Diana's Costa Rica Blog: Angel Tree

Monday, December 29, 2014

Christmas in Costa Rica - 2014

Another busy Christmas has come and gone and soon it will be New Year's Eve and a brand new year will be ushered in.

This year, we once again participated in the Angel Tree program. We selected two "angels" from the tree and bought each one a gift. Our angels were a two year old girl and a nine year old boy. I enjoyed buying the presents that they had asked for. I believe there were around 350 children who received gifts and had a great time at the party where Santa made an appearance and handed out all the presents. We have to thank all the volunteers who help make it happen.

Our Angel gifts.

For Christmas decorations, I hung our usual twinkle lights on the hedge. I have a new decoration this year - a tree made from driftwood and decorated with more twinkle lights. It was made by our friend, neighbor and fellow artist, Pete Snyder. He collects the driftwood from the beaches around Jaco and fashions them into trees.

Pete's driftwood tree.

Our friends, Diane and John, invited us to their house on December 21 for Christmas dinner with turkey and all the fixings. Great food and great friends.

Cocktails before dinner at Diane and John's house.

The following day saw us heading to a Christmas party at our neighbor's house. These same super neighbors served us another Christmas dinner on December 25th. It was a sit down dinner, served outside by the pool. All the tables were beautifully decorated. There was turkey, a ham, all kinds of different side dishes, yummy desserts.

Merry Christmas from us, Diana and Lance!

It's so amazing to be celebrating Christmas in a tropical country. It is something I wish everyone could experience at least once.

Feliz Navidad, everyone.

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Wednesday, January 1, 2014

Christmas, 2013, and The New Year

Christmas is an easy holiday here in Costa Rica, at least for us. When I think of all the work involved in having Christmas in Canada, I prefer our new style.

There are a lot of artificial Christmas trees here and we don't have one, because it would be another "thing" that has to be stored and hauled around if we move. I have two strings of LED lights and they go on the hedge and look nice twinkling in the dark tropic night. We will put them away on January 2nd.

This year, we participated in the Atenas Angel Tree Project, an initiative started by Tina Newton, owner of Su Espacio. This project provides the disadvantaged children of Atenas with a Christmas present and a party with pizza, cookies, a visit from Santa, an entertainer ... all the things we took for granted when growing up. The childrens' gift requests are printed on a paper angel, along with their age, and hung on a tree. We selected two - a boy and a girl. The boy wanted a ball (soccer, we assumed) and a truck and the girl wanted a remote control car (cool!). I heard that one little boy asked for nothing more than a new pair of shoes.

We found everything in one shop in Atenas. Then I made 50 cookies for the party. Over 355 children were there. Thank you, Tina, and all the volunteers who make this a big day for the children to remember. It was a pleasure to go shopping for the two kids, especially because it was not done in a giant mall and we were supporting a local store owner.

For Christmas dinner, we invited neighbors Tony and Rose Mary and our Canadian friends, Diane and John. Our tiny oven was a challenge for my ambitious main course (seafood baked in pineapple shells) and dinner was served a bit later then I wanted. I would like to try the recipe again in a full sized oven. Lance kept everyone calm with his excellent piña coladas. Rose Mary brought appetizers and Diane contributed her brownies with ice cream. Even Barney the cat and Scruffy the dog joined us - they walked down to our house with Rose Mary and Tony (their owners).

We received our annual fruit basket from our taxi driver and friend, Mario. Love the grapes! Mario's daughter recently married Jorge ... I did a post on the wedding in November.

And now it is 2014 .... we are looking forward to the new year in Costa Rica. The dry season is here, lots of tourists, school is out .... beautiful days as usual.