Getting The Ears Pierced

We took Emma to get her ears pierced for her 8th birthday. She knew it was coming and had been talking about it for months. There are no "Claires" around here that pierce ears because every baby girl just gets their ears pierced in the hospital here. So, we had heard that we would have to go to a tattoo parlor. I had to let this sink in for about a month, and then decided that they obviously know what they're doing, and what a fun story to tell. The tattoo parlors by our house didn't have the correct earrings, so we were told to go to the big mall in San Pedro where there is a jewelry store across the way from a tattoo parlor.

We bought the $30 gold earrings from the fancy jewelry store and walked across to the funky tattoo parlor. That's when Emma panicked. Here is Will having a talk with an uncontrollable Emma for almost an hour. She was hysterically crying, but wanting to get it done so bad at the same time. We finally told her that we were leaving and not coming back until she was 9. As we were walking into the parking garage, I looked at her and said, "last chance". She became really calm and determined and said "okay...let's do it".


She marched right in there and sat down to wait her turn. You can tell she's been crying for forever, but she is finally calm (thank goodness). Those guys in this shop were so patient watching us crazies walk in and out that store with a hysterical daughter for over an hour. 

I love all the tattoo options in the pictures on the wall behind them! haha


Nervous crying, but not hysterical. There are no ear piercing "guns" here. Just a gigantic, enormous, humongous needle that he shoved through her ear after pinching it first with pliers. She actually quit crying when he pierced them...she was more nervous crying before it even started. 

Jack thought the whole thing was awesome. He was such a trooper just hanging out in the store watching his sister be crazy. He says he would like one ear pierced when he's older so he'll look like a "rock-n-roll dude". Great.

Finally calm. But check out those pliers!!!! There was a huge mirror right across from her, so we just told her to keep her eyes closed. It was for the best.

Putting the earring in

Screwing on the back of the earring

Ahhh success!!! Whew. She was so incredibly happy when it was over. And so was her mom.

February Things

I'm pretty behind in blogging right now, but I'll catch up. The month of March is quite a blur probably because I felt pretty sick for most of it. At the end of February we found out that we're having another baby! Yay! Yes this was planned and yes it happened quickly. My due date is November 1st. I have been feeling pretty green most of the day and it's been really difficult finding things I want to eat. So when I don't eat I feel even sicker. And waking up at 5am to go speak Spanish every morning didn't help my sick feelings. I think we've turned a corner though and I'm finally feeling much better! Thank you so much for all of your thoughts and prayers. I wanted to update a little bit on what we did in February. More pictures and blogging coming soon.

Emma's favorite day of the year is the annual Father/Daughter dance at our church. Since we're in Costa Rica this year, Will asked her out on a date instead. She got all dressed up complete with makeup and perfume. I had to help her get ready in her room with the door shut so he wouldn't see her until he picked her up at the door.

Will brought her flowers and strawberries with sugar. He took her to eat at Tony Roma's in Escazu and after they went to the Escazu mall to buy Emma some white Converse tennis shoes for gym class at school. They had the best time and she told me all about it.

Look at that smile!

Once they left, this is what Jack looked like. When he could finally tell me what was wrong, he said he was crying because he didn't get any strawberries with sugar. Poor guy.

On a random Saturday, I decided to clean out the "secret room" that's under the stairs (door to the left). The owners of the house had stuff packed to the door and you couldn't even see inside. Emma and I got in there and cleaned it out and moved all their stuff to the outside storage room. It took us all day and we found some pretty strange stuff in there (adoption papers, snorkeling equipment, chlorometer with chemicals, sewing machine, published books by the owner of the house who died...wait, what if he died IN that room?!?!).

And this is what we did with it. There are shelves on the left and another "door to narnia" at the far end that leads to a private little courtyard. Will hung up Christmas lights so the kids could see. I couldn't believe it, but no we didn't find anything dead in there.

We put some pillows and blankets on the floor in the back and voila...a pretty cool secret room for the kids to play in. I even snuck in there one day to do my homework.

Emma in her school gym uniform and her new Converse shoes...with the mouse she got for Valentine's Day

I had to include that girl's crazy school schedule. It may be hard to read, but she takes different subjects at different times each day. I don't know how she does it! She loves having art, music, computer lab, Mandarin and French. She even gets several breaks each day to go buy snacks. It's such an answer to prayer that Emma loves that school.

Hanging out in the hammock on the balcony...our favorite place

Cute Jack in the mornings...with the monkey he got for Valentine's Day

Emma and Jack tattooing up Ivonne. They love it when she babysits them and she's such a trooper with them. She's always watching movies and playing Wii whenever they ask.

Ivonne with a kitty heart tattoo

And tons and tons of school work for us

Will studying

Me studying

Picture of the board in our kitchen with all our verb tenses on them. During first tri we only learned one verb tense...now we know 14. It gets pretty overwhelming....poco a poco. Only a few more weeks left in our second tri and then we get about two weeks off! Yay!