And... we're back.

It's been about a week since we returned to Pittsburgh.  The end of our stay was busy. Mike had to leave a week before the rest of us to start a new job, and Martha and the kids and I packed up while trying to finish up my work project, return bicycles, clean house, say goodbyes, and work through all the transitions.

In the weeks before we left, the kids had a project for environmental science making ecobricks (where you fill plastic bottles with plastic bags and wrappers to make building materials out of trash rather than throwing them in a landfill). It was more fun and more useful than I expected, and Oren, who really really likes mass production (he has long liked making a particular craft and then doing it over and over once he has the hang of it), wants to keep it up...

There were lots of assemblies for the start of the Costa Rican independence day season, which seemed to kick off with the Dia de Nicoya (here are preschoolers dressed up and reciting a poem) and goes through independence itself the 15th of September (which we will miss, but which had all sorts of parades and bands and flags and formalities in store).

In early August, Oren turned 8 and a half...

And a couple of weeks later, Eytan turned 12.

Mothers day in Costa Rica is also in August, and it definitely seemed to be a way bigger deal than in the U.S.  First of all, it's an official holiday from school/work. And then the kids' school organized all sorts of things (this one from Li'el's class).

Eytan's class threw a big surprise bash (his class teacher seems to really like parties) complete with dinner and music and performances and dancing.

Li'el's class had had a party meanwhile for all the first-half-of-year birthdays.  

And all the kids' classrooms did big goodbye parties for them when we were leaving.

As did the leather workshop where Martha had been working.

And we spent a day doing our own goodbye party at a nearby swimming pool/picnic area with our neighbors.

I have to say, in the end, all the kids learned some Spanish.  We probably stayed just long enough for them to start to get comfortable (Noa, who was maybe the most resistant to the language shift, began speaking more in Spanish near the end, and Oren, for whom it was also a bit harder to switch, also got more comfortable).

Li'el and Eytan were maybe the saddest to leave, as Li'el had immersed pretty well (friends picture below)

and Eytan had ended up with a group of super nice, super close friends (who came over for a birthday party for him before we left).

So, although I don't think I/we would have wanted to stay permanently in Costa Rica, we were sad to go, and I was sad for the kids being sad to go, and at the same time, I was happy that they were sad, because it means they (probably) had a good experience overall. I will miss things like the internet company coming to our house to pick up the monthly payment and the lady who delivers eggs on Friday, and more importantly the ability to walk a lot and commute everywhere by bike (here are pictures from my last couple of months' walks around campus and nearby areas). 

I may not miss all the millions of special occasions at the kids' school and the special things needed for each one (outfits, money, snacks) which were always just a little bit last minute and hard to keep up with. And te week before we left, a new hospital opened near our house, and on the day they transferred patients from the old hospital, it was ambulances and helicopters all day long. It quieted down after that although it meant our neighborhood had just gotten a little busier and more traffic-y than it had been (that said, it also meant greater frequency of buses, which was convenient). I wonder how it will look if/when we get to go back and visit.

Before we left, we took our last shuttle bus into Turrialba

for a last trip to the market,

and a last ice cream treat

at the park,

a last round at the playground,

a last supermarket visit,

a last hammock-squish back at home,

and then eventually, a last walk to school.

The trip back itself was mostly uneventful, the hardest part really being the car ride to San Jose, but then we had dinner with a friend of mine from grad school who met us in the city.

The flights were all easy (unlike all the missed flights and airport floor overnights we had had with other similar trips) and the kids (and the mama) did great. 

And then... somehow, we were back.

Riding home from the airport, the cars and roads felt super fast and smooth, and when we got home, our refrigerator and microwave seemed enormous. It's shockingly dark early in the mornings, and we are trying to remember to throw toilet paper in the toilet and not the garbage can. But now everyone is back in school again and we are searching the house and shed to find missing socks and hangers.  

Mike's job seems good so far, and mine seems about what it always is. I had been supposed to be one class short for teaching this semester, so I had decided to take a class myself, but two weeks ago I got an extra teaching class added on, so I'm a bit overbooked. 

On the one hand, it's like we never left, we just popped back in time to our lives here, and on the other hand, there's a weird inkling or tugging in the back of the head that something was and is different. For 2-3 years before my originally planned sabbatical (which would have been 2020), and certainly since then, this Costa Rica trip has been on the horizon. And now, after maybe 5-6 years wait, it's in the rearview mirror. So it's weird to be back to where we were, but with memories rather than anticipation.

And after starting 5th, 4th, 2nd, and kindergarten twice in one year without finishing them, the kids are now entering 6th, 5th, 3rd, and 1st grades. Noa had her "rose ceremony" yesterday, where the graduating 8th graders give roses to incoming 1st graders as a welcome. 

And with that, we have four school aged kids, back in the U.S., with memories of Central America and a new school year ahead. I may end up being slower again with blog updates...