Caleb Jonathan Fraze... Mi sobrino!

Just 5 days after returning to the States, on July 16th (a week earlier than the due date), at 8:43pm, my beautiful nephew, Caleb Jonathan Fraze, was born into this world! After nearly 24 hours of labor, my sister-in-law, Kendra, gave birth to a healthy baby boy that weighed in at 7 pounds, 3 ounces, and stretched out to 19 inches long! Que belleza de muchacho!

I just happened to be in Boulder the day that Kendra went into labor. We had planned to hang out and get coffee that morning, but my brother woke me up early to inform me that Kendra had been having contractions all night, and asked me to come over and be with her while he went into work! It just so happened that Jason had a HUGE meeting on Wednesday for which he had been preparing for weeks, and his boss threatened him that his baby better not decide to come on that day! Well, it's funny how things work out... and some things you just can't plan for! I spent a few hours with Kendra at their apartment. We played some scrabble and she called various family members to inform them of her progress. After an intense contraction Kendra started to feel nauseous and texted Jason in his meeting. He called a few minutes later and after talking with Kendra for a few minutes in the hall, his bosses gladly urged Jason to head home to care for his laboring wife!

We headed into the clinic to get Kendra checked out. Their midwife assessed the situation and informed us that Kendra was dilated to about 5cm! The midwife said that she could go home and wait it out for a couple more hours, or go ahead and check into the hospital and get prepared for the fun evening ahead! I stayed with Jason and Kendra for a few more hours in the hospital room. After Kendra and the baby were monitored, Kendra spent some time in the bathroom hot tub and the doctors urged her to allow them to install an entry port into one of her veins just in case an emergency were to arise. It turns out that Kendra has some pretty stubborn veins... and after about 10 tries and three different people, they finally managed to find a vein! Not surprisingly, the good little Boulderite granolas that they are, Jason and Kendra decided to do everything completely naturally! A little later the contractions started getting really intense, and I opted to leave the happy couple alone... not to mention the screaming was starting to scare me. I waited in the hallway for a while, but then my parents arrived and I joined them in the lobby to wait to meet our new family member.

Around 9pm I was getting really impatient, and dying to know what was going on! I begged the receptionist to go find out if there was any news of a new baby yet. She said that she wasn't at liberty to leak any info to us, but she went to the room to put a little guilt trip on the expecting dad to come give us an update. Around 9:20 Jason finally came out to tell us that he was a new dad to a beautiful little boy!

It's so incredible to be an aunt! And I feel so blessed that I was able to be here during this exciting time! I have already spent several days with little Caleb and am really enjoying getting to know him! Praise God for his faithfulness and provision! What an incredible gift!

To see more pictures of Caleb, check out my brother's online album at:

http://picasaweb.google.com/jdfraze/CalebSBirth

Final Thoughts

I returned home to beautiful Colorado on Friday, July 11th. It's hard to believe that this experience has already come to an end! It's amazing how fast time flies. Before leaving Costa Rica, I was required to complete a large packet of debriefing questions. I wasn't too excited about it, but at the end, it turned out to be a great way of reflecting on my experience and recognizing all of the ways that the Lord has changed me and grown me. Here are a few highlights and conclusions from the debrief.

Dominant Themes that God is revealing through my time in Costa Rica:

*God is BIG and Faithful
-He cares about the big and small issues, loves me more than I could ever comprehend, and loves everyone else more and better than I ever could.

*Following Christ (being His disciple) is a serious commitment
-It requires effort, time, discipline, and serious lifestyle changes (against the norm)

*Following Chirst (being His disciple) is a group effort
-I can't run the race on my own, I need a mentor in my life to challenge & encourage me, and I need to be pouring into others.

*Family is important, a gift from God
-I have a great (Christian) family and I cannot take that for granted. My family should be considered in ALL big life dicisions, and I should rely on them for fellowship, encouragement, prayer, counsel, love, friendship, and accountability.

*Kids (& old people) are a gift from God
-Life is so much richer when it is lived close to people of ALL generations!


Practical Next steps for following through on what God has shown me:

*Commit to daily morning quiet times
*Commit to finding a Godly female mentor
*Commit to purity & righteousness in all relationships
*Commit to making family a priority
*Commit to finding a place to volunteer my time
*Commit to being plugged into a church and involved in a small group


It is absolutely amazing to look back and testify to all that the Lord has done in and through me during my internship in Costa Rica. Thank you to everyone for your love and support and encouragement! I hope and pray that all of these lessons and convictions from God will have a significant and lasting effect on my life. God Bless!

