Pura Vida - Part 1 May 2-6

Welcome to Costa Rica! We flew out of Salt Lake on Friday at midnight and didn't actually get to the airport in Costa Rica until 1 pm on Saturday. Airport really is such a relative term, more like wooden posts holding up a shabby roof with no exterior walls. Danny and Lindi, the couple that we went with, didn't get in until about 2:30 pm on Saturday so we waited, on the floor, for them. We were so worried about making sure that we met up with eachother that we decided Adam and I would wait at the baggage claim for them. Not necessary. You get off the plane. You walk in to the "airport" and they put your bags on the floor. We couldn't have missed eachother if we tried.

Once we all got our bags and got our rental car we were on our way. I felt so adventerous since we didn't have a guide, just a couple maps and Adam and Danny's spanish. We stopped at a shack on the side of the road about an hour from the rental place to eat some lunch. It was called El Cebolla, or the Onion. Should have known! First of all, there aren't many places that we went that even had menus....they just served whatever they made. We finally figured out that it was rice, beans, chicken and salad. Sounds good, right? Oh my....we should be glad that I didn't get a picture of the chicken, I couldn't even tell you what part of the chicken it was. Besides that and the nasty fried plantains that they served at nearly every meal, it wasn't too bad. Infact, I didn't get sick one time on our whole trip.

I digress.....so we get back on the road and head up this CRAZY dirt road. It was so beautiful...the countryside, the color of everything, the basics of life. We drove by tiny towns with tiny shacks put together from scraps of other peoples homes. It was a humbling experiance to be there and to see that alot of people live with dirt floors, no electricity, no gas stations, etc. In fact, I think we went 3 hours without seeing a store or gas station. At about 7 pm we finally get to our cute little eco-friendly hotel in Monte Verde. I'm pretty sure I fell asleep as soon as I laid on the bed.
The next morning we ate a yummy breakfast of rice and beans, toast and lots of fresh fruit. That is one thing about Costa Rica that inspired me - they eat so much fresh fruit and vegetables, it was awesome. We were in the heart of the Cloud Forest and so we decided to go hike around for a few hours.....it was amazing. It's like something you can't even describe to be in the middle of so much life.

That picture above marks the Continental Divide, which means that water on one side runs to the Pacific and water on the other runs towards the Atlantic or Carribbean. I think that's what it means...

Yep, that was pretty much one of the scariest bridges I've ever crossed...in my life. It said it could hold a maximum capacity of ten people. What kind of people though, little midget people or normal people or little kiddies? I sure didn't stay on that long, especially when Adam was moving it all around. After we finished playing in the jungle we got on our way back to the hotel. On our way we saw a sign for a waterfall and thought it'd be fun to check it out. When we got to the little "toll booth" it said it was $8....but there was no one there. There was a note that said if the owner wasn't there than to leave the money on the table. If there had been someone there I would have felt bad trying to sneak in but there wasn't. What was so awesome is that this waterfall was right off the main road, just like a few hundred feet. We saw a few monkeys on our way back out and actually got a really good picture of it!








We felt like we were on the set of "Lotst" with all the trees looking like that!



When we had checked into the hotel on Saturday night Adam had heard that one of the best things to do around Monte Verde was a canopy tour so they booked it for Monday morning. After a quick run into town for some snacks we were on our way to "Extreme Canopy Tours" and pretty excited about it. It was even better though that I could have imagined it. Besides the fact that we got to wear those cool helmets and harnesses while hiking up intensely steep trails, we were seriously flying through the jungles and across huge valleys. I was expecting it to be small ziplines, but these were like four and five hundred feet long way up above the ground. I felt slightly bad because there was a couple in our group who were from California and just like us didn't really have an idea of what it really was. They were probably in their mid 50's and I think one of them was afraid of heights. The walks up to the zip lines were brutal for us and you could tell it was hard for them, plus the lady had a pretty bad heart condition. She kept on braking and then didn't have enough momentum to make it to the other side so the tour guides kept having to come pull her in. I guess they were sick of that so for the last 1/2 of them they just had her ride on the back of one of the guides. Anyways, it was fun. I loved it and wished that it could have lasted longer.

