Tag Archives: costa rica

surfing with kids

Mom Life in Costa Rica

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I quit breastfeeding in February and over the next few months, starting feeling like I was reclaiming my body and mind just a bit. My kids are still very attached. We co-sleep and co-nap, but not needing to rush in from the surf to breastfeed every couple hours has given me a lot more time and flexibility to reconnect to myself and my surfing.

Due to the civil unrest in Nicaragua that’s been happening since April, we have been hanging out in Southern Costa Rica. I miss our home in Nica, but it’s also been great to hang out on the shady, jungle fringed beaches and surf super long left point breaks on every swell.

Here’s a highlight video from a couple of good swells where I was able to dawn patrol the point, then come home, have breakfast, grab the kids, and cruise down to the mellower spots to catch a few waves with the kids.

Life is good.

adventure with baby, beach baby, surfing with kids, toddler activities

Family Friendly Surf Retreat

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Now that I have kids, it’s so awesome when I can bring them to work with me. My surf yoga retreat business, Surf With Amigas, has recently begun adding family friendly retreats. It’s so awesome to have returning Amigas come back with their husbands and kids to share the adventure with the whole family. My kids are always stoked to participate and are inspired by the older kids.

Here’s the highlight video from a recent retreat. I can’t wait for the next one!

adventure with baby, beach baby, Uncategorized

Family Boat Trip Surf Session

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Surf With Amigas is gearing up to do our first family retreat in Costa Rica in a couple of weeks. In preparation, I loaded up my family including my sister, her husband and their 14 month old into a boat to head across the gulf. We surfed some rights, walked through the jungle to a cute little resort for lunch and pool play, and got up close and personal with some very friendly monkeys. It was a great test to see how kids could handle the boat trip and long day. They were all passed out on the boat trip back but they loved it! Continue reading Family Boat Trip Surf Session →

adventure with baby, beach baby, surfing with kids, toddler activities

Last Few Days in Costa Rica

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Our family lives primarily in Northern Nicaragua, but we do spend several months per year in Costa Rica. We love our little house in the jungle, watching monkeys from the porch, walking across the street to check the surf, playing with the kids in the river, and catching waves ourselves.

I pulled out the GoPro on the last couple of days of our trip to capture a few scenes summarizing our life in paradise. Kid play, a lot of checking the surf, and even a bit of surfing.

surfing with kids, toddler activities

Luna Suli Surfs With Her Mama at 2.5 Years Old

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Luna has been going in cycles of wanting to surf with me every day for a couple of weeks, and then showing no interest at all. I don’t push it. If I say, “want to surf with mama?” and she says “not today,” then it’s not today.

But on this day, I asked her if she wanted to surf and she said “YES!” I passed off Soleo who was not thrilled at hanging on the beach with the nanny right at that moment, but when Luna wants to surf she gets to go surfing!

The waves were nice and small with a big channel. We paddled out and relaxed on the outside for a while. We talked about the channel, the peak, the inside, the outside. She pointed out whitewash and green waves. We played on the board, jumping off and swimming back to it. We looked for turtles, pulled up small pieces of driftwood for inspection, sang songs from Disney’s Moana.

Eventually a set swung wide and we were in the perfect spot, so while still singing a song, I turned to paddle. She held on tight, looking around as I did some gentle turns, was smiling and happy, and even gave me a mid-wave high 5.  Then we paddled out for another. It was probably my favorite wave ever. 

After this wave, she was talking about surfing non-stop for the rest of the day and even practicing popups on my hand plane.

natural births

Planting the Placenta

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According to our midwife, the placenta that nourished my little guy for 41.5 weeks was something special. Of course all placentas are miraculous, and I haven’t seen enough to know the difference, but our midwife was weighing it, and exclaiming over it’s large size.

Luna was born in a hospital so her placenta was thrown out, or burned, or whatever hospitals do with that sort of thing. This time around, we kept it wrapped up in a tortilla bag in the freezer at the birth house. A couple of weeks later it traveled in a cooler on a two day drive down to our home in Pavones where it was shoved into our freezer there and mostly forgotten. Continue reading Planting the Placenta →

natural births

Soleo Lanz Obermeyer’s Birth Story

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With Luna it was slow (read Luna’s birth story here). Contractions started after dinner and I was up all night dancing in the moonlight, too excited to sleep. I shared the sunrise with a hummingbird looking out over the lake, spent the day getting in and out and in and out of the tub, but my cervix just didn’t want to open. Ultimately, I ended up pushing her out partially anesthetized on my back on a hospital bed, 30 something hours after contractions began. It wasn’t the gentle home birth I had imagined, and I really hoped the second would go better.

screen-shot-2016-10-26-at-8-41-46-am Continue reading Soleo Lanz Obermeyer’s Birth Story →

beach baby, surfing with kids, toddler activities

Luna’s Day at The Beach – Swimming and Surfing at almost 2 years old

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It’s been a while since Luna has wanted to get on the board in the ocean. We didn’t want to force it, preferring to wait until she asked. The last few days she has been asking. Yesterday morning she surprised us by riding her first few waves solo. She was even paddling back to dad (with some pushes from mom) after each ride. We didn’t have a camera.

Today, armed with a GoPro we tried again. The waves were a little bit bigger and more consistent so she was a little more nervous, but she did get this one great ride and ended it with a big smile!

adventure with baby, beach baby, surfing with kids, toddler activities, Uncategorized

Luna’s First Solo Waves

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Screen Shot 2016-08-14 at 12.49.00 PM

It’s been a while since Luna has wanted to get on the board in the ocean. We didn’t want to force it, preferring to wait until she asked. The last few days she has been asking. Yesterday morning she surprised us by riding her first few waves solo. She was even paddling back to dad (with some pushes from mom) after each ride. We didn’t have a camera.  Continue reading Luna’s First Solo Waves →