November and December 2017

Life here in Panama has been pretty good recently. The weather is nice and we enjoy being outside a lot. The kids have had fun and everyone is feeling well. These are the pictures that were taken in November and December. 

I love the way this plant looks next to the lighthouses that are all around the neighborhood. It turned out really cool in black and white. It's pretty big! 

 I got to hold a friend's baby goat and it was so cute! I think I forgot to mention that Big Mac died after we had had him about 10 days. One day he just didn't stand up and we got him some antibiotics, but I guess it was too late. It's okay though, just wanted to pass that along in case you were wondering how he is.

 I started doing a reading/English club with another 2 ladies here in town. One started it and then we joined in after we found out about it. The kids are so sweet and really smart. They meet at the school every Saturday morning to practice. But we are on a break now since it's summer here now.

 The kids wanted to color by the creek one day on a walk. They all packed up a coloring book and colors and took it with them. So cute!

 We had a great Thanksgiving meal with our small group at our place in November. It was a lot of fun and some really great food. We always enjoy having everyone over.

 I just planted this stick in the ground and it grew this. So pretty!

 We got to go to this trampoline park in David and the kids loved it. There were all kinds of things to play with - a few trampolines, a foam pit, a big jungle gym. It looked like lots of fun!

 The town had a Cabalgata. It's basically a horse parade where you watch pretty much all the cowboys and cowgirls in town ride their horses down the road. It was pretty fun to see some of the horses. I think this was an independence day parade.

 The kids let me take a pic of them on our rock! I thought it was pretty cute. It was possibly going to be for a Christmas card, but that didn't happen. So pretend it says Merry Christmas from Panama on the rock.

 We have done a lot of work on the house. Well we have done a lot and the contractor has done a lot. One thing we had done was have the roof painted from green to orange/red.

 We also have installed cabinets and granite in the new kitchen. It looks great (and this pic was taken in November, so it looks even better now)! It's a lon 12 foot island! Tons of counter space!!

 Of course Panama has a giant stuffed penguin sitting outside a store, so of course we needed to have our pic made with it. When I think Panama, I think penguins.

 Here is the master at work installing the open shelves and brick tile in the new kitchen. He's pretty handy and it's awesome! He did a great job.

 Hanukkah of course happened and we go to play dreidels and light our menorah. Each kid got to light the candles one night.

 This guy just loved getting to light the candles. He was all for it, even with me helping a little bit.

 The kids love spending time outside every day. On this day, it was watercolor painting outside that held their attention for a wee bit. Now we have art all over the house that they've painted.

 Night number 2 of Hanukkah.

 We also got to help Mrs. Este decorate her tree. We went to her house on Christmas Eve and helped serve a Ngobe church some dinner. Mrs. Este put it all together with the pastor who is their neighbor. She had the church people come over and eat a nice meal and everyone received a gift before leaving (chocolates and cookies wrapped in Christmas paper). The pastor did a little sermon and they sang. It was really a special way to spend the evening!

 Here is the finished product with Bella, the three legged sheep. Bella was a bad sheep and later ate a lot of the lights and pulled a lot of the decorations off.

 Night 3 of Hanukkah and a happy girl to light the menorah herself.

 These are my favorite plant here in Panama. Perhaps because they remind me of my honeymoon in Costa Rica. Heliconias are what they are called. I call them lobster claws. Great colors!

 Night four of Hanukkah!

 Rainbows are everywhere during this season. They're so pretty and so bright. They stay around for a while too. This one was practically in the field next to us. So pretty.

 Night 5 of Hanukkah. Everyone likes to watch the candles burn and then blow them out. Such a special treat when it's your night! Ha.

 This was right behind our house. It was awesome looking! You can see the edge of our house there.

I made this from a picture I took of Baru. We hope that you had a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. The kids were excited to have a fun Christmas morning. Then we had friends over for lunch who were in town as well. On New Years Day, we had a few friends over as well and enjoyed eating and hanging out. Now looking forward to what 2018 brings our way! Blessings to all of you!! 

