End of the weekend BBQ with corn on the cob!
Monday, May 31, 2010
Memorial Day
They love playing together in this house. It's mostly filled with sand since that is what they pretend is their food. They do a lot of "cooking". Well, I guess Avery does the cooking and Isabel does the fetching. I hear "Isabel, get me more sand, Isabel get me more water" an awful lot. She does it and seems to be having fun so I'll let her change the rules someday when she's tired of it. :)
Looking for Avery!
Avery is teaching Isabel how to do "Cheers". This was our first dinner outside, so nice not to have to clean up after them.
The girls getting daddy up for church.
Isabel enjoying watermelon. By the end she's covered in watermelon juice!
Avery reading a book to Isabel.
End of the weekend BBQ with corn on the cob!
End of the weekend BBQ with corn on the cob!
Friday, May 28, 2010
Life in May!
We've had a fun but busy May. On Mother's day weekend Aunt Katie and Grandma MAG came for a visit. It was Katie's first time to visit us and we were so excited! The girl's loved her and we got to do a lot of fun things. Unfortunately I still need to get most of the pictures back from Katie and Marianne. The rest of the month was just business as usual.
Fun with Aunt Katie!
I've heard about kids doing this during meal time but never saw it. Ryan said he was only in the kitchen about 5 min and came back to this.
Avery's new bike. Still can't get her to really ride it but we'll keep trying!
Fun with Aunt Katie!
I've heard about kids doing this during meal time but never saw it. Ryan said he was only in the kitchen about 5 min and came back to this.
Avery's new bike. Still can't get her to really ride it but we'll keep trying!
Avery's 4th birthday
While Ryan and I were having fun in Costa Rica my parents were watching the girls. It also happened that Avery's 4th birthday was while we were gone. It was hard not to be there but she was happy to have grandma around. My mom and dad took Avery and a couple of her friends (Sydney-Kate and Regan) to Chuck E Cheese and she has a blast. She's still talking about it. Funny story about the dinosaur cake, we saw that at Costco many months ago, like January, and Avery told me she wanted it at her birthday. I said OK but really thought she would forget. In early March we went back and she talked about that cake again. The closer we got to her birthday the more she mentioned it. When my mom got here I told her that she might need to get a friend with a membership to take her to get that cake but my mom thought she had probably forgotten about it. Oh no, right after we left Avery starts telling her that about her birthday party and the blue dinosaur cake she was going to have. Needless to say my mom and dad were at Costco the night before and my mom says the look on her face when that cake went in the cart was priceless. She now talks about her party at Chuck E Cheese and the yummy cake she had.
Costa Rica
Ryan and I had a wonderful time in Costa Rica. It is a gorgeous country and there were some parts that I could even imagine living in permanently. It was a slightly early 10year anniversary trip and we had a nice time reconnecting and remembering why we got married in the first place! We were completely stress-free and got a lot of relaxing in. In fact, because it was dark there at 6pm, we were usually a cab ride from the closest town and it started raining at about 6-7 we were usually in bed asleep before 10pm! The nice thing was that we were both up and fully awake by 7 and ready to face the gorgeous day.
We did get some gorgeous pictures but sadly no picture can do the country justice. Part of the wonder was the feel, smell and humidity all around. And another note on the humidity, I realize we are 7yrs outside of a normal midwestern summer but, even the most stalwart would be taken by the CR humidity! It literally felt like a sauna. Just standing would bring a sheen of sweat to the body. The only place that didn't have too much humidity was Monteverde. The lack of humidity and the fact that it was gorgeous definitely made it our favorite spot.
It was fun to see sloths, monkeys and lots of birds in their native habitat. Someday I would love to take the girls back and travel to even more areas!
This was the first hotel we stayed at Arenal. Every bungalow had a nice view of the volcano, whenever there weren't clouds! (not often)
I thought these towel animals the housekeeper made were so cute!
One night we hiked up to see the volcano but it started POURING! We got absolutely soaked. After waiting for about 30 min it did clear for about 5 sec and we saw and heard the lava flowing. Still a fun night. After that we went to one of the hot springs and enjoyed a relaxing swim there.
Apparently only 6% of people see the full volcano, 40% see about this much and the rest never see it at all. Even half covered with clouds it was beautiful.
A view of the volcano during our horseback ride.
One day we took a little horseback ride to the volcano. Unlike American horseback rides they let you do anything you want with their horses.
On one of our excursions we stopped by this place that had iguanas everyhere!
Bats, the small one is the male.
