feliz cumpleanos

 Oh my did I just have a great birthday. Lisa and I have been so lucky to have made the most amazing friendships on our travels. We had a few of them over for some salsa and salsa on Saturday night 

It started with this guy- my 5th grade class gave me a card- uncanny resemblance eh?

Lily had the formidable task of teaching us to salsa. She began with the basic how to move your hips

I love this next picture because not only are my hips not moving like Lilys- I am facing the wrong direction! Lily said we would start with some merengue and then move to salsa which is a bit more complex. After seeing me she said "maybe tonight we just dance the merengue."

But slowly I started to get it and didn't step on anyones toes.

Josh can do it with his eyes closed!

Mike and Stacy cutting the rug!

Tim and Nadia- the naturals- they were clearly ready to proceed to the salsa but hey... its my party!

 Great angle on this one- Sean has devil horns!

Time for cake. Lisa Allen had asked Wilder what kind of cake her parents like, thinking along the lines of chocolate or carrot cake. Wilder said "I dunno, my dad likes sloths."
Totally rocking this challenge Lisa made a gluten free sloth cake- so amazing I had to pull out the sweater.

Earlier in the day we stopped by the pinata store to get some plastic cups and fake moustaches. Lisa and the owner both said buenos tardes and laughed knowingly. That should have been my hint that she had already been pinata shopping that day.

It was great- I didn't break any glass or hit Cesar while he made that paper mache dance!

here I am going in the wrong direction- kind of like when I merengue.

getting warmer

got it! and it was full of hard to get items like toilet paper- you should have seen the scramble!

Oh my god- I love Lisa so much- imagine, she puts up with my dancing, my newfound sloth fancy, and well... me! One lucky guy.

 Jessica, Julie, and Cesar with one up to no good grin!

Brandon, Claudia, and Josh

Ian and the grumpy old man of the rum table. "who stole my limes?"

 Jeffrey, Darren, Sean, and Kimber

 Van and Mike

Remember earlier when you read the part about going to the pinata shop for cups and moustaches and you thought "why moustaches?"

well, no reason.

So thanks everyone for being our friends- that was one fun party. and how in the heck did I not get one photo of the Stein-Rosses? They were being very ninja that night.

and what does Luca think the next morning when he finds a stache? that it is all absolutely normal

I've got two tickets to paradise

Bug Paradise that is. Butterflies and pretty flowers, moonbeams and rainbows. As you saw from the previous post I was a bit taken by the numerous sloths at Casa Maria- bug paradise. But honestly they were not the best part- neither were the butterflies/ moonbeams/ etc. The best part was the chance to spend time with great people from ECA who have become dear friends of ours. and thats not the rum talking people- we are so fortunate to have made the connections we have over the years. Oh and also good night hugs from Cormac, those were pretty cool too.

Next year these families will be scattering across the globe: China, Poland, Venezuela, Colorado. There are a few missing from the picture but it was hard to get everyone in the same place for very long- and the kids? Forget it- they were running all over the place- chevere!

We got to go on a cool excursion in the big "Macina" to see how chocolate is made. Here is my brief recap:
1) Hire a good driver

2) Park. (nicely done Cormac!)

3) Find the good beans (these ones are as large as Elka!)

 4) Walk around a bit- it takes time for the beans to get just right.

5) Put the beans in a warm box covered with banana leaves so they get warm and squishy and start to ferment. Seriously? who first thought this would improve the flavor.

6) Dry out the beans (at this point most of these beans get sold to a factory in Europe- but he keeps a few on hand)

7) Grind the beans (as we all know steps 7-9 all require oompa loompas, but it being carnival they apparently had the day off)


8) Smoosh the beans into oil and powder.

9) Put the powder in here and magically turn it into chocolate (again- oompa loompas needed)

Lisa did such a good job listening to the owner speaking only in spanish- you can see her intent expression- just waiting to hear the phrase: "ahora es el tiempo for comer la chocolate!"

"say it... say it."

 So thanks Shayne, Diane, Jess, Chris, Sean, Kris, Ian, and Maya for a great trip and great friendship. Come visit us in Colorado soon, Lisa and I can be your Gaby and Norbert.

Here are a few more

taking a moment to give thanks to the coffee bean- oh how I love you so.

 

Shayne and I both were quite upset when we were not given the memo to bring our butterfly nets like this guy was. I think we coulda taken his Shayne- I think we coulda. just sayin.

Sloth porn

Just got back from a 4 day weekend with a fabulous group of teachers from ECA. I will devote another post to our time at Posada Casa Maria, aka Bug Paradise. But I just need to first regale you with all of the sloth pictures. This is the same place where I saw my first sloth last year- and well they must have known I was coming back because they welcomed me with 3 toed open arms. I fully realize that most of you won't be able to make all 22 photos- I fully realize that this post is mostly for me (and Susan Cannon!)

Enjoy!

action shot- see how fast it climbs

lovely silhouette  

 Oh but wait- just when it couldn't get any better- a baby sloth!

Hide-n-sloth

hanging upside down eating! legend.

"you see this branch? this is a good branch."

I gained an expert eye of which tree they would be in: hint* check the bark*

perfect tree to find a sloth in

not going to find any sloths in this tree

So just one more to leave you with- Sean spotted this one and believes it was giving birth. I would have waited to see the new born but figured that some humans are in labor for about 24 hours so in sloth time that could be weeks! In any case it was nice to know that a new generation of sloth is being born today... tomorrow... you know, soon.

you could see more of the birth from up close- but I didn't want to gross y'all out.