10 ten reasons I love my Vacation

10) You can play in the dirt all day and no one cares!

9)  You can be anyone you want to be at the beach.

8)  You can dig a hole and stick your kids in it...and they like it!

7)  You get by without, um, freshening up as much.

6)  You get to hang out with family and snuggle.

5)  You get to act like a kid.

4)  You get to ride a sea monster.

3)  You get to ride a roller coaster...inside.

2)  You get to celebrate special birthdays.

And the number one reason I love vacation...

I get to spend it with my family (sometimes even watching a cool new 3D movie, like Toy Story 3).

Beach photo shoot

Special News

Yay!! I'm super excited.

Well to tell you the truth, I started out jealous.  I read several other blogs where bloggers were invited to participate in a cool new program.  And I was jealous...because I had not been asked.

But now I have!!

I am the newest CSN preferred blogger!!

Woohoo!!

That means every other month or so, I'll have a review or giveaway of one of the myriad of items they sell in the CSN stores - such as headboards, toys, luggage  (may have to check that out before my next trip), ...the list goes on and on.  Know why?  There are over 200 CSN stores!!!  That's why!!

So stay tuned for great giveaways and reviews coming really soon!

Nicaragua Day 2

Sunday

We started out the day as usual - breakfast, getting ready for church, orientation meeting in the eating room. I had started to get worried because we were supposed to leave for church at 9:15 (church starts at 9:30) but 9:15 rolled around and we were still in orientation.  Finally 9:40 hits and my dad asks what time we need to leave.  Oh, now, says our host when he realized the time.  But its OK, he says, you're on Nicaragua time now - where nothing is on time.  So it didn't matter that we were 45 minutes late to church or that the person preaching was with us.  They just kept on singing until we got there. 

It was interesting having a church service through an interpreter.  That was a first for me.  My dad preached and several people from our group stood up and talked before that.  After church we came back to eat lunch and I took a much needed nap that felt GREAT!

Then it was back to the church for a youth Bible study...at least that was what was on the schedule.  While the "adult" (those more grown up than me) were planning the younger crowd (which I'll include myself in this time) went outside to play with the kids.  There was impromtu kickball, soccer, and volleyball.  It was so encouraging to see our youth having fun with kids.  Even when you don't speak the same language, you can communicate through play and sports.  It also amazed me that there were older Nicaraguan teenage girls - we talking 17 and 18 year olds - who were out there playing games like kickball and volley ball with the little kids.  I don't think I'd see that in the states.  They are all too busy texting there.  It was a refreshing sight.

I think we set a good foundation for building relationships this week, which is our main goal while we are here.  Today we have eaten breakfast and are getting ready to leave for our first full, long day of service.  Keep us in your prayers and stay tuned for more.

Party all Week

These posts aren't necessarily in chronological order - just wanted to get that off my chest to start out with.  I'm kind of a chronological fanatic, but I'm OK with this (deep breaths).

Every other year of my kids lives, I have been insistent that they have separate birthday parties.  When your kids have birthdays 6 days apart, this is hard.  It takes up 2 weekends to do "friend parties" and another weeknight or Sunday afternoon to do an "extended family party."  All that can get exhausting and requires about 2 weeks of our time.

This year was different.  We went to the beach over Julie's birthday which took up 2 of our possible party weekends in June.  My mom had the brilliant idea that I just have one BIG party with everyone invited - Julie's friends, David's friends and all our family. 

So I did.

And it turned out great!  We rented a pavilion at a local state park (for free), cooked out hotdogs on the grill (that I got on sale and had coupons for), got one really big Star Wars cake and a Darth Vader pinata and we had ourselves a par-tay!  I ended up spending about $100 to entertain and feed 35 people.  I thought that was pretty good.

Here are the smiles to prove it (Oh, did I mention that my kids are huge Star Wars fans now).

I think I might regret getting the kids those lightsabers ...

Be flexible

I'm using a borrowed computer, so I don't know yet if I can upload pictures.  But here I am in Nicaragua.  We arrived safely yesterday at about 5 PM Nicaragua time (2 hours behind home) after leaving our church at 5:45 AM.  The airport was still 2.5 hours from our mission house.  So after going through customs, getting our luggage and driving to Chinendega from Managua, we got to our home away from home at 8:30 PM (10:30 PM home time).  We had some pizza and crashed after our very long day.

But backing up a little...the first thing we were told when we got here was that the town of Chinendega has been without water for 5 days.  The town pumps blew out.  Our gracious host went and got a cistern yesterday before we got here and filled it up with water for us to use - however conserving water is an understatement for what we must do to make that water last.  My shower this morning was refreshingly cold (it actually felt pretty good) but was more like a sponge bath standing up.  Get wet, turn off water and lather up hair.  Turn on water and rinse, turn off water and wash body with soap, turn on water to rinse, etc.... 

Our number one priority on this trip was to be flexible so we are flexing.  In just a little bit, we are off to our first Nicarguan church service, then they have planned a Fourth of July cookout for us tonight with hotdogs and hamburgers - which I think is incredibly sweet. 

Much love to my family who I already miss so much.  I'm showing everyone your pictures (even those who don't really want to see them).  Be good for Daddy and I'll see you soon.

Ready for International Travel...I hope

This is it.  My last night here for a while.  Tomorrow I leave bright and early (or really dark and early) for a mission trip to Nicaragua with my church.  I'm excited and nervous at the same time.  I'd love to blog from down there, but I'm not sure how well I'll get internet access.  I'll certainly try.

In the meantime, my wonderful husband is going to take the week off from work to watch the kids.  He's decided to blog his adventures this week - both as a way to keep me informed of what's going on here while I'm gone and to reassure me that the kids aren't just running wild :).  If you'd like to check it out, you'll find his first post (Day 0) here. 

I'm going to schedule some posts for next week.  If I end up posting from our mission house in Central America, I'll just preempt those posts.  Have a great week!