A Quick Overview of October and November

At the end of September, D turned 9! What fun we had opening presents and eating pizza at our favorite place here in the area, Dos Rios! He even got his own lemonade which was a highlight. It's delicious. 

 We also celebrated with a cake from a local bakery with friends. He sure is a happy kid!

 Here is the progression of the bookcase in the hallway. As you can see, it's floor to ceiling.

 Books are going on! We had a helper or two come out and organize books first and then start loading them in the shelves.

 It is still a work in progress, but it is basically full at this time. We had to build another one for the other boxes we still have to unload!!

 The kids love their loft/lookout! It is a fun place for them to hang out.

 Our favorite stores in David give us free helium balloons and free popcorn. One recent trip, we left with 15 helium balloons in the car! 5 kids, 3 stores!

 Small group is always fun. We started meeting at our house on Friday evenings. There was usually a nice view, great fellowship and good food too!

 Views kind of like this one... (This is also the view from our porch gym while working out.)

 Ben is doing a great work of fixing up the house. This wall in the (future) homeschool room is one example. I LOVE this tile. We area also going to have an accent wall in our bathroom with this. It's lovely.

 We hired two new yard workers recently too. They sure do work hard!

 Here's the story... Believe me, there was much grumbling to get this picture.

 This is what I call enjoying your duro. Duro mustache and unibrow. It doesn't get much better than a Don Joaquin duro. Believe me.

Apparently everyone needed to go on the walk with an animal this day. The cats usually chase us around the circle. 

 In November, this silly girl turned 6. She sure is a sweetheart! She also started in Year 1 of Ambleside and is doing well! She has decided purple is her favorite color which is mine as well!

 We had some friends over for a little bit of cake. I made a chocolate one (which she later told me she doesn't like chocolate cake) and drizzled peanut butter all over it. Elsa candles, of course!

 And we painted nails! And had little teacups. Fun and girlie!

 We had a really cool yellow bird run into our windows and stun itself. We held it for about 10 minutes before it got better and flew away.

 Walks are pretty much a daily thing. It's a great way to burn off some energy and take a look around us to appreciate the great weather and scenery.

 Scenery like this.

Library and Loft Construction, Celebrating Ds Birthday at the Beach - September 2017

This is the start of our library being built in the hallway of our house. It is massive.

 Ben had this idea to build a loft up to the lookout in the area that is now the kitchen. The kids are so excited about this project. It will be large enough to hold a twin size mattress and makes a great reading area. You can see that they can get up into the window/look out area.

 This is one of my favorite pictures taken in David. As you can see, one of these children wasn't loving being on top of the bike rack.

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For D's birthday, he wanted to go to the beach, so we set up a time to load up and head down with some friends. We went to the beach, Las Lajas, which is about 2 hours away and really nice. The waves are really small and undertow isn't bad. In this picture, I should have already put sunblock on all of us...

 This child hated the water and screamed if I went near it. Needless to say, he may be my child. I am not a fan of the ocean either!

 We got this super awesome umbrella for Christmas last year from Nana and Pop and got to use it today. It worked great until the tide rose and we had to yank it up and run!

 We had fun digging in the sand with our friend! The kids love getting dirty and then playing in the water!

 We found a ton of shells and sand dollars. This black sand dollar had just died. After we got it home, it turned white! It was really big too - about the size of my cell phone! M and I spent a lot of time looking for shells since we didn't go in the water.

 We had a picnic lunch with our friends under this little covering.

 Everyone had fun playing in the water. It was low tide, so we had to walk really far out to get to the ocean. They could have played here all day!

 And we could have sat under the umbrella all day!

 He sure is a mess, but he has a lot of fun and he sure loves his mommy! He usually sticks to me like glue! He was totally covered in sand since he stuck his head in the water puddle he was playing in. Black sand was all over everything!!

 Here are some of the sand dollars we found that were still alive. We threw them back in the ocean. There were tons of them on the beach that day.

We had a great time celebrating D's birthday and playing in the ocean with our friends! Can't wait until we can go back and do it again! The place we parked had little cabanas you could rent for the day, showers, bathrooms and a little restaurant. It was really nice!