Sunday, January 17, 2016
Tour Costa Rica Using our Interactive Map!
Enjoy the beaches, volcanoes, valleys and cloud forests of Costa Rica! Click on the map below to follow the Wilson Journey in Costa Rica with key points of interest and photos along the way.
Tuesday, January 12, 2016
Changes for the Wilsons in 2016
Happy New Year!
Take a look at our videogram to catch a glimpse of what we were up to in 2015.
The other day at the dinner table I asked everyone to come up with one word to describe the year that we're having from June 2015 through June 2016. Seth right away piped up with "Exciting!", then Kyle said "Fun!", so Joel thought he would follow suit with "Fun and Exciting!". With some additional thought, Kyle changed his to "Eventful... in a positive way", and Sarah summed it all up with "A gift", for that is the essence of what we feel. The time that God has given our family to venture out and experience another culture has been nothing short of an amazing gift from God.
Two years ago this January when I started to work for Food for the Hungry, Sarah and I had a growing desire to use the flexibility that virtual work provided in order to live overseas as a family. While the thought of "living somewhere else for a while" seems fun and interesting, the mechanics of how and when to make that happen with a family of five are quite a bit more difficult. Starting in February of this year we were amazed to see God bringing the pieces together as FH started to look at Costa Rica as a location for a new software development team (which I would help lead) and a house-sitting option opened up that would provide a good home base for our time in Costa Rica. Since we had planned on moving to a house with a bit more space anyway, it also made sense to sell our house and put things into storage while we were away.
That sounds simple and straightforward on paper, felt anything but simple at many points along the way. Almost all of August was like that. Our house was half taken apart, our to-do list seemed to be following the rule of "2 steps forward... 3 steps back", and I was in Bangkok for a 10 day business trip. The driving thought in our minds was not so much "This makes sense" but rather "What have we done!?". And yet now, in the moments that I see the boys exploring a trail through the rainforest, or when I see Seth naturally use a phrase or gesture that he only could have learned from a Latin, or when I see Joel learning to ride waves on a boogie board, a clear gratitude for what God has done rules our minds.
And yet there is more (to borrow Kyle's word) "eventful" living ahead! In November, I was asked to consider the role of Director of Technology for the Association of Christian Schools International (ACSI) in Colorado Springs. This was a very difficult decision for us. Because I love my work and the mission of Food for the Hungry (where I work currently) I was not overly eager to leave the job. We also dearly love being close to many friends and family in Grand Rapids. All 5 of us talked many times about being excited to resume relationships with people that we'd grown to love in our 9 years in Michigan. However, the opportunity to lead the technology strategy in a global organization is something that I've been thinking and praying about for years, so in the end, we decided that our family adventure will continue on to Colorado in April of 2016.
The list of questions is growing quickly - when should we buy a house? How will we move our things from Michigan? How can we possibly have the stamina to make it through the next year? Who will we be when all this is over? We'd certainly appreciate your calls, house-hunting tips and most of all your prayers in the months that are ahead.
Although we don't know the words we will choose a year from now to describe 2016, we do know that God has gone before us and prepared a home, community, and work for our family. In the midst of uncertainty and questions, this is such a comfort. We pray that throughout the transition, He will open our eyes to see the gifts He offers.
Thanks for the valuable part you play in our lives.
Kevin (and Sarah, Kyle, Seth, and Joel)
Take a look at our videogram to catch a glimpse of what we were up to in 2015.
The other day at the dinner table I asked everyone to come up with one word to describe the year that we're having from June 2015 through June 2016. Seth right away piped up with "Exciting!", then Kyle said "Fun!", so Joel thought he would follow suit with "Fun and Exciting!". With some additional thought, Kyle changed his to "Eventful... in a positive way", and Sarah summed it all up with "A gift", for that is the essence of what we feel. The time that God has given our family to venture out and experience another culture has been nothing short of an amazing gift from God.
Two years ago this January when I started to work for Food for the Hungry, Sarah and I had a growing desire to use the flexibility that virtual work provided in order to live overseas as a family. While the thought of "living somewhere else for a while" seems fun and interesting, the mechanics of how and when to make that happen with a family of five are quite a bit more difficult. Starting in February of this year we were amazed to see God bringing the pieces together as FH started to look at Costa Rica as a location for a new software development team (which I would help lead) and a house-sitting option opened up that would provide a good home base for our time in Costa Rica. Since we had planned on moving to a house with a bit more space anyway, it also made sense to sell our house and put things into storage while we were away.