I'm not sure how far 750 meters is, but in the picture below Adam is stading at the beginning of the line and taking a picture of the other side and that little spec of white flying through the Costa Rican air is me!

Later that night we just hung out in the non-thriving town of Monte Verde and ate a little local cuisine, which wasn't too bad. In the morning we got up and decided that there must be trails all over this place, why should we pay to walk on them. So we found our own "trail", although I don't think you can call it that. We pretty much just bushwacked it through the jungle until we found some cool trees and waterfalls, which we did. Not only did we find those, but we also found some cool trees that give nasty rashes and have super huge thorns that like to stay in your skin. Yep, Adam and I pretty much got our trash kicked on that hike. It was fun, Danny is quite the trail blazer!

It's totally true that everything in the jungle is bigger, look at that ginormous caterpillar that Adam found! I couldn't even believe it!

Adam thought that this sign posted in our bathroom at the hotel was funny. It says "Tropical septic systems cannot handle paper or plastic.....Please do not flush toilet paper or similar. Thank you." I don't think he liked the idea of throwing away used toilet paper.

On our last night in Monte Verde we went on a night walk through some forest. It was crazy....we saw huge tarantulas, a sloth, lots of creepy crawlies and some birds. We had fun, even if I was slightly paranoid about huge things crawling on me :)

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention what Pura Vida means: Pure Life. It's like the Costa Rican motto and people say it always. Like if you pay someone at the cash register, instead of Thank You, it's Pura Vida. You accidentally run into someone, you just say Pura Vida. It really was so fun to be there!

Introducing Raquel Rigby!

This beautiful baby is my newest neice, the daughter of my brother in law Brandon and his wife Marci. She was actually born on the 29th of April, so we got to see her before we left on our trip to Costa Rica. She is so sweet and has a ton of hair. More like a mullet of hair...not much on the top but a ton in the back. We are so glad that she is part of our family and that Cambria now has a cousin on the Rigby side.
It was so fun to hold her....hard to believe that my baby was that small just 10 months ago. In the picture below, make sure you look at her feet....they are SUPER long!

Welcome to the craziness that is known as the Rigby Family...we are so excited to have you. We'll have to make some extra trips up to Layton between now and September because Bran and Marci are moving their little fam up to Oregon where he is gonna go to Graduate school.

Just the Girls

Conference weekend my two sisters and beautiful niece came down and it was so fun! Kristin bought tickets for her, Hannah and I to go to the Colbie Caillat concert at Tuacahn...which was awesome! We are lucky she bought them so early, because they were sold out the day that they went on sale to the public. It was fun to be just the three of us, Adam bravely stayed home with the girls. He had more fun than he let on. He said that he had put them down to sleep when Kristin's in-laws who were in town stopped by 5 minutes later. Maci woke up at the noise and so Adam brought her out to see them and tried to get Cambria to go back to sleep. That threw her into a fit of rage which sent her soon after rolling off the bed. My sweet Adam felt so bad!

Maci and Cambria are so funny together, they both get so easily flustered by eachother. They times are far and few between where they are both happy and smiling and getting along (hope that isn't a foreshadow of what is to come.) Clearly Maci doesn't like Cambria hovering over her :)

Pretty much all weekend the two of them were kissing, or should I say slobbering on eachother. It was so so cute....they actually would reach out their arms towards eachother and hug and just suck on each other's foreheads. Then we took the girls swimming in the not so warm swimming pool and it was a blast! Maci was ecstatic...I can't remember seeing her so excited in a long time. Plus she hadn't even gone into the water yet and she was super excited. Plus she had the cutest swimsuit ever, unlike Cambrias scary Strawberry Shortcake swimsuit.


If you look close, you can see the tattoo that I put on Cambi's "muscle". I bought them at Target a while ago and thought it would be fun to put one on her...she didn't mind but a lot of random strangers thought it was mean. Not really sure how it's mean to put something sticky on your childs arm that she doesn't seem to even notice...but whatever.

