Rubber Boots & Barbed Wire: May & June Highlights

Sorry this post is about two months old. I wanted to add on the low points of May and June but never finished! So for this post, you'll just hear the positive! I recently read our friends and fellow MCC’ers, Adam and Marisa Clymer-Shank’s blog (http://theclanks.wordpress.com/) and could totally relate to some of their points in their June post. I decided it was about time to post something on our blog in attempts to share a bit of our recent lives with you all. Although, now it's August and there are more updates to share with you. I will try to do that soon and actually post it! It’s hard to know what to say sometimes when so many things are swirling around in my head, so I decided to take Marisa’s approach, and post the top five good times we have experienced in May and June. Hope it helps to get a little idea of where we’ve been recently. We would appreciate your continued support through e-mails, letters, thoughts, prayers, phone calls, etc. We need the encouragement and positive words to keep us going at times.

Exciting/Positive/Adventurous times

We have had some real opportunities to celebrate and travel to new places in Nicaragua. It has been a real blessing and definitely refreshes our spirits to get away or to celebrate locally with friends.

Family visiting (May 31^st-June 9^th)! Nate’s dad, two aunts and one uncle came to see us. We had many amazing adventures with them! Including (but not limited to): cooking and hanging out in our home for three nights in Teustepe, having coffee with MCC friends in the MCC office, visiting two communities where we work, meeting families that we work with and eating a real campo lunch, hiking in one of Nicaragua’s largest nature reserves, seeing orchids, butterflies, monkeys, and a sleeping sloth, driving to the top and hiking around Mombacho Volcano, seeing leather goods and cigar production in Estelí, climbing bell towers in the colonial city of Granada and visiting artisans who make pottery for Ten Thousand Villages in a small village of San Juan del Oriente. We feel so blessed to have wonderful family and happy that they could come to visit us!

Norm, Liz, Nan, Nadine and Dwayne enjoying lunch in the campo.

Are you stuck in the mud Dwayne?

Nate, Nan, Dwayne, Liz, Nadine and Norm in Malacatoya!

Celebrating Nate’s 32^nd birthday on amazing white-sand beaches in southern Nicaragua at the end of May. We got away with two other MCC couples for a beach weekend! It was gorgeous—pristine beaches hardly occupied, with crystal-clear waters. Temperatures were perfect and our hotel was beautiful, complete with a pool and kitchen for cooking our dinners! We had so much fun and needed the R&R!

Matilda's Beach was our favorite!

Chilling at a café on a sufer beach!

White sands and clear waters=pure heaven!

Neko our kitty! We’ve had Neko since April 14^th and he is a super-sweet, spunky, playful cat! He was just two months old and so tiny when we took him home. He has grown a lot since then and enjoys his life with us. He is great entertainment and cheers us up when we need a good laugh.

Little Neko (8 weeks) and not sure what to do with an ice cube.

Neko (3 months) sneaking onto the guest bed!

Neko loves sleeping in many funny positions!

Patron Saint Festivals in Teustepe in May! Santa Rita is our local saint and her special day of the year is May 22^nd. Every year there are big celebrations in her honor. The week before is kicked off with a horse parade. It’s a beautiful event, in that horses from all over the country arrive in our little town of Teustepe. It is great people watching too, and don’t forget to wear your plaid shirts and cowboy boots and hat to the event! Our friends, Adam and Marisa spent the weekend with us for the horse parades. The following weekend, our friends Kevin and Cassie spent the weekend seeing the festivities. We went to see bull riding in the stadium, which is a cultural highlight for many.

Adam and Nate enjoying the hípica (horse parade).

Marisa and Liz, next year's Toña girls!

The rodeo was quite exciting this year!

Celebrating Nicaraguan Mother’s Day (May 30) with our neighbor’s family in Teustepe. I continually love seeing the close-knit ties of family in Latino culture. It can be so sweet and often more expressive than in American culture. We felt honored to be able to spend this special day with three generations.