SHERWOOD FOREST

During our stay in North Carolina there was the cutest picnic gathering for Memorial Day. The wooded community that my parents will be living in is called Sherwood Forest and continues the theme throughout the entire community, as you can see with the Robin Hood Barn where the picnic was located. It really is quite cute and made for such a quaint picnic. My brother, his wife, and I only got to spend a few days down there but we already know we can't wait to go back!

NORTH CAROLINA VACATION

A few weeks after the fact but .. for Memorial Day Weekend, my parents, brother, sister-in-law, and I all came together in my parents' new house in North Carolina. When my brother and I were kids, this was our family vacation spot and many years later, my parents decided to purchase a house here! We had so much fun exploring this lake and the forest around it that we had spent hours playing in when we were children. We both decided that everything looked just a little bit smaller now than before ;)

I have many more pictures from these three days of vacation so be prepared for a few more posts with lots of pictures of the North Carolina scenery that I couldn't get enough of.

a mish mosh of vacation pictures

here is another little splattering of vacation pictures from when my parents were visiting. there were probably about 3 million pictures taken those few days by the four of us so i'm trying to give you as much as possible without giving you everything.

so we're starting off with some sloths because i certainly love them and i know at least one other person reading this loves them too. so these are for you, girl. then we head to some downtime at the lovely hotel restaurant where we quickly turn to a little jungle hiking action, veer towards some kindle reading, piña colada-sipping, pool lounging, and finally an airplane restaurant (we did not eat there .. just took the picture).

so there you have it. this may or may not be the last vacation picture post. i mainly just want to keep thinking that i am on vacation instead of back at work. today was kind of a wonky workday, as most first workdays are after a lovely vacation. but there is a strong chance i am moving into my new classrooms tomorrow! fingers crossed everyone.

sloths, iguanas, and monkeys, oh my!

like i said yesterday, the hotel we stayed in at manuel antonio was called costa verde. it is one of the coolest hotels i have ever been to. it is literally right in the middle of the jungle and the property is huge. they have four or five different areas of rooms, three different pools, an incredibly delicious restaurant, and the best part ... tons of animals!

thats right. since it was built in the jungle and they didnt destroy much of the surrounding land, many of the animals just hang out right on the property. my favorite though, the sloths. they are just too cute! the hotel's slogan is "still more monkeys than people" however i didnt actually see any monkeys on the property (my dad did though) i saw a ton of monkeys at the beach. there were however, probably more iguanas than people.

that picture with all the leaves actually has a sloth in it! you can see his little head somewhere in there while he was looking down at us. it was my goal to see a sloth on this trip and i saw two! also, those monkeys were actually that close to the camera. they were not afraid of the people at all and actually got close enough to steal a bag of potato chips from someone!

even more vacation pictures to come tomorrow ;)

a little vacation

soo sorry i've been mia for a while. but school has been kicking my butt. my annual plan was taking forever and thank god i got a little extension to help me finish it. not to mention all the normal lesson plans, test making, test and project grading, etc etc. so needless to say i have been a little busy ... 

 

not to mention that my parents are here!!! they have been here since last wednesday and are leaving tomorrow morning :(  but also another reason why i just havent had time to write in here! we've been having plenty of fun though, don't you worry. my parents met paris's parents for the first time (hence the picture above). paris's mom and sisters had a nice meal prepared at home and all the sisters served us while me, paris, my parents, and his parents sat down to eat. even though there is a little bit of a language barrier i think everything went really well and everyone seemed to be getting a long great.

so since this week has been holy week here in costa rica (easter week aka vacation for students and teachers thank youuu) i have had off from work and my parents planned a little vacation to the beach! i suggested manuel antonio because it is the much nicer of the few beaches i have been to here in costa rica and i am pretty familiar with it now. i suggested the hotel costa verde where paris and i and some friends stayed a few months back. my parents LOVED the hotel. here is just a preview of the view from the hotel restaurant.

i'm going to save the rest of the hotel pictures for tomorrow because right now blogger is giving me a really hard time about uploading my pictures. but i will leave you with some pictures from the crocodile bridge on the way to the beach. there is a bridge that is famous for having crocodiles under it! sometimes there are only one or two but this time there were a ton! and some really really big ones. 

 

 

and for everyone who asked me if these crocodiles that we are laying on are real ... they are not! don't worry.

enjoy!!