December 24, 2020

Dear Friends and Family,

Many warm and sunny greetings from Ecojoya Farm in Costa Rica. I hope this finds you and yours happy and healthy. 

It seems many people are ready to get rid of the year 2020, and I get it. But for me 2020 was life changing in an amazing way. Lia Irene was born June 7th, at home on the farm, and she is healthy and happy. So for me, 2020 has been the best year ever. 

I live at the farm with my partner Ben and his almost 8 y.o. son Ian. I’ve become a mother and a stepmother in the past year. I wanted to be a mother since I was a little girl, and at my age had accepted it probably was not going to happen, so it is a real joy to be one to these two. I mean, I’m tired and never have time to take a shower, and Lia is teething and Ian is tweening (isn’t it too early for that?) and I’m grateful for all the feelings, sensations, and experiences.

Today is Christmas Eve and Ben’s mother Joan is visiting with us for Christmas. We also got to celebrate her birthday with her on the 20th. It is wonderful to have her here. She is the first family member to visit since Lia was born.

The hardest thing about this year for me has been the separation from family. My mother and stepdad were supposed to come to Costa Rica in June for Lia’s birth and because of the pandemic borders were closed here. Costa Rica has not had as extreme a problem with Covid as the United States, most likely because they enacted strict measures as soon as the virus landed here, but it’s meant that travel is very difficult.

I never thought that the moment I had a baby in a foreign country the door would sort of slam behind me. I had been so mobile up until now. And it breaks my heart that my mother hasn’t held her granddaughter yet. Since there’s nothing we can do about it, we just accept it and look forward to when we can reunite. I know we are all affected by this in different ways and send love to all. 

I never sent a Christmas card out like this before. Must be a mom thing. But I have read countless family updates in Christmas cards over the years so I thought I would do one here:

Ian will turn 8 in January. He was quite happy to have school canceled this year. His favorite things to do this year have been to play Minecraft and Legend of Zelda. He also learned how to cook and now makes his own french toast and banana pancakes some mornings.

Ian is the best person at making Lia laugh. He does this by jumping around and making funny sounds. He likes to snuggle Lia and she loves him though will swat him out of the way if he gets in her face too much. Which he usually does.

This year Ian saw a huge improvement in his reading of English. He speaks Spanish too, and will hopefully be improving his Spanish reading soon. He just learned multiplication and is on to division. His mother just had twins (a boy and a girl) in November so in one year Ian went from an only child to having 3 siblings!

Lia is six and a half months and is getting two front teeth (on the bottom). She’s been kind of cranky lately because of the teething. She seems to grow by the minute. She mostly breastfeeds, but does love banana and papaya. Good thing we live on a banana farm! Her favorite food is dripping from the trees all around us. 

She can roll any which way but is not quite steady sitting up yet. Her favorite thing is to watch the chickens and the dogs outside the kitchen. She also likes laughing at her brother and being held (all the time if possible). 

We’re still waiting for her hair to grow and it looks like her eyes are brown. She’s been finding her voice and sometimes she will say something that resembles Mama. We all love living with “the cutest baby in the world” (we know we are biased). We are also very fortunate to have Elsy, a 19 y.o. girl in our village, who comes and takes care of Lia most mornings while I work.

Ben is working hard as usual. His latest endeavor is building and selling molecular hydrogen machines. I’m actually posting this letter on his website. We’ve been breathing hydrogen and drinking hydrogen water and it’s been helping us both with different issues. He is shipping machines worldwide.

He’s also a disappointed farmer because we are down to one goat. This is hard to believe because when I first came here two years ago there was a flock of at least 50 sheep and goats. Our local puma has wreaked havoc on the animals. Now Ben’s increasing the chickens. I have no idea how many we have, so a lot. We also have a couple of pigs, guinea fowl, turkeys, dogs, and a cat.

In addition to bananas on the farm Ben planted a lot of coffee. An exciting development is that we got a coffee roaster in 2020 and Ben and his mom just roasted a bunch of coffee for her to take back to the U.S.

I still work part-time for Sivananda Ashram Yoga Retreat helping with a lot of things. An exciting development in my work this year has been the chance to work with Ben to help the ashram establish an online learning management system. It is very helpful for me to stay connected to the ashram community.

I am also taking the Spiritual Mentoring Training Program with New World Ayurveda. I just took an exam last night on how to answer questions that come up when teaching people how to meditate and center in their heart. I am so grateful for the opportunity to continue working and studying things that are important to me from the top of a mountain in Costa Rica.

Besides work and studies I also am enjoying cooking, and like to come up with reasons we need to celebrate with some sweet treat. My favorite shows to watch are the baking shows on Netflix and I get lots of good ideas. Maybe someday we will get something bigger than our king size toaster oven to bake with.

 

Ok, I think this is enough now. Thank you for reading. If you get this it means that I hold you specially in my heart and am thinking of you these days. I hope you have a beautiful celebration this year and can find the joy in these strange times.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Love,

Jennie / Sri Devi

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