That sounds simple and straightforward on paper, felt anything but simple at many points along the way. Almost all of August was like that. Our house was half taken apart, our to-do list seemed to be following the rule of "2 steps forward... 3 steps back", and I was in Bangkok for a 10 day business trip. The driving thought in our minds was not so much "This makes sense" but rather "What have we done!?". And yet now, in the moments that I see the boys exploring a trail through the rainforest, or when I see Seth naturally use a phrase or gesture that he only could have learned from a Latin, or when I see Joel learning to ride waves on a boogie board, a clear gratitude for what God has done rules our minds.
And yet there is more (to borrow Kyle's word) "eventful" living ahead! In November, I was asked to consider the role of Director of Technology for the Association of Christian Schools International (ACSI) in Colorado Springs. This was a very difficult decision for us. Because I love my work and the mission of Food for the Hungry (where I work currently) I was not overly eager to leave the job. We also dearly love being close to many friends and family in Grand Rapids. All 5 of us talked many times about being excited to resume relationships with people that we'd grown to love in our 9 years in Michigan. However, the opportunity to lead the technology strategy in a global organization is something that I've been thinking and praying about for years, so in the end, we decided that our family adventure will continue on to Colorado in April of 2016.
The list of questions is growing quickly - when should we buy a house? How will we move our things from Michigan? How can we possibly have the stamina to make it through the next year? Who will we be when all this is over? We'd certainly appreciate your calls, house-hunting tips and most of all your prayers in the months that are ahead.
Although we don't know the words we will choose a year from now to describe 2016, we do know that God has gone before us and prepared a home, community, and work for our family. In the midst of uncertainty and questions, this is such a comfort. We pray that throughout the transition, He will open our eyes to see the gifts He offers.
Thanks for the valuable part you play in our lives.
Kevin (and Sarah, Kyle, Seth, and Joel)
Saturday, January 2, 2016
A different christmas
For me, this Christmas season didn’t feel the same. What I really wanted for Christmas was for it to feel the same. I miss a feeling that I don’t think I will feel again. Even though same things are different this Christmas, there are things that are the same. What did you feel like this Christmas?
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| Christmas in Michigan |
In Michigan, we celebrate Christmas in different ways. At a tree farm we cut a tree down. On Christmas it is under 35 degrees. On Christmas Eve, we go to a candlelight church service and go to my grandparents' house. We go to Meijer Gardens about a week before Christmas.
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| Christmas in Costa Rica |
I wonder how Christmas will be like next year!
-Seth Wilson
-Seth Wilson
My trip to the border crossing
Our first three months in Costa Rica have gone by so quickly. Since we are on tourist visas, we have to leave Costa Rica and re enter every three months to renew our visas. We decided to go into Nicaragua to renew them.
Before we went to the border, we stayed at a house called Casa Blanca (meaning White House) with our cousins. The house was right on the beach and only a few hours from the border. When I had to say goodbye to the house, it was only a few hours until I was already missing it. We stopped at the hotel that we were going to stay at to ask questions about crossing the border, but the clerk seemed to know next to nothing about it except that there are a lot of fun beaches just over the Nicaraguan border, so we had to move on. When we were near the border we knew it, because so many trucks were waiting to cross over. They all had lights on because it was dark, so it was really hard to see where we were going. They only had one person working at the truck office, so things were going VERY slowly for the big trucks because there are a lot of things they need to check. At first, we didn’t know how we were going to get through all those trucks, but there was a police guider car that helped us get through.
Our first stop was to pay a Costa Rica exit tax and to receive a exit ticket, and then we drove about one block until we saw a protected parking lot. It was fenced in and had a guard, so it was protected enough. Then we went out and walked about a block across the border and through a Nicaraguan checkpoint. It wasn’t that different on the Nicaraguan side, except that there was a HUGE blockade of police officers and soldiers with big guns. My dad thinks that since there lots of Cuban refugees there, and they aren’t allowed in Costa Rica, they’re trying to prevent a riot among the refugees for not being allowed to get in. We went through the immigration office without any troubles and paid the entrance fee. After that we saw a little restaurant, called a soda. We stopped there and drank some pop and ate some yummy Gallo
Pinto. Gallo Pinto is the national dish of Costa Rica and consists of rice, beans, Lizano sauce and sometimes meat, but has many different varieties. When we were done, we walked right back across the border to the Costa Rica immigration office. We filled in some forms and they scanned our baggage and then we were successfully in Costa Rica. Lastly, dad went and got the car.
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| Our family eating Gallo Pinto |
When we were driving home, we saw a 3 MILE line of trucks. It was crazy! We finally got to our hotel. It was a fun but crazy evening!
-Kyle Wilson
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