Afternoon Coffee in Brazil

My table all ready for my special guests.

What was supposed to be a fancy dancy Moist Lemon Chiffon Cake.  Not a great hit in my opinion but it was, let's say, very lemony!  Even for me.

These women, my dear folks, are some of my favorite ladies in the world.  As the weeks pass, I will share more about what we were planning, dreaming and praying about this afternoon.  Suffice to say, I love them.  And they brought all sorts of delicious things to eat!  Just icing on the cake, so to speak.

I want to share briefly about one of my favorite  Brazilian customs to date.  I love so much about the Brazilian culture and sometimes in sharing about our home life here, I think I forget to say that.  So, here is my "speel" on "cafe da tarde" (afternoon coffee) in Brazil!

If you stop in at anyone's house at anytime during the afternoon, you will be sure to be treated to cafe da tarde.  It may be as simple as a tiny coffee cup of the blackest, strongest, sugary coffee you have EVER drank in all your life with a salty or sweet cracker, but something you will have.  And I just find it so interesting that if the visit is spontaneous, nothing is said until you say you have to go and suddenly there is a whirl of activity to put "cafe da tarde"on the table.  A clean tablecloth is always spread out and then follows a myriad of yummy things, depending on what the hostess has or does not have on hand.  And if it is planned, you can be sure it will be a spread like non other you have seen in your life.

I love it!  Like, in truly, I LOVE it.  Besides my addiction to coffee in all shapes and sizes, I just love the culture of needing to serve something, even if it is the last thing I have in my cupboard.  And yes, I am sure there is some kind of conspiracy behind the whole idea because yes, your visit is very much extended after all that!

A note about visiting here: Brazil is a culture (historically anyway, though some would argue that is changing and I have definitely seen the quiet changes in the last 8 years) all about people, versus the American focus on time.  So, visiting people any time of the day or night is perfectly acceptable and unannounced visits are not uncommon.  I am still quite American and call and schedule my visits for the most part.  Having someone come visit and stay hours is also very common.  That part I have become quite Brazilian!  Because it is the person and relationship that matters, the clock is not an invited guest.  There are many good things about this worldview.  Obviously, there are drawbacks, but this post is not about those!

I was absolutely thrilled when several ladies from my church agreed that if I made the cake, they would come have cafe da tarde with me (I live very far away from all of them so this is not a common occurance and therefore even more special for me).  I used the opportunity to share some things I was thinking and dreaming of doing in our church with the non-existent women's ministry.  It was a lovely afternoon of eating and drinking over laughter, tears, and more laughter!

So, this week I took a break from my frenzied organizing and actually CLEANED my house...for the first time in like, well, forever.  It was a sad state of affairs but after three days of slowly but steadily cleaning, it is to my liking once again.  It takes THREE days, folks because this is what my "helper" looks like:

You can't see them but he is actually chewing on matches.  yes, matches that light up into flames!

This picture really does NOT need a caption at.all.

Notice his healing scar on his face?  That was last week's scare.  Nearly poked his eye out trippig on the rug and hitting the sharp edge of my stove. 

Emptying out my "pantry" cupboard while mommy cleans other parts of the house.

So, yes.  Cleaning house is a very time consuming, slow process that involves mommy needing TONS of patience and feeling more FRUSTRATED than patient through most of it.  My current motto: this too will pass.  it is a phase, right?!"

I was given the rare and much needed TREAT of a couple hours alone last night.  MIL kept my children and I took my journal and sat in a snazzy bakery close by and drank, get this, a chai latte (Brazil is seriously coming up in this world, I tell you what!).  I journaled like a crazy woman for an hour.  Journaled so I would not go crazy.  Most of my journal pages are full of questions like:

"How can I enjoy my children more during this exhausting, draining, sometimes-plain-hard time of toddlerhood and 5 year old-hood??""

"How can I enjoy my children more when my days feel like a round of mundane discipline, training, correcting, leading, bathing, dressing, etc?"

"How can I enjoy them more because for heaven's sake, THEY ARE GROWING UP SO FAST?"

"How can I be more patient, consistent, loving and gentle when I am just.not.any.of.that???"

So, it was a lot of soul-searching going on last night.  and today.  and probably tomorrow.  I have no answers but I know WHO does.  My heart's cry today is: Lord, change me.  I desperately need YOUR touch because well, I just do.  Lots of it!  Touch me so I can touch my children and lead them to YOU.

So, visits, cafe da tardes, raising toddlers and pre-schoolers aside, my random note of the day is it has been ridiculously hot here in SP for the dead-middle of winter and I.am.loving.it!  I refuse to worry about how hot our summer may be if this is winter but I cannot tell you how grateful I am that it is warm and sunny and dry!

So, that is all for now!  Thanks for listening and have a wonderful, blessed and joyous weekend, my dears!
                                                                      Peace to you,
                                                                                 Jama