22nd Birthday in Costa Rica!

Yesterday morning I decided to go into Santa Elena and visit the Orchid Garden.  Here at the orchid garden they have a collection of more than 425 different species of orchids.  Of course not all of them were flowering but I was able to see a lot of beautiful orchids and learn a lot more about them.  Each species was identified with its scientific name and I was able to see species that are endemic to Monteverde as well as saw the smallest orchid in the world!  Below are pictures of that!  I was also planning on going to a couple of other exhibits but July 25th is also a Costa Rican Holiday:  Guanacaste Day. To mark the annexation of Guanacaste from Nicaragua in 1824.

In the afternoon I decided to take my family out for ice cream for my birthday so here you can see 3 of the 4 kids (the other daughter was at play practice).  Sury and I decided to share brownie delight which was brownie, chocolate ice cream, hot fudge, oreo cookie crumbles, and homemade whipped cream.  (I think we got all of our calories for the week!)

But we finished it without a problem!

We had a good dinner consisting of fresh fish that Tarcissio (the dad) brought back from the coast.  He had to go there yesterday to pick up a package.  So we had fish and then when we were done eating out came the cake.  I had no idea this was going to happen but I really enjoyed it none the less.  So I was sung Happy Birthday in 2 different languages Spanish and English!  

This was the beautiful view of the sunset last night from the porch, this is something that I will be missing.  Is still finalizing plans but will for sure be leaving here next Wednesday morning to do a little bit of travel before I go back home in 13 days!  Today I am trying to get some projects wrapped up as well as go and see the snake garden in Santa Elena!