantime here is a video to enjoy. We thought this noise Lucy was making was very funny so we tried to capture it in video. At the end of the movie you will notice that we are trying to get her to say "Chao" (Goodbye in Costa Rica). She said it today for the first time to her teacher and we thought it was very cute.

First Day of School

Okay I know I am a dork but I made our family take a first day of school picture. You will notice in the bag beside Lucy that she even has her very own lunch box! We had orientation this morning and had to take placement tests to see what level we are in for our classes. Then in the afternoon our classes began, we have 2 classes one for grammar and the other for conversation for a total of 3 hours.

I believe this picture says it all, we were all worn out when the day was done. Lucy did very well in the nursery even though she didn't take a nap. Our teammate, Erin, graciously volunteered to take Lucy home for the afternoon and let Lucy nap in her own crib. I think Lucy will take some time to get adjusted to being in childcare, only hearing Spanish from her caregivers, and having a little to no nap in the afternoon but I pray that this time of transition would go well and quickly for her.


We put her to bed early because she was so exhausted, hopefully she will get a good nights rest and be prepared for another day tomorrow. Meanwhile Sean and I have homework we have to do!

My Playroom

Our home here in Costa Rica has 3 bedrooms so we decided to make the extra space Lucy's very own playroom. She loves having so much space to play in and we hope it will teach her to play independently.

Lucy loves playing on her world map that Gannie and Mac gave her for Christmas. She is going to be an expert at world geography by the time she is 2.

Lucy's cottage which Aunt KK made for Christmas made its first appearance yesterday when we finally found a table here in Costa Rica. She loves playing in her house and pretends to hide from us.


This picture is taken in honor of Aunt KK because not only did she sew the playhouse but also the outfit Lucy has on. I love you Aunt KK and if you have time you can keep making me cool stuff :)


Every time we have gone to other friends houses to play Lucy has always loved the little chairs so yesterday we got Lucy her very own little chair. She is thrilled!


Where's Lucy?!