If you are a mom and on Facebook, then I am sure you have seen at least one meme/post/joke about being over school. This is the one I most relate too:

End of year laziness is compounded for me by two additional reasons. 1) our school sells hot lunch so Averi can still eat even if I don’t pack her a lunch. 2) Michael was gone this past week on a business trip, which always means I do less.

I didn’t realize how much less I did this past week until today. Michael got in super late last night, but we still had to wake up regular time today. Which means he wanted coffee. And he couldn’t make coffee because the coffee pot was dirty in the dishwasher. Where he had placed it on Sunday before he left on the trip. And today is now Friday. Which means I haven’t run the dishwasher in five days. Because I didn’t need to.

I didn’t have enough dirty dishes, pots and pans in FIVE days to warrant running the dishwasher.

In my defense, Averi likes to eat breakfast at school and I did make her three of her five lunches this week. But thats like two pieces of tupperware per lunch. And we did eat dinner at home two of the four nights. It’s just that one of the nights dinner was cereal. Averi really wanted it, and considered it a special treat. That’s right. Averi felt like I was giving her a huge treat and was super nice and helpful. So I would give her a bowl of cereal for dinner. I am winning on so many levels. 🙂

But Averi and I’s dinner bliss doesn’t get Michael’s coffee pot cleaned. Luckily, I had just purchased a French Press Coffee Pot. We had used one on the Girl Scout camping trip in the Keys a couple weekends ago, and Michael really liked it. So when I saw one at a great price on Amazon, I ordered it. Michael used it this morning to make his coffee.

It made almost exactly the amount he needed, but there was around a small cups worth left. I offered to put it in the fridge so he could have iced coffee later, but he wasn’t interested. So instead I told him to leave it and I would see about baking with it. I have always seen those chocolate recipes that call for coffee, saying it will enhance the chocolate. But since I actually hate coffee (how many of you just gasped?) I have never bothered to try any of them. Since I hate waste though – and I’ll admit to wanting to earn some brownie points (literally. ha!) – I figured I would bake today.

I couldn’t find any recipes that called for brewed coffee though. Then I read that you should consider coffee like water and just use it in any recipe that way. So I found a recipe for brownies that looked good that called for water. But it also called for some ingredients that I didn’t have and couldn’t fake. Then I found a recipe that looked good but it is apparently endorsed by Oprah. And I really don’t like Oprah. I still can’t get over the time I saw her magazine and its version of Martha Stewart’s monthly calendar. But instead of listing good times to plant things and menu suggestions, she had personal improvement stuff listed. One of them was to think of someone you haven’t talked to in a while and send them good mental vibes. Um, no. Pick up the freaking phone and call them! But I digress. 🙂

So in the end, because I am still me, I just busted out a box of brownie mix and made that. It really was better with the coffee. Richer tasting. But not coffee tasting, which is necessary for me. I am so happy with it that I am going to go and get the chocolate needed for the first brownie recipe I found (which was not Oprahs) and make those when we next have extra coffee. I’ll share that recipe. In the meantime, for now, just remember that you can replace water with coffee. And if you need a coffee press, this is the one we used. I liked it cause you can make tea in it too, which is so much better then coffee. 🙂 Sorry it’s no longer on sale.