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Best Surprise of My Life
What’s better than your mom and pops coming to visit during your Peace Corps service? Surprising you at the airport with all of your siblings who you thought couldn’t come! I might have fallen down...
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The Payne Gang
Spending time with family…doesn’t get much better than that. It was so hard to say goodbye yesterday, but the memories made will help carry us through our service until we can all be together...
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Moves
This past weekend we were invited to a Noche de Gala to celebrate and honor Nicaragua’s famous poet, Rubén Darío. In addition to beautiful poetry readings the night was full of music and dance. From...
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August Guidepost
Guidepost to Wholehearted Living – August 2015 Cultivating Meaningful Work: Letting Go of Self-Doubt and “Supposed To” Our thoughts on this Guidepost: + Why Peace Corps Blogging is Meaningful Work +...
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ACCESS (and Oregon) Forever
Today we had the honor of attending a bittersweet graduation of around 40 ACCESS Estelí students and reconnecting with a few students from our Oregon ACCESS Camp group. They’ve come so far and their...
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Andrew’s First Nica Birthday
A year after starting life over in Nicaragua I feel confident and comfortable in my relationships that I’ve been able to form with Nicaraguan friends, Peace Corps Volunteer colleagues, the students and...
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September Guidepost
Guidepost to Wholehearted Living – September 2015 Cultivating Laughter, Song, and Dance: Letting Go of Being Cool and “Always in Control.” Our thoughts on this Guidepost: + Molding Memories in...
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Introducing Peace Corps Nicaragua’s 30 Day Photo Challenge
We’re so excited to take place in PC Nicaragua’s 30 Day Photo Challenge this September! We’ll be posting our photos daily on our MayWeSuggest Facebook page. At the end of the month, we’ll make sure...
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Peace Corps Nicaragua’s 30 Day Photo Challenge
If you’ve already liked our MayWeSuggest Facebook page, you’ve seen how much fun we’ve had with the Peace Corps Nicaragua 30-Day Photo Challenge this month. It challenged us to not only take more...
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Molding Memories in Nicaragua
This is a guest post by Andrew’s sister, Kari, from when she visited us in September 2015. September 2015 Guidepost to Wholehearted Living Cultivating Laughter, Song, and Dance: Letting Go of Being...
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Surprise! ¡Feliz Cumpleaños!
Andrew told me that he checked with my counterparts and they were too swamped with work to attend/host a birthday party for me this past week. (It is the end of the school year, after all, so I...
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Peace Corps Holidays: Nicaragua
As a proud Midwesterner, I’m honored to have been asked to participate in a series of posts on the Midwest Peace Corps Volunteers blog about spending the holiday season abroad. As I explained my...
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12 Days of [Nilsen] Christmas 2015
Last year, Andrew had a brilliant idea for lifting our spirits during the holiday season. We had just arrived to site and were at the beginning of our Peace Corps service. This meant that we could not...
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2015 Seasons Greetings
Dearest friends and family, If 2014 will be remembered as a year of adventure for joining the Peace Corps, 2015 will be remembered in our family as a year of anything and everything Nicaragua. We...
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Happy Peace Corps Week 2016
55 years ago today, President John F. Kennedy signed Executive Order 10924 to establish the Peace Corps. All week volunteers (returned and current), host countries, and the Peace Corps family are...
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The Sun has Risen on Easter Morning
From fireworks starting at 3:30 am and processions at 5 as the sun is peeking over the mountains, to Easter sunday services and that big egg-laying bunny: however you celebrate today, may it be filled...
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Camp GLOW 2016 Video
With a Spanish version of “Fight Song” as our anthem, workshops about sharing power in relationships, goal setting, HIV/Aids and pregnancy prevention, and redefining ideas of beauty, all combined with...
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English Singing and Not Yet Goodbye
We had the honor of helping with the annual municipal (county) English Singing festival this past week. Over 20 schools sent their best English singers to compete for the chance to represent us at...
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National English Singing Competition 2016
This year, we had the honor of attending the National English Singing Competition with our school and one of our students who qualified for the competition. There were 38 participants representing...
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12 Days of [Nilsen] Christmas 2016
Two years ago, we began a tradition in our family that would allow us to celebrate the holiday season no matter where in the world we found ourselves. After 2014 and 2015, we figured we were getting...
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