"God is not unjust; he will not forget your work and the love you have shown him as you have helped his peole and continue to help them. We want each of you to show this same diligence to the very end, in order to make your hope sure. We do not want you to become lazy, but to imitate those who through faith and patience inherit what has been promised." (Hebrews 6:10-12)

Red, White and Blue... stripes, but no stars.

It's always an interesting experience to celebrate America's day of independence in a different country. This happens to be my 3rd 4th of July in 23 years out of the country. The first was when I was 10 years old on vacation with my family in Europe and consisted of our crazy drunken Scottish tour guide lighting off fireworks (with beer and cigarette in hand) somewhere in France. The second occured 2 years ago during my internship with Youth for Christ in La Paz, Bolivia (can't currently remember how we celebrated).

Here at EMI Costa Rica, we did not take the 4th off as a holiday, but we did however clock out 2 hours early for some fun and patriotic activities! We headed over to my boss Tom's house around 3pm. His 3 young kids had a whole afternoon of events planned. We started things off with an indoor obstacle course (it was pouring outside), then moved on to the revoluntionary war trivia contest, followed by a flag design contest. We then ate yummy grilled hot dogs, german potato salad (so good!), baked beans, and salad! After filling our plates with patriotic cake, we sat down to watch 'Facing the Giants' (a good football movie produced by a church in Georgia).

My host family picked me up from the 4th of July celebration to head to the next party. It just so happens that my host family brother turned 3 years old on the American independence day! We sat down together for dinner (which I skipped out on), then sang 'feliz cumpleanos' and cut up the cake that Lucy brought home (which I did not skip out on). A little later we broke out the 'funfetti' cupcakes which I had baked the night before for Walnercito (which I partook in as well, making it my 3rd type of cake for the night!). Lucy and Walner bought all sorts of new toys for Walnercito at the American toy store! The coolest (but unfortunately not the best for a 3 year old) was a 700-piece Lego set with directions to construct some awesome construction site equipment - a little office building, a dump truck, and an excavator. Chris and I spent about 2 hours assembling the new Lego toys (by choice... fun, frustrating, and addicting), while doing our best to fight off Walnercito and his urges to grab a hand-full of tiny pieces and half-assembled trucks and soliciting the help of the adults when necessary.

A fun 4th filled with good friends and 'family'. It would have been great to spend the holiday with my very loved and missed friends and family back home, but this was a nice substitute, despite the severe lack of pyrotechnics! Cheers.

The Blessing of Travel

I love to travel. And as a citizen of the United States, it is easy to take the privlege of travel for granted. The majority of the world does not have such a privlege, and there's nothing fair about it! I am so blessed to have traveled as much as I have. It's always so eye-opening and educational and fun to experience a new culture and place and people and food, etc. My friends and I are determined to do our best to not miss out on the chance to visit and know a few new places on this vast planet. Before we head back to the States, the other interns and I have quite the travel itinerary ahead. We spent the last weekend in San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua, we leave tomorrow for the Carribean coast of Costa Rica, and then we plan to cross the Panamanean border before heading back to Atenas in order to visit the Bocas el Toro islands. Only two weekends remain after that, which may include visiting another beach town in Costa Rica and/or returning to Tuis to visit the dear friends we met at language school. So exciting!

While it will be difficult to sum up all of these destinations in words, I will at least do my best to provide for you a photo journal of our travels. So please check out my Online Photo Album page (link to the left) to view pics from Nicaragua, and check back often for new additions!

Supervised Splashing!

For the last month or so, Steph and I have been teaching weekly swimming lessons at the local orphanage. We had some grand ideas about what and how to teach the valuable skill of swimming to the kids, but have come to find that our time at the orphanage is better spent supervising and playing than actually doing much teaching. But what the heck, at least we're all having fun!

We usually take a group of between 5 and 15 young kids (ages 2-6) to enjoy about an hour of splashing about in the 'big' swimming pool. These kids are pretty young and there's a bunch of them and the tias (women that care for the kids) at the orphanage are pretty paranoid (usually for good reason), so all of the kids are required to wear life jackets when playing in the 'big' pool. We do our best to give a couple quick lessons (blowing bubbles, kicking, etc), but the majority of the time is spent giving 'dragon rides' and loving on the kids and doing our best to help avoid any major injuries (only one split lip so far (-: ). The most challenging part of the whole ordeal is getting the kids in and out of their swim suits... it takes a while!

