YWAM Costa Rica fellowship weekend

This blog is a bit late but we didnt want you all to miss out on our YWAM Guanacaste adventure. Two Saturdays ago we headed out to Guanacaste, the northwestern province of Costa Rica, to spend a weekend with all the staff members of YWAM Costa Rica and to celebrate the inauguration of the new YWAM base in Quebrada Honda, a small farming community on the Nicoyan peninsula. There were over 100 of us who attended and it was a special time of fellowship and building relationships. It seems that God is doing something special here in Costa Rica and drawing together an incredible team of people from many different nations. 

We started out the weekend with a bang celebrating the marriage of one of our Costa Rican staff members to another Ywamer from the States. Here they are getting a ride to the wedding reception via ox cart. 

From there we all headed out towards Guanacaste, one of the most beautiful parts of Costa Rica. Here's a photo of the main house. 

Part of the event was the pig that they butchered the day before the event, and then placed in a pit to slowly cook for the next 16 hours. As it was a bit of an experiment the poor pig got a bit overcooked but it was still excellent!

The boys had a blast as they were 2 of about 25 kids. They spent the weekend  running around the property and looking at the cows.

The other major event of the weekend was a jungle hike that start out by fording several creeks with in 15 passenger vans and ended with us hiking through chest high water at dusk trying to escape a bees nest. Karen and Gabriel both were stung but not too badly and every one eventually made it back to the van. One more Costa Rican adventure under out belts!








Karen and i had a great time as well hanging out with old friends and making new ones. Over all the weekend was a lot of fun. We finished it out with a time in prayer together to dedicate the new base and its directors to the Lord.

We will will post again soon with some more ministry orientated updates and a rundown of what this next year will look like. Thanks for reading, many blessings,
Douglas, Karen, Gabriel and Zachariah

Crazy Weather in Costa Rica

This morning I woke up, put on wool socks my sweats, a long sleeve shirt, and a sweatshirt then wondered, "when did I move back to Oregon?"  I'm not sure I remember such cold weather the whole time we have lived here in CR. This cold front is following a week of terrible rain that has caused much flooding, many landslides and led to over 20 deaths. We are all thankful it seems the rains have slowed and now we are just cold.

Please join us in prayer for all the families that have lost there homes and or family members.

Hello Again from Costa Rica !

As we were looking over our blog's we became very aware that we have been very poor communicators over this whole last year and that we have missed out on sharing with you a lot of what has happened over the last seven months. As you all know from the few blogs we have written we have had a very busy and some times very difficult year. But as we look back over all that has happened it is exhausting and very exciting all at the same time. We decided the best way to catch you up is with pictures, so here is a look at some of the events in our lives over the last several moths.
 

Back in January my (karen's) cousin Travis came for an overnight visit. It was great to get caught up as it had been many years since we had seen each other.

Gabriel lost his first tooth in Feb. and his second a few months later.

We took a quick trip to the beach at the end of Feb. before Douglas left for Argentina.

 

My Parents came for a visit while Douglas was away. Mom stayed 2 whole Months!!  What a blessing!!

My mom and I redid our front garden area while Douglas was away.

My mom also finished the mosaic she and I had started the year before.

Gabriel participated in a small competition at his gymnastics gym and got first place in his age group. there were only two others his age in his group but he was still very excited.

                  On the 4th of July we celebrated Zachariah's 4th birthday. Some of our closest friends here in CR recently moved to the coast so we went and celebrated with them. We got to go to a fire works show at a resort near their house that caters to Americans. It was the boys first real fireworks show and it was great! Riah thought they were all for him.

July also brought the start of the school for Douglas.

 

In August we celebrated the 50th Anniversary of YWAM here in CR we hosted the event for all of central America. It was a great honor and a lot of work for every one on the base. Loren and Darlene the founders of YWAM were here to lead the event and it was an amazing time of remembering God's faithfulness in the first 50 years and looking forward to the next 50.

The last weekend of Aug. we took part in a retreat for the bcc students. They spent the whole weekend reading Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua and Judges. They read out loud and at one point Gabriel got to read a chapter or repeat what someone else read. 

Douglas and I and the the two other staff members did all the cooking so the students could focus on their reading. It was great to be able to help out and be part of the weekend.

September brought Gabriel's 6th Birthday and a new skate board!

Dress up day at school."I'm King Daved" This year Zachariah is in pre- kinder and Gabriel is in Kinder. School here runs Jan.- Dec. so we are coming to the end of the year in just over a month.

Just a  week ago After all this craziness, God blessed us with a whole week to just get away as a family ! we spent only the first night of our trip in a hotel and then spent the next 7 days at a condo on the other side of the city from where we live. 

we went out to eat,

We played in the pool,

or laid in the sun.

Zachariah learned to ride his bike with out training wheels and Gabriel who had just learned got more comfortable on his.

We spent one whole day at an amusement park just outside of San Jose and the rest of the time we....

Played games and we even went to the movies one night.




 These few pictures don't tell even half of the story but they fill in a few of the holes.

In truth it has been a very trying year as we are just starting out full time with YWAM and we feel how we have been under attack as a family as we try to start this new bible core course and as i step in to my role at the base working with the  staff and doing a lot of logistical stuff.
We Thank God for all his protection and provision over the last months and trust him for the future. 
Thanks to all of you that have been praying for us and supporting us in so many ways we could not do what God has called us to with out you.

The Bible school starts at last!

After a long three months in Argentina and a month of preparation, the first Bible Core Courses  at YWAM San José, Costa Rica started this last Monday.

This is our classroom about two weeks ago. We have had a lot of fun getting everything together although it has been a tremendous amount of work. In addition to translating materials from English to Spanish we also have been trying to collect books for a library for the school and preparing a classroom. There were short term teams staying in our classroom up untill the tuesday before the schoolstarted. So in a little less than a week it was transformed from bran new bare walls to a beautiful classroom.

The picture on the right is of my two fearless partners. Melinda is from YWAM Perth wich is in Australia. She is helping us pioneer the BCC here in CR. She has lead over a dozen BCC's and her expertice is invaluble. The other lady is Grace from south Korea. It has been an incredible blessing to have her as part of the team.









Here are some of our students helping us to paint, clean up the cobwebs and sweep up the floor. Most of our students have either been staff at the base or students in other schools meanning they were all avalible to help out and it was such a blessing.

Between the 7 students and three staff, we have 8 nations represented: Costa Rica, El Salvador, Honduras, the USA, Canada, Saint Lucia, Cameroon and South Korea. 

To start the school we heard the books of the New Testament recited in Spanish, English, French and Korean. We are very happy that this school will be a truly iternational experience. This has its benefits and its challenges to be sure. 

The first couple weeks of the school are spent learning the basic steps of the inductive bible study method which is the the heart of the course. This week we are reading the book of Acts, breaking it down into its basic elements and then putting it back together so that we can better understand it. For today we have distributed the book between the students who are writing out titles for each paragraph in their portion of the book. The idea is to capture the big picture and the general flow.                                                                                                       

 To kick off our school and the Discipleship Training School that is starting, the base had a great party including a traditional costa rican meal, music,and dancing .







We could certainly use your prayers during this time. It is an incredibly busy time with the school and all the ministry that Karen is involved with. We are trying to find balance in this new season of life while still recovering from 3 months apart.

Thanks for your continued intrest in our crazy lives here in CR,
Douglas