For Moms...Especially My Mom

Mother’s Day doesn’t come around in Nicaragua until May 30^th but Nicas have the right idea and celebrate mothers for the entire month.  And moms deserve it…at least an entire month.  

Even though I’m away from my mom this Mother’s Day, I think my time away has helped me realize the pure and awesome "amazingness" that she is.  Though I’m all the way in Jinotega, she has made sure that home does not feel so far.  I’m never short of moisturizers, chocolate covered matzo, or games and crafts because she never fails at getting a package out to me just when I need it.  I’ve called her with good news and with sad news, and no matter what the topic, I always come away feeling better than I did before talking to her.  Her support has helped me to finish my Peace Corps service, for a while I didn’t think I could or that I wanted to…but even though I know she would have preferred it if I just came home, her support made it ok to stay.  Sometimes I don't think she realizes just how important she is to me.

I love you and miss you, mom and cant wait to see you in July! 

To GRANDmoms too!...

To moms we're really missing...

To surrogate moms taking care of us when we're away from home...

To lots of moms for holding big families together...

So let’s take a cue from Nicaragua and continue celebrating moms for the entire month of May…because aren’t moms just the best.

Coffee Beany

so sue me for running with a theme....but give me some credit for switching up the type of bean.

i’m not one of those people who depend on my daily cup of coffee.  i don’t need it, but oddly enough i admire those addicts who get more jazzed over a fine caffeine rich brew than i get over just about anything these days (yes, im bored and jaded with nicaragua, couldn't you tell)...but I certainly do love to savor a bitter cup, black, when the mood strikes. And after living in coffee country for the past two years, i know more about the little bean than i ever thought possible.  The department of Jinotega produces some of Nicaragua’s highest quality coffee beans (if you like Peet’s Coffee, you might be familiar) and it is BIG business.  November-March is harvest time and people will literally drop everything to participate, uprooting families and transplanting from coffee farm to coffee farm across northern Nicaragua.  Money rains down from the mountains.  Coffee is a big deal.

And we all love coffee.  We all drink coffee.  And we’re all left with coffee grounds.  My mom always throws it out onto the flowers in front of our house in NY and I knew for this reason it works great as a fertilizer.  But within used coffee grounds lies a wealth of practical and valuable applications.

My favorite: I take a big scoop out of the bottom of my French press and scrub that lovely caffeine filled grime all over my face.  FACIAL SCRUB.  Smoothes, softens, and revitalized my sun-torched skin. 

Use them in brown hair too, to give it a lovely deep coffee sheen. Just be careful and try to catch the grounds before they go down the drain, large quantities of coffee grounds will clog it!