It's been so great to have this opportunity at the orphanage. For one, it gets Steph and I out of the office for a couple hours! But it's also such a blessing to hang out with the kids, get to know them, and hopefully show them a little bit of the love of Christ! And although the kids may not be expert swimmers, they are however leaps and bounds beyond the majority of Costa Ricans that have never learned how to swim! And based on the fact that a few of the kids used to be incredibly scared of water (even taking a bath!), I'd say they're doing pretty well! Enjoy the pics!

Family First

It's funny how life changes you... For as long as I can remember, small kids have always somewhat intimidated me, and I can never remember having a strong desire to ever have kids of my own. When my boss here in Costa Rica told me that I would be living with a 2 year old kid, I was a little nervous to say the least. But the Lord really does have a sense of humor sometimes. There have been some rough times with my small host family brother, but we have really grown close over the last several months. When I return home after work I am often greeted with jumps of excitement and a wet kiss on the cheek. We then spend the next hour or so running around the house, chasing each other or playing with toy cars and imaginary chickens. He really exhausts me at times, but he's such a joy!

Here in Costa Rica there are several things about the culture that really contrast that of the States, one of which is the importance of family! Don't get me wrong, I love my family, but the States as a culture really emphasize the importance of individuality and independence. It's very easy, once in that mindset, to take one's family for granted.... which is precisely what I have done.

Another big recent change has to do with travel plans. At the start of this internship in Costa Rica, I was 100% set on taking some time (maybe up to a few months) to travel around Latin America. What better time, right? Before getting sucked into the commitments of work, life, possibly a family some day. What could be better than seeing more of the world, learning about different cultures, and making new friends?

In November my brother and sister-in-law found out that they were going to have a baby! This news was quite a shock to me... and based on previously mentioned views about kids in general... I wasn't sure how to feel! ...so I just kinda brushed it off and went on with MY life and MY plans.

I don't want to get lost in the silly culture of the States anymore! I don't want to take my wonderful family for granted! I want to enjoy them and love them and grow with them! I want to enjoy the good times, the ugly times, the funny times, and the crazy times. I am so excited to be an aunt!

All of these new feelings and outlooks on life have lead me to a very difficult decision. My new niece or nephew is due to be born on July 23rd. My internship is scheduled to end on July 11th, just in time to get home to see my VERY pregnant sister-in-law and witness the first days of life for my niece/nephew.

I honestly don't know what I was thinking! I can't believe that I was planning on traveling instead of being with my family during this incredible and exciting time! I just hope that I make it in time and don't miss out on this beautiful time for my bro Jason, his wife Kendra, and my soon-to-be-grandparent parents.

I love you guys and hope you will forgive me for not sooner realizing the blessing that you are in my life! XOXOXO

Volcanoes and Beaches!

**In case you don't have the perseverance to make it to the end... check out the link to the left to view my photo album from the trip!

Last week my parents came to visit Costa Rica!!! It was great to see them and get a little taste of home to carry me through the end of my internship! Their visit was also a great excuse to do some of the traveling that I have been itching to do! This country is so beautiful and there is so much that I have left unexplored! Fortunately, this little excursion allowed me to cross a couple beautiful destinations off my list!

My parents took a non-stop red-eye flight from Denver that arrived in Costa Rica at 530am! They were joined on the flight by Steph's parents and sister. Even though they were completely exhausted when they arrived, their spirits were high and they were ready to start the adventure. We went directly from the airport terminal to the rental car lot to pick up our vehicles for the week. After a quick bite an Denny's (yes, you know the one), we hit the road!

The first leg of the trip involved a 3 hour drive on the narrow, curvy, fog-covered highway toward La Fortuna. The drive was gorgeous and amazingly uneventful. La Fortuna is a quaint little town that lies at the foot of Arenal Volcano, a quite impressive, lava-spewing monster that has been erupting everyday since its awakening in 1968. We pulled into town, struggling to pull our gaze away from the cloud-covered volcano, and quickly found our hotel.

After settling in and taking a quick walk around town while my dad caught up on some sleep, we rallied the troops and headed off to the Baldi Thermae hot springs. This was the cheaper of the hot springs options, but turned out to be absolutely incredible! If the other place is actually worth 3 times the price, I can't even begin to imagine the extent of its extravagence! There were dozens of pools at various temperatures ranging from 98 to 145 degrees!!! There were acres of beautiful tropical gardens surrounding the hot springs as well as the most extreme water slides I have ever seen and numerous bars that you can just swim on up to. We must have spent over 4 hours at that place... and it was still difficult to leave when they closed down!

