Oops.

Yeah…it’s been a while since I’ve updated this…for those of you who actually read it, I’m sorry! I haven’t even had much going on…I guess that was the problem. I didn’t have much to talk about! I’ve just been working at the daycare full time which is exhausting but very rewarding, and I’ve been sick for about a week now…I finally went to the doctor on Thursday and it turns out I have a sinus infection, and maybe had pink eye? I don’t know, the visit was in Spanish, so I understood moooost of it….that’s good, right? Anyway, I’ve got some eye drops that I have to use for a few more days and some different pills that I also have to take for a few more days. I feel much better already :-)

Since I’ve been sick and unable to work for a lot of this week, I decided to spend a lot of the time when I wasn’t sleeping applying for jobs. I’m applying everywhere, and so far just teaching jobs. We’ll see where I end up next year! Very overwhelming to think about….I think I’ll just enjoy my time in Costa Rica instead.

So, another reason why I haven’t had much to write about is because my only Costa Rican friend left me to go to school in Boston (booooo Charlie, come back!), so now I have no friends besides my housemates. :-( Haha, pretty sad, but true. Don’t get me wrong, I love my housemates, but we do spend all our time together and some of them have other friends so they aren’t always here to hang out with. As it turns out, I don’t know how to make friends outside of a school setting. Right before Christmas, I think I was making friends with some co-workers, but they are at the school, which hasn’t been in session. So I’m hopeful that after school starts I’ll be able to make friends a little easier! We’ll see, though. One good thing about this whole no friends thing is that I have had a lot of time to myself, and at first, I went a little crazy and was super bored, but then I started being productive and using the time to reflect on my time here, what else I want to get out of it, etc. It’s actually been very refreshing, and I’m getting to know myself a lot better. That sounds weird and nerdy, but it’s true, haha. I really want to start keeping in touch better with people, and I’ve failed pretty miserably at that so far, so if you guys want to help me out and shoot me an email (kelli.finch@gmail.com), I would LOVE it. :-)

So here are some pictures of what I’ve been up to in the last few weeks! Enjoy :-)

My favorite co-worker, Gloria with Moises. She is the cook...sweetest woman EVER!

Moises (porque si!)

Amanda had a birthday party and a clown. Most of the children were terrified of the clown at first, which was kind of funny. Look how excited they are!

Eric! My favorite new kid. He's super sweet and always walks up to me puckering his lips (his way of asking for a kiss...so cute!). Haha.

Milagro. She's new, and she is very cute, but she is causing proooooblems! She likes to steal toys and then show no emotion when the other kid cries about it. Her expression is almost always exactly the same, and I saw her smile for the first time the other day when I was dancing with her and twirling her around. She has a beautiful smile...just have to figure out how to get her to show it more.

Noemi. She also likes to steal toys and then pretend that she had them first. But she is suuuuper cute and sweet the rest of the time.

Carlitos! He loves to shout "VEA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! VEA VEA VEA VEA VEA MUCHACHA VEAAAAAAAA!" (looooook!!!) at me at the most inopportune times. Haha, but he is very cute.

My walk to the bus stop in the morning.

Pretty sky!

Pretty sunset :-)

I know I put pictures of Dorian up a lot, but he is just so cute. I tried to get a picture of him smiling, but my camera did not want to do it well.

I went to a mass last Saturday to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Casa Maria (where I work) at the Cathedral of San Jose...I couldn't get very good pictures because I couldn't use the flash, but it's very pretty.

More of the cathedral.

I guess it's really common here to do a "Rezo del nino" (prayer for Baby Jesus? more or less) when you take down your nativity scenes after Christmas. It's generally a gathering of family and close friends and you pray a rosary for Baby Jesus and have some food and whatnot afterward. Um, at least I think that's the point of it.... Anyway, we went to Yami's house (Liz's boss) to celebrate, and she had about 80 people over!! It was crazy, and very cool. We sang Silent Night in Japanese, German, Spanish, Italian, and English. It was a rather extravagant affair :-)

Fancy catered lunch at Yami's after the rosary.

Pretty sunset.

Back in Costa Rica :-)

I've been back in Costa Rica for a couple of weeks now, and I got a chance to go to the beach with Liz and Juancho, Brother Jim came down to do a retreat with us, and I just started work again on Monday. The weather is awesome (I got burned last weekend), and it's nice to be back with the kids at the daycare. Not much to talk about, but I just wanted to put up some pictures (mainly for my mom's sake) of the last couple of weeks here. :-)

Brother Jim's birthday is today, and we celebrated on Monday night with Margaritas with Yami and Marta :-) He loved his Spanish birthday song and brownie.

