Morning Coffee Moments of Connections

I’ve got to tell you about my morning coffee moments of connections with my husband. He is such a morning person that he wakes about 2 hours before he is supposed to just to enjoy a nice cup of hot coffee and read the morning news. He usually starts of making a huge pot of coffee and it’s normally half gone before I even wake up.

The coffee pot stays on for 4 hours so I have plenty of time to wake up and drink the remaining pot he has made for me. My mornings don’t seem as pleasant as his though. I’m already really upset because the alarm woke me anyway. First things first as I stumble to the bathroom to brush my teeth and usually grumpy as ever. Knowing darn well I’m gonna be in a bad way in the morning from staying up way to late every night reading my kindle but I still keep my routine.

Now My Hubby, the sweetheart that he is, has already prepared a special cup just the way I like it by the time I get out of the bathroom after just waking. Secretly I wonder if he’s prepared this cup of coffee only to immediately change my morning mood. haha! Either way, he is a doll! He always makes it just the way I like it with my caramel colored coffee with a sprinkle of Pumpkin Spice Coffee-mate creamer and a huge topping of extra whip cream! He is definitely a keeper!

Now after all that he does to put up with me I had to think of a special way to show him just how much I appreciate him. It started off with a simple trip to Walmart to grab his favorite coffee. Or as his grandma used to call it “Cafecito!” After grabbing the coffee I ran past the breads section fighting the fact that I wanted donuts to go with it. He’s doing the no carb or low carb diet plan so he wouldn’t appreciate that at all. The only carb he is willing to cheat on is the Pumpkin Spice Powedered Coffee-mate coffee creamer. So I made sure to grab that too!

The only day my honey sleeps in is on Saturdays (if he doesn’t have to work that is). I decided to wake up extra early (yeah, that’s true love baby) and make him a very special cup of coffee exactly the way he does for me. He will flip at the fact that I woke up early, let alone the awesome cup of coffee ready for him when he wakes. I decided to go above and beyond and make him a coffee with latte art! This is not something that I normally do so I don’t have a cappuccino maker with one of those nifty little foam makers either. It’s okay though, I’m crafty. I can figure this out.

I ended up getting crazy with the foam and latte art! We did bears, hearts, flowers, I love you sayings and more in our cups of coffee. When the little ones woke up they wanting some cocoa art in there cups too! This is exactly how our family connects over coffee! (or cocoa for the little ones!) ha!

Here’s how I made Coffee Latte Art and Milk Froth:

Ingredients needed:

Milk
Nescafé Classico coffee
Chocolate syrup
Mason Jar (to heat the milk)
Spoon
Toothpicks
Thermometer

Directions to make Milk Froth without a cappuccino maker:

First, I had to make milk froth without using a cappuccino machine. Here’s what I did: I grabbed a big mason job and added about a cup of milk in it. I heated it to about 165 degrees in the microwave. Off and on this took me about 2 minutes. You don’t want your milk getting any hotter than that or else you will scold your milk. After the milk was heated I placed the mason jar lid on the jar of hot milk and shook it vigorously. Be careful and use heating pads to hold the jar on both ends. Make sure the jar lid is secure before you begin shaking it too. You don’t want hot milk to go all over the place and burn you. I’ve taken a photo of the froth it creates below.

Once the milk froth was ready I quickly heated some water and added my favorite Classico coffee. I only added about a 1/4 cup of water and made my coffee strong. I knew I was adding the rest as milk. Make it how ever strong you like your coffee. For me it was two heaping scoops in the 1/4 cup of water. Next, I poured the hot milk into the strong coffee and scooped the foam part off the top to start creating my design.

Here’s a design I did making a cute little bear! To get the brown froth simply stir the white foam with the coffee to make it brown. Then add scoops of white foam to shape the bear head. Next, take a small scoop of the brown foam to make the bear nose and draw out the rest of the face with chocolate syrup. The kids get a big kick out of this design so this one is perfect to try in your hot cocoa too.

Next I attempted a beautiful flower design. I think it was the best one yet!!! I have to link a quick 30 second video on this tutorial because it’s so much easier to let you see how to do it rather then try to explain it. In the video I am using a toothpick to draw out my lines in the flower.

How about and “I Love You” cup of coffee?

After all my hard work and planning over the perfect cup of coffee to show my husband just how much I appreciate him he sure did like it! He doesn’t like photos but I was able to snap one of him sipping his cup of love! I love you honey!!