Pictures... finally. Forgive the lack of order.

This is the area that leads from the living room out to the kitchen/bathroom. Our bedroom is on the left. I think we'll call this our "courtyard." Sometimes there is a hammock hanging there and that old shower curtain on the left is Clavo's bed.

Here is our old host-sister Gloria Elena. She just turned 5 and she is holding her sobrina (neice) Francela who is almost 3 months old now. Francela's dad, is shown singing in the bottom picture.

We went to a beach once with our old host sister Francis and our friend Greg. Here they are walking on it.

I think this was Christmas Eve and you'll have to enlarge this and look closely to see it, but that ball of light that all of the chavalos (kids) are running from is a guy who puts a huge box over his body covered with fireworks and runs around in the streets. In the US he would need years of training, several permits and probably firefighters on hand. Here all he needs is someone to light him up.

So, we used to go to the baseball stadium and play frisbee with kids fairly often. One time Brenna said, "Do you think you can throw the frisbee over that wall?" It didn't make it, but luckily there is this random stairway that I could stand on (I'm about 20 feet off the ground) and we found three long branches that I tied together to get the frisbee (I wanted to just climb up and relive my pre-PC rock climbing days, but the tin roof was overhanging about 4 feet and the tin wall offered no purchase for my Chacos). The frisbee was about 6 meters away. Maybe you can see it in the picture, but I'm not sure. It was a good thing we weren't doing much in the beginning, as this took about an hour.

Here is our "bathroom" with the shower on the left and the toilet on the right. This is much nicer than many volunteers. Most have a latrine and no shower (a bucket). The doors were hastily built just before we moved in and don't really close.

Here is a look at the sweet closet I built in our bedroom. Very complicated construction. This took days.

Our kitchen. A two-burner hooked up to a gas tank and some dishes. We keep all of our food in big plastic boxes because of animals, and actually this is all covered up now at all times with a sheet to keep the dust off of the dishes. All of this came with the house.

We share a patio (yard) with our landlady's family and they have a chanchito (baby pig) tied up back there who Clavo likes to play with. Also notice the pile of burned trash in the foreground.

Yes, sometimes I even eat dinner in the hammock. This photo is a month or two old at our old host-family's house. That is a typical Nica meal of gallo pinto (rice and beans mixed together with oil), queso (a chunk of salty, squeaky cheese unlike anything we have in the US that I know of), and pan (bread). Most people eat this three times a day every day. Needless to say, I was ecstatic to start doing my own cooking when we moved into our own place.

Here is our sala (living room) before we moved in and painted. That open window faces the street.

Another view of the living room. The previous picture was taken from the doorway you can see in this picture. Our bedroom is back there. Yes, the house came with 4 sillas abuelitas (rocking chairs).

Here is a similar view after we moved in and painted. You'll notice our two hammocks. Also, we have pictures of the wedding and our previous life hanging on the brick wall in the background.

Same as the first house picture (above) only with paint.

Me standing in our front door. Notice the dirt street. We throw our waste water (from laundry and dishes) on the street to keep the dust down. If you click to enlarge this one, you should also be able to see Clavo in the doorway with me.

Here is Clavo in a box on a bus. We were transporting him from his old home to our new house, a trip that took 3 busses and about 4 hours. Isn't he handsome?

A scorpion on our bedroom floor. (1 of 3 so far) Including the tail it is probably 6 inches long.

Here is a tarantula being attacked by a huge wasp. That tarantula is about the size of Brenna's hand, so the wasp is huge! I'm not really sure what the wasp did to it, but it laid there and looked dead for about an hour and then I picked it up with a shovel to move it (it was right outside our back door) and it started running around.

There is a holiday here called Purisima that celebrates the virgin Mary. People go from house to house and shout ¿Quien causa tanta alegria? (Who causes all this happiness?) and the people reply: ¡La virgen Maria! and then they sing and the people give them candy or other goodies. Here are some guys singing at our neighbors house. The one on the right was our host brother, Javier.