On my first day back, Dorian was sick, and apparently that meant that he did not get a bath that morning, because this is what he looked like all day. He was just so pitiful and adorable all day.

He woke up a lot earlier than everyone from his nap, so we did a little photo shoot. He might need a haircut soon! He's getting so big. Weird.

My beautiful wall decorations. I wish I had pictures of everyone that I miss, but that would be a lot of money and a lot of time at the internet cafe....these like 10 pictures took about an hour to print!

A beautiful rainbow on one of the first days back. It's no circle around the sun, or anything, but it's still pretty sweet.

Sunset in Manuel Antonio, the beach that we went to for a few days. We watched the sunset every night we were there, and it was gorgeous every time.

This is Liz and John's engagement picture. Haha. They prefer Christmas card, but whatever.

At the beautiful beach! Juancho looks THRILLED to be taking this picture.

Ah it was sooo pretty!

Monkeys! We saw them steal some people's food at the beach....they opened their grocery bag, took out a bag of chips, and went up in the tree and opened it and started eating it! It was crazy. Apparently that is normal though, because people warned us about that before we got there, haha. We also saw GIANT raccoons that tried to steal people's food.

Well that is all for now, off to bed so I can have some energy for the daycare tomorrow!! :-)

You're the prettiest girl this side of the Mississippi.

Name that movie.

Today was my last day in Costa Rica before I go back for two weeks for Christmas. It was BEAUTIFUL out. I'm NOT ready for it to be cold!!

Our sweet hammock.
Again. My photographer felt the need for another photo?

Que ricooooo! I definitely got burned today.

The end. Merry Christmas! If you are going to be in or near Blo-No in the next couple of weeks, call me :-)

I believe I can flyyyy!

This was my last week of work before Christmas! The daycare's last day was on Friday, and the high school girls' graduation was on Wednesday. It was a very good week.

On Tuesday, my housemates and I all went to Volcan Irazu with Fray Jorge, one of the friars that lives across the street from us. It was really cool...we were in the clouds....definitely a different experience.


For graduation on Wednesday, I got to hand out some of the diplomas, which was really cool. I got to give all the girls a big hug and congratulations...it's going to be sad without them there next year! One of the teachers that I work with, Oscar, had to read a prayer for the graduation, and he has told me in the past that he is "Catholic" but he definitely is not practicing. So the principal of the school called Oscar and I into her office and was telling us all the things we needed to do to get ready for the graduation, and she said, "Oscar, you'll read the prayer, okay? So just start with a sign of the cross, read the prayer, and then finish with an Our Father and a Hail Mary, since we're in the house of the Virgin." Haha, it was pretty funny, I had to help him to remember the Our Father, and he was super nervous. It went very well, though. :-) After graduation, Isabel, another teacher, asked if I could help her with her English homework, so we went to KFC to practice for her English test that she had on Friday. I'm really glad that I'm starting to make more friends at my work, because I have felt that I've had a pretty difficult time fitting in there until now. A couple of the teachers, Oscar and Alejandra, even came to the Christmas party that my roommates and I had on Friday.

The last day at the daycare was super fun. We had this big elaborate party for the kids and their parents (most of which were moms and some grandmas), and the kids sang some songs, Santa Claus came, and there was a tooooon of food. It was kind of sad, because a lot of the bigger kids are not going to be coming back in January because they'll be starting school! A couple of my favorite kids are not going to be back, which is a big bummer. Also, the woman who works full time there, Magaly, is not coming back in January either, and it was super sad to see everyone say goodbye to her. She's been working there for four years, so I imagine it's going to be hard to leave. I have no idea who is going to be able to take her position, because she is soooo good with the kids. It will be interesting to see how next year goes.

Well, I don't have too much else to talk about, but I do have lots of pictures :-) I'm going to the beach tomorrow! How's the snow treating everyone?

Agustin! He's such a little sweetheart. I was sad that I failed to capture the mohawk he was sporting the day before.
Diego. He's a little flirt.

Isaac. He always says to me, "Y su papa?" "And your dad?" And we'll go through my whole family before the conversation ends.

Jeremey and Allen...sweeeeeetest brothers ever.

Allen again.

Juancho and I at the volcano.

Juancho, Liz, Kinzie, Fray Jorge and me.

Fray Jorge. I was trying to teach him how to blow bubbles with his gum...kind of failed though.

I can flyyyyyy!

It was freeeezing up there!

Charlie, Liz and I at our Christmas party.
Hahahahaha, this picture totally captures the intensity that the kids had while they were performing. It was awesome. That is Camilo, Agustin, Amanda, Engel, and Alexa.

Michelle! She's just precious.

