Sobremesa Stories

Letting stories unfold around the table

How We Make Money With Airbnb (Without Going Crazy!)

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Jordan and I LOVE to travel.  We spent five weeks last summer backpacking through Europe, and we loved all the fun people we got to meet, beautiful places we got to see, and amazing food and drinks we got to try.  During our trip, we stayed almost exclusively in Airbnb’s, doing everything from staying with people in their homes to renting out private apartments.  We had such a fun experience and loved how we experienced a more “local” feel of the cities that we stayed in.  It also saved us a ton of money (which we of course spent on more fun things like delicious food and German beer).

How to Plan Your Dream Europe Trip

Cliffs of Moher, Ireland

If you’ve never traveled with Airbnb, you should check out this post I wrote a few weeks back about how to use it! I go through all the details of creating your profile so future hosts will accept you and what to look for when booking spaces.  Okay, you’ve read that and are still interested in hosting? Let’s get going!

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How to Use Airbnb to Plan An Amazing, Affordable, and Safe Trip

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When Jordan and I were planning our Europe trip last summer, we knew we wanted to spend as little as possible on our lodgings (and instead spend lots on delicious German beer and Parisian chocolate croissants).  I stumbled across Airbnb through some travel websites, researched how to use Airbnb as safely as possible, and made some bookings in various cities throughout our route.  We hopped on a plane, praying with all our might that this Airbnb thing we’d signed up for wasn’t about to get us killed.

And y’all…our Airbnb experiences were AWESOME!

How to Use Airbnb to Plan an Amazing, Affordable, and Safe Trip

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Slow Summer Days

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Summer Days Beach Mexico

Summer break in Mexico after we got married!

While teaching definitely has its challenges, there is one major thing that makes it much, much easier: the BREAKS.  Sorry to all my friends who work year-round and get 10 total vacation days, but having built-in breaks during the year and for summer is AWESOME.  I love having my year come in seasons and knowing that there are plenty of random days or weeks I can look forward to for times of rest, silliness, and adventures.  We used our summer after we got married to travel to Mexico and Sonoma, CA.  Last summer we backpacked through Europe for 5 weeks.   This summer will mostly be lazy with a smaller trip to Boulder, CO for Jordan’s Half-Ironman race and then a combined trip to Mexico and California in July.  But beyond those trips…we’re mostly just being lazy.

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How to Make Tissue Paper Flowers

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Before I taught Spanish, I taught two years of English as a Second Language and loved every minute of it.  I worked closely with a small group of students from all around the world and they made my world a million times brighter. They made me laugh every day, like when my wonderful Nigerian student Rasheed asked me what “nipple” means because he’d heard it in the hallway.  Try explaining that one without pictures or gestures!  My ESL students taught me how to make a delicious pozolé (a Mexican soup), how to be resilient in the midst of incredibly hard circumstances, and how to see the world around me with curious eyes.  One of those students, a sweet girl from rural Mexico named Lucía, also taught me a more practical skill: how to make Mexican tissue paper flowers the way her mamá in Mexico had taught her.

How to Make Tissue Paper Flowers Graphic

These tissue paper flowers are a traditional decoration at Mexican celebrations of all sorts, and Lucía and I  made bunches of them that day while other students finished their standardized testing.  Since then, I have made about a thousand of these for our house, for baby showers or other parties, or to celebrate Cinco de Mayo with all my students.  These are beautiful in a vase, strung on a string like a garland, or tied together to make big puffy decorations for parties or bridal/baby showers!

How to Make Tissue Paper Flowers Example Books

The process below is what I’ve refined after teaching a couple hundred unruly middle schoolers how to make these.  I will say it is an art form, not a science, so feel free to play around with these until you find a style that works for you!  All you need is tissue paper, scissors, and some sort of wire/pipe cleaner to tie the middle and you’ll be good to go.

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Sobremesa Stories

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La Sobremesa: The time spent at the table after a meal; laughing, talking, and sharing stories with the people around the table.

Sharing Stories around the table, Outdoor Dinner Party, Sparkling Lights, Lanterns, Globe Lights

Ever since I was a little girl watching the grownups sip their wine and share old stories around the dinner table, I have felt a certain magic in the moments after a meal:  crumbs of dessert scattered across plates, candles burning low, and conversation turning to laughter and memories.  I loved hearing my dad reminisce about his travels through Europe (complete with many spot-on accents), my mom’s loud and contagious laugh, and the back and forth of neighbors and friends discussing everything from the latest Angels baseball season to the brokenness and hurt in their homes.

Sharing stories at a Wedding Table, Rustic pink and white flower in jars, burlap runners, candles , globe lights in barn.

In Spain, there is a specific word to describe this time around the table after a meal: la sobremesa.  Spaniards are accustomed to spending a long period of time in the middle of the day sharing lunch with friends, family, and colleagues, taking time to savor a meal and conversation before the work day continues. There is no direct English translation for this Spanish word that so beautifully encompasses a culture of lingering, a culture of spending time around the table with the ones who remind us we are known and loved and worth listening to.

Any time I have traveled, this cultural tradition has challenged my on-time, driven nature.  It reminds me to choose people and stories over to-do lists, even when my introverted self wants nothing more than to cozy up on the couch with some Moose Tracks ice cream and an old episode of Gilmore Girls.  When I moved to Kansas City, Missouri to get married and “settle down,” I knew I wanted to carry the tradition of sobremesa with me.

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