A month down celebrated with a trip to the beach and a boys vs. Mom futbol match!

From a wall painting at Soda Jaco Rustico

We celebrated a month down and my birthday by trying out a brand-new 'beach highway' that put us on the Central Pacific in an hour.  The new Caldera highway is fantastic. Because we had to wait until school was out at 3pm, we headed to the nearest beach town to San Jose, a place by the name of Jaco. It's improved over the years. Still just a small town, it was loaded with the classic surf shops because Jaco is justifiably known far and wide for its surf breaks. 

J couldn't get enough.

                                                                 We had a great time.

The view of the beach outside our place.

We stayed down at the quiet South end of Jaco and it was really uncrowded, clean, low-key and plain old fun. I had happened to meet a Mom at Baby-O's school last week who had just left Jaco after living there for a decade; she pointed us to great condos, La Paloma Blanca, that we were able to score at a good price.

Gigi spent a hunk of time sorting out synthetic division (?????).  They were given three pages of equations to do do over the weekend. Here's a peek:

A break after an intense month getting settled and starting school.

Gigi assures me Baby-O is going to kill me in the future for posting the following however a good laugh is never to be wasted!

The next laugh is at my expense. J joined the local futbol school in our town and on Sunday morning the boys played the Moms to celebrate Costa Rican Mother's Day. 

It was a blast!

                                               We even had a shoot-out! J and I both scored!

We finished with a BBQ on the sidelines. 

Coach Mario of La Escuela de futbol de Salitral

Coach Mario has been super kind to J and invited him to play up on Thursday evenings with the 'big boys'. J towers above his age group in height but I think it's J's handy left-footedness that was cause for the invitation. He said, 'You know J's surdo? (lefty) That is hard to find!' This Thursday will be his first practice with them, rain witholding.

We've been here for a month now and I'd say our laughing is increasing by the day. A good sign. The kids received their progress reports from Blue Valley and are doing an outstanding job. I've found a butcher, a baker not a candlestick maker. . .yet!

We miss you!