Moises....they made all the kids go in the kitchen for like 15 minutes while they talked to the parents...yikes. About half of them were screaming about how they wanted their mom the WHOLE TIME.

DORIANNNNN. He's sooooo cute.

Nick and I ice skating in a mall! I met Nick last summer when he was a chaperone at one of the CHWC sites I worked at...it turns out he's in Costa Rica, too and lives super close. We went ice skating, got our picture taken with Santa, and ate some Taco Bell. We also played in lots of toy stores...all in all a fun day. :-)

Merry almost Christmas!!!

Random stories.

I don't actually have a lot to talk about, but I have some random things that I want to say, so you can read them if you want, or you can just look at the pictures and call it a day. Whatever floats your boat.

We have cats. I don't know why, but we have cats in our yard, and they make very, very strange noises at all hours of the night. I'm pretty sure they are living in our roof now. That's good, right? I just hope they don't die up there, because when I was in Florida for Catholic Heart Work Camp last summer, we had a possum in the ceiling of the room we were sleeping in, and it died. I think that all of the girls on my CHWC team would agree with me when I say, that is not a stench that I wish to smell again.

I'm watching that clay rudolph movie on CBS right now...and I have to say...I'm pretty sure I've never actually watched this. I know it's been on every year on my TV, but I don't know if I've ever actually paid attention. I'm now a fan.

The other day, I was walking down Paseo Colon (the main street I walk on for about a half hour each way to and from work every day), and I passed this guy selling lottery tickets (the lottery is crazy here...there are people selling tickets on every corner I think). As I passed him, he looked me up and down, and shouted/sang, "HEY JUUUUUDE!" And that was all. I was too busy giggling, but all of my roommates said that I should have sang back to him. I've also gotten a, "NICE!", a "Hello baby, how are jou?", and "Hello, blonde." I'm pretty sure people see me, see that I'm obviously from the United States, and use the only English they know. It's pretty entertaining, and slightly offensive, but I always get a good chuckle out of it.

So for Thanksgiving, we went over to our friend Charlie's house, whose mom is from Guatemala and whose dad is from the US, so they do Thanksgiving dinner every year for his dad. I had to frantically make 4 pumpkin pies in about 2 hours right before we went over, because Liz was going to make them, but got extremely ill the day before Thanksgiving, and was that way for a couple of days after. It was very sad...she couldn't even eat a Thanksgiving dinner. But I made the pies, and they turned out edible, so that was good. It was super fun being over there, and it made me not quite so homesick to be with friends and to eat delicious traditional Thanksgiving food. Kinzie has pictures on her camera, so once I get those, I'll put them up.

This weekend, John, Kinzie, Gabe and I went to Gabe's family's house and we went with his cousin to "Monte de la cruz" or "Mountain of the Cross," and we hiked a bit, walked under this freezing waterfall, almost fell about 5000 times because it was so slippery, and finally made it to the top of the mountain where there was a huge cross (surprise!). Apparently, according to what I understood of Gabe's cousin said (which often is not much, because he speaks SUPER fast), there are 3 crosses in Costa Rica, and this is the top of the cross....So the three crosses make one big one or something? Okay, maybe I should talk to him about this again....haha. Anyway, so then we hiked back down, saw a little lake, got a big bruise on my thigh from climbing over a fallen tree, and then played a pick up soccer game (I know. I do NOT play soccer. It was funny to say the least) with some random high schoolers. Then we went back to Gabe's family's house and ate some delicious authentic tortilla soup (probably the only Costa Rican dish I actually enjoy). And to top off the day, Liz and I went to see New Moon that night. IT WAS AWESOME. I'm also excited to see it again in the United States with delicious movie theater popcorn. I definitely enjoyed my Saturday :-)

Yesterday was my night for prayer, and I decided that I wanted to spend some time together decorating our house for Christmas, so we had a blast decorating ornaments and wearing Santa hats and eating M&M cookies with frosting. I couldn't find any sugar cookie mix/didn't want to put in the work to make them from scratch. They were still really good. You should try it. Really. Betty Crocker M&M cookie mix. Delish. Enjoy the pictures of our Christmas celebration :-)

We decided to do a pensive pose. It took like 5 tries....and we still didn't get it.

Corny, but funny.

Juancho has a lot of guts. He's lucky I did not notice what was going on.


The famous "John's dad pose."

A few of our awesome ornaments!

Working on the ornaments.

Liz and me working hard.

Juancho was showing me his ornament, and said, "...and then here, I put FC Eleven, for FrancisCorps 11, and here--" And then I cut him off and said, "Wait. Isn't that a 6?" We're going to go over his roman numerals soon.

My four fabulous friends. Haha, I was going to say roommates, but then I got excited about alliteration.