Amigos, InBio Parque, and The Incident...

This past week has been awesome. Kelsie, Paul & Katy's trip was so much fun! Paul & Katy took off on Tuesday morning, while Kelsie stayed until today. She left early this morning. This picture is with Paul, Katy, Oky, myself, and Kels when they came over to enjoy an authentic Costa Rican meal with my host family. Kels stayed here with us and was able to come with me to school both Tuesday and Wednesday to see what I do everyday. Wednesday, however, we were able to go with a 1st grade class on a field trip to a local bio-diverse zoo exhibit. The place is called InBio Park and has multiple ecosystems displaying animals and plants that are native to that area. There was a dry forest, a rain forest, a farm, etc.

Here is our group of 15 first graders with their teacher, Mrs. Sobrado. Our tour guide was awesome. At one point, a little guy fell down and scratched his knee. The guide helped him up and told him how lucky he was to fall right where he did, because the bush right next to him was magic. He plucked off a leaf, rubbed it on his knee, and asked the little boy how it was feeling now with the magic on it. Of course, he felt much better. :) (I'm going to have to put that one in my own bag of tricks!)

Here are a few of my students showing me the snake skin. "Touch it, Miss! Touch it!" Ummm...no thanks!

A big hit with the kids was the finca (farm). They had goats, rabbits, chickens, pigs, a horse, some sheep, etc. It did smell like a farm, which they couldn't seem to get used to, but they loved all the animals. Here is Kelsie holding one of the friendlier rabbits.

There was also a butterfly garden area. This butterfly (which you can barely see...it's on my pinky) is a blue morpho. These are super common in this area and their roaming grounds stretch all the way to South America. The outside, as you can see, is a dark camoflauged brown, but the inside of their wings are a gorgeous bright metallic blue color. God's creations are simply stunning!!

This is the mushroom exhibit. Our rear-ends barely fit between those trees, but it was the perfect photo-op. The trip was fun, but exhausting. We both crashed on the way back to school, falling asleep. We awoke to 6 pairs of eyes staring at us. The little guy that fell down earlier asked me "Are you doing yoga?" ha ha...My mouth had dropped open and I must have been making an "Ohm" face as if I was meditating. Oops!

On another note...I STEPPED ON A GECKO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Tuesday morning, I went to the kitchen to get some strawberry jelly out of the fridge. I walked around the butcher block and stepped (BAREFOOT!) on something a little squishy. As I opened the fridge door, I lifted up my food and a little gecko ran out to hide under the fridge. This just might be the grossest thing that's ever happened. Ewwww