Pura Vida

Sometimes in life God steps in and gives you just what you need.  We have had a hell of a year and for the moment we stand on the other side of it.  This weekend my husband and I stood on top of a mountain and proclaimed our victory.  We made it through what has been the hardest year ever. We are stronger, ever so much wiser and quite frankly pretty darn proud.  Did we have some hiccups along the way, heck yah, but were it not for those, we couldn't stand as tall knowing we pushed on through them.  We sat high in the mountains overlooking the ocean and sang our praise.  For all those days lying on the floor begging for mercy, my throat so swollen with fear and tears that I couldn't talk; we were given 5 solid days of relief.  I remember stopping once and looking over at Dave saying "this here...it's heaven honey" as we gazed out watching the rain fall upon the rainforest with the Pacific ocean as its background.  If I close my eyes I can feel the sheer peace that radiated throughout us while we were there. There was no need for words. Our friends surrounding us, we were silent. Taking it all in. Each one of us in "our happy place". 

Greens were vividly bright. The air so light. We slept with the house wide open. We had "cockytails" by night and woke at 6 am because who wants to waste the day sleeping in a place as gorgeous as Costa Rica. Maybe we'd nap mid day out by the pool after brunch...

Maybe we would all go for a swim. Either way, it was up to us. No clocks. No worries!

We laid out bananas to corral the monkeys to come join, the iguanas thanked us too.

Pura Vida.  That's what they say in Costa Rica. It means THE GOOD LIFE.  It was in fact the good life and we enjoyed every single solitary moment of it.  We ziplined through the rainforests. We hiked through the mountains.  We rested.  We were rejuvinated.  We were so very, very grateful!

And when we boarded the plane home we were overflowing with excitement to get home to our babies. I walked through the door and Austin grabbed my face in his hands and said "Mommy did you miss me? I missed you." I realized then that as amazing as Costa Rica was, nothing compares to hearing that.  I was reminded the grass may very literally be greener on the other side, but it certainly isn't better!

We should all be so lucky to see this:

 So that we when we return home restored to hear the squeals of delight, we are able to stop and feel the gratitude.  

Pura Vida, yep, we have the good life!