Sloth
Howler Monkeys
An Ahinga slamming a fish against a log to break the bones and make it easier to eat.
White-faced capuchin monkey.
Hummingbird nest.
Technically we can tell people that we also went to Nicaragua since the boat went just over the border. Too bad we didn't get the passport stamp.
On the Jeep-Boat-Jeep to Monteverde.
Our cabins in Monteverde.
Can you see the moth that is camouflaged to look like a leaf?
These are caterpillars, not dead leaves!
Blue Morpho Butterfly found in Monteverde.
Owl Butterfly laying eggs.
Zip-lining over the cloud forest was amazing!
Jungle Emily swinging on a vine.
These pictures of a male and female Quetzel. The male has a very long flowing tail and the female has a small avocado in her mouth. We were standing right by their nest.
Little town of St. Elena as the clouds came in. This was my favorite spot in Costa Rica.
Blue-crowed Motmot. Costa Rica has some very beautiful birds. This post would be twice as long if I added all the pretty birds and flowers we saw.
This was our last and nicest hotel. We splurged and stayed at this nice 5-star resort. Everything was laid out perfectly and it was a good place to relax and lay by the pool. Ryan got to golf twice on the amazing course and I got fried by the pool. We even got a couples massage one afternoon.
Leaf cutter ants. They build these huge mounds and spend all day carrying leaf cuttings back and forth. They were so organized and neat to watch. The picture below is our guide holding one of these ants but the ant is holding up that stick. It was at least 12 in long. They are so strong, the natives used to use the pincers as sutures.
An agouti, basically a large rat.
Orange-collared Manakin
We did get some gorgeous pictures but sadly no picture can do the country justice. Part of the wonder was the feel, smell and humidity all around. And another note on the humidity, I realize we are 7yrs outside of a normal midwestern summer but, even the most stalwart would be taken by the CR humidity! It literally felt like a sauna. Just standing would bring a sheen of sweat to the body. The only place that didn't have too much humidity was Monteverde. The lack of humidity and the fact that it was gorgeous definitely made it our favorite spot.
It was fun to see sloths, monkeys and lots of birds in their native habitat. Someday I would love to take the girls back and travel to even more areas!
This was the first hotel we stayed at Arenal. Every bungalow had a nice view of the volcano, whenever there weren't clouds! (not often)
One night we hiked up to see the volcano but it started POURING! We got absolutely soaked. After waiting for about 30 min it did clear for about 5 sec and we saw and heard the lava flowing. Still a fun night. After that we went to one of the hot springs and enjoyed a relaxing swim there.
Apparently only 6% of people see the full volcano, 40% see about this much and the rest never see it at all. Even half covered with clouds it was beautiful.
A view of the volcano during our horseback ride.
One day we took a little horseback ride to the volcano. Unlike American horseback rides they let you do anything you want with their horses.
On one of our excursions we stopped by this place that had iguanas everyhere!
Bats, the small one is the male.
Sloth
Howler Monkeys
An Ahinga slamming a fish against a log to break the bones and make it easier to eat.
White-faced capuchin monkey.
Hummingbird nest.
Technically we can tell people that we also went to Nicaragua since the boat went just over the border. Too bad we didn't get the passport stamp.
On the Jeep-Boat-Jeep to Monteverde.
Our cabins in Monteverde.
Can you see the moth that is camouflaged to look like a leaf?
These are caterpillars, not dead leaves!
Blue Morpho Butterfly found in Monteverde.
Owl Butterfly laying eggs.
Zip-lining over the cloud forest was amazing!
Jungle Emily swinging on a vine.
These pictures of a male and female Quetzel. The male has a very long flowing tail and the female has a small avocado in her mouth. We were standing right by their nest.
Little town of St. Elena as the clouds came in. This was my favorite spot in Costa Rica.
Blue-crowed Motmot. Costa Rica has some very beautiful birds. This post would be twice as long if I added all the pretty birds and flowers we saw.
This was our last and nicest hotel. We splurged and stayed at this nice 5-star resort. Everything was laid out perfectly and it was a good place to relax and lay by the pool. Ryan got to golf twice on the amazing course and I got fried by the pool. We even got a couples massage one afternoon.
Leaf cutter ants. They build these huge mounds and spend all day carrying leaf cuttings back and forth. They were so organized and neat to watch. The picture below is our guide holding one of these ants but the ant is holding up that stick. It was at least 12 in long. They are so strong, the natives used to use the pincers as sutures.
An agouti, basically a large rat.
Orange-collared Manakin
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