The next day we woke up early to find the best deal on canopy ziplines. This is one of the largest tourist spots in the country, so there is no lack of options for the common tourist. We ended up finding the best (as several parties claimed) zipline experience in the country! The excursion consisted of ten ziplines, including the longest one in the country (980 m), a horse back ride, and frog & butterfly farms. It was such a blast!!! Being quite the adventure seeker... this one tops the charts for me (even surpassing skydiving)!!! The ziplines were fast and exhilarating, and the incredible wildlife was the icing on the cake! During our couple hour excursion through the rainforest, we spotting several animals including a sloth, a blue jeans dart frog, and toucans! So awesome.

It turns out that Steph's dad (Steve) is quite the social butterfly, able to strike up a conversation with absolutely anyone that he comes across! As an introvert, it was very interesting to witness him in action and benefit from his boldness! All of us ate at a small, locally-owned restaurant right across the street from our hotel 3 times in 2 days! As a result, and with Steve's help, we ended up making pretty good friends with the owner and waiter of the restaurant. On our last night in La Fortuna, Steve invited our new friends over to our hotel for drinks and conversation. It was so fun to get to know them and learn more about each other's countries and cultures. It was especially memorable because a local high-school musical group was staying at the hotel that night and entertained us for hours with traditional Costa Rican serenades. The night made complete with a dance from my new tico friend and we finally turned in around 2am.

Our experience in La Fortuna was beautiful. We were very blessed by relatively clear skies, being able to see the tipity top of the volcano at several different instances, beating the typical visibility odds. It was sad to leave, but we were beach-bound and ready to see more of this incredible country.

On Sunday afternoon, after about 4.5 hours on the road, we rolled into the beach community of Tamarindo. We quickly checked into our hotel, dropped our stuff and headed to the beach for sunset! It seemed a little odd that we didn't really see anyone else swimming in the water at sunset, but we decided to take a quick dip anyway. The water was warm (seriously... like getting in the tub) and the sunset was breathtaking.

The next morning we made our way to the tourist booth to plan out our next few days. Steph, Jen, and I immediately booked a surf lesson for that afternoon! I was pretty nervous about the whole situation... being from the Rocky Mountains and fairly intimidated by the big blue ocean! Despite my nerves and fears, we had an awesome experience. Our instructor was very patient and knowledgeable and encouraging. I was stoked to pick it up pretty quick and catch several waves. I think the years of snowboarding may have helped! It was sad to see our lesson end, but it would not be our last time on a surfboard.

The next day we enjoyed an afternoon catamaran excursion. We sailed for several miles to find a calm and prestine snorkeling location! We spent almost an hour marveling at the incredible underwater world. God is so creative! We saw some incredible things including blow fish, angel fish, parrot fish, puffer fish, octupus, and an eel. After eating some yummy food, we pulled in the anchor and headed back toward shore. The experience was topped off with an incredible golden sunset! Unbelievable.

We planned to hit the road the following day and explore another beautiful beach town further down the coast. However, some sickness in Steph's family convinced us that it would be wiser for us to avoid any extended travel and take it easy in Tamarindo for a couple more days. We finished out with week with several days of surfing and a small snorkling excursion to a quiet beach called Playa Conchal, named after its unique entirely shell-pieces sand. We thoroughly enjoyed our time at the beach and my shoulders are sufficiently sore from the five straight days of paddling around on a surfboard. It was also such a treat to be visited my large families of howler monkeys right outside our beautiful hotel!

On Saturday morning we finally bid farewell to the beach and headed inland to introduce my parents to my little town called Atenas. It was really cool to see my parents meet my host family! When we left their house after dinner my mom started crying! She said she was so happy that I lived with such a nice family... Aw. I also took my parents to the little church that I attend here in Atenas. I think they appreciated the experience, but it was a long service entirely in Spanish! Oh well, at least they got to witness the church sing happy birthday to me and enjoy some cake!

It was sad to say goodbye when my parents had to head back home, but I am so thankful to have shared this place with them. Now it seems like no time at all until I will be back with them in Colorado. Love you mom and dad!

P.S. Check out the link on the left to my online photo albums!!! Now you can see many more pics, with much less effort on my part! Enjoy!