I’m sitting at my kitchen table listening to the seagulls from the nearby Petitcodiac River frolic in the bright sun and watching them sunbathe as they sit on the pharmacy roof next door. I have two electronic documents open that I am slowly editing: one is a Spanish-version of my MEd capstone and one is the English version. They are about the history of the founding and first decades of the work of Centro Esperanza, or Hope Centre, the NGO in Chiclayo, Peru that received me with open arms in July of 2013. Both versions of 85+ pages are nearly complete and I am just waiting for feedback from Centro Esperanza and my MEd supervisor.

I am grateful for mornings such as today to be able to go through carefully and re-read and edit my writing. Doing so naturally brings back many memories from years ago as well as some of my trip to Chiclayo in January of last year to conduct the interviews which serve as the base of information for the capstone. But I’m also constantly forming new memories of Centro Esperanza. Today, tomorrow and Sunday I will offer online workshops for mothers in women’s circles about the importance and joy of reading at home with their families, as part of the program of La Cometa Lectora, or the Reading Kite, that I helped to launch back in 2014 with Centro Esperanza staff. Now the library also has boxes of books that rotate to houses for one-week periods so each family can experience having a mini curated library for children or teens in their home.

Here are a few moments with other seagulls at Santa Rosa beach from my last trip to Peru. Wishing you a restful weekend ahead, and if you are in the Northern Hemisphere, many sounds, sights and smells of spring.