All in all it was so fun to have them down....I miss living closer to my family. It's so nice to live on our own and be independant but it's also so nice to be surrounded by family and people that really know you.

Easter pictures

Doesn't she look a little like the statue of liberty? I mean a really cute statue of Liberty
Little Diva (she already has her hands on her hips!)


Here are some more Easter pics that I had taken of Cambria. A good friend of mine that I work with offered to have her daughter take some pictures and let us borrow her bunny. Cambria loved the bunny...I think it made my friend Janeen a little nervous at how much she loved him. She was petting and patting and pulling....but so much fun. They turned out so cute. I think there is only a handful of pictures where she doesn't have one of those eggs in her hands....she LOVED those and that basket. Thank heavens for things like that that keep her occupied for a long time :) Anyways, enjoy!

The Randomness!

I've decided that if I can update this 2 times a month, then I'm in pretty good shape! Things have been so super busy which is wonderful and can be overwhelming. Last weekend for Easter Cambria and I went up to Bountiful to see my family and it was so fun. I wish that Chris and Karly where there, but we were certainly thinking of them. We went out to eat, I tried Sushi, we got pedicures and pretty much just hung out and laughed at our babies. It was super fun. I love to go up there for a lot of reasons, but one of them is that we always have so much fun together. I love that. Below is a jumble of pictures that have accumulated on my camera....I'll try and make sense of them!

On Saturday Adam took Cambria and I to Springdale, right outside of Zions National Park. I love it up there, it is so pretty and they have such great shops up there. This isn't up there, but it's a ghetto "trading post" on the way that we've always driven by. We decided to stop and show Cambria the animals (which she loved). I love how she is totally waving in this picture!

Adam by the osteriches
This is in Springdale where they have reindeer and elk and all other sorts of animals. That is pretty much Adams favorite place to go when we head up there.
Outside of the park
Cambria with the llama.....She is totally her fathers animal loving child!

She loves this basket! She can now sit up all by herself and has officially broken through her first tooth. For a while it would get close and then go back down, but now its through!

The ceiling fan that my hubby put up all by himself. Not an easy thing to do, those things are super heavy. He put it up once, then noticed that the cap to cover the wires wasn't on yet so he had to take it off and put it back up. Thanks baby!
Okay.....I had to put this picture up. I know it's gross, but pretty funny too. She is totally smiling, even in the midst of all that snot. If you couldn't tell, we have been sick at our house with stuffy noses!
Cambria and I in front of a buffalo.

Also while we were up in Springdale Adam surprised me by taking me to this art gallery that sold prints of my favorite local artist. I have seriously been looking all over town for places to buy a print. I would love an original or even giclee, but don't have the money. He got a hold of the artist, found out where she has her stuff at and bought me some. I was in tears, it was so sweet. I can't put her pictures up, but you can check out her website at http://www.gina-jrel-art.com/artist_gina_jrels_paintings.html He's a wonderful husband who surprised me with a funderful day. (like how I make up my own words?!)

About Daughters

So I got this book for Adam when we found out we were having a girl and it's calle "Father to Daughter", by Harry H. Harrison. I was reading through it the other night and thought there were some worth sharing :)

• Sometimes (okay, many times) she may not know what she wants. Your job is to help her figure it out.
• Display her artwork in your office. Why should all the good stuff go on the refrigerator?
• This cannot be said enough: Don't give into the urge to buy her everything.
• Inspire her to never give up.
• Take her out to dinner, just the two of you.
• Prepare for the day when you aren't the most important man in her life.
• There will be times when you'd rather stick needles in your eyes than have a particular conversation with her. This is when you must act like a father.
• She will decide you need a complete, head-to-toe, fashion make over. Beware! This will not make you look cool
• Don't put any more restrictions on your daughter than you would on a son at the same age and maturity level
• Accept the fact that girls squeal (or cry) when they're happy, confused, excited, scared, or they just saw a certain boy in line.
• Write this down: Girls cry. Alot.
• Remember if little girls don't get a nap, they can resemble something from a Stephen King novel.
• Dance with her always. She'll never be too young. Or too old.
• Show her how to throw a right cross. That will stop any boy from picking on her.