Yes, we have to work in Costa Rica too.

Mid-March morning view

The last couple of days have lacked any significant drama in our household.  And we're okay with that.  After a busy Saturday for Erica's birthday, we had an equally lazy Sunday.  I'm pretty sure this is the first day we didn't really leave the house.  Among the highlights were a couple of naps and a car-washing session that happily devolved into a water fight.  And nobody cried!  A short attempt at a family soccer game in the yard was thwarted by the combination of chasing the ball down the steep hill (while carefully avoiding potential snakes) and the unfortunate mix between a lack of sympathy towards the youngest player and a parental desire to toss some of the kids down the aforementioned hill.  Fortunately no major injuries ensued.

Happy car washers

We enjoyed the fish and rice dinner originally planned for our friends Friday night.  Erica's birthday cake was amazing and much enjoyed.  Today, Sullivan had school at 7 am, Henry had the day off and Madeleine went at 12 pm.  Erica managed to do honest-to-goodness work work for four hours or so while I split my time between shuttling kids, shopping and spending several hours helping both Madeleine and Henry study for their Spanish exams tomorrow.  Both still have plenty of work to do but impress me in what they have been able to learn.  Each kid can do a decent job at translating a fair amount of what is in their books and are working at answering the questions in Spanish.  Although they may not be fully aware, they've come a long way in a month in school.

Our resupply today included more local eggs that were collected four days ago.  Despite the warm temperatures, eggs are not refrigerated in the stores and sometimes are even sold in bags.

My final trip to school today included another "reunion" meeting for Sullivan's kindergarten class, this time just for the committee of which I am a part.  Sully ran around outside with several classmates while the two teachers, 8 mothers and I met for a bit more than an hour.  This is a warm and welcoming group who took time to explain the important points to me (including the requisite sausage jokes) with a slower pace of speech.  We again discussed selling food to raise money for the class.  The next event is in two days, the field sports event where kids from schools all around will come to compete.  It's a good thing I was at this meeting as this was the first time we'd heard the date and time for this event in which Madeleine apparently is competing.

Several other simple pleasures were also enjoyed by our crew today:  hanging wet laundry out to dry in the warm sun, catching lightning bugs, watching another enormous toad on a path to the driveway, more guitar practicing and spotting LOUD congos (howler monkeys) from our house for the first time.  I'm actively trying not to take any of this for granted and to savor every day, especially since I'll be heading back to the States to work a bit pretty soon.