Today we’d like to introduce you to Vittoria Di Cesare
Hi Vittoria, so excited to have you on the platform. So before we get into questions about your work-life, maybe you can bring our readers up to speed on your story and how you got to where you are today?
My husband and I are both teachers based out of Toronto, Canada. We hate the winter. Loathe it. Always said that we need to move seaside. Then Covid hit and we couldn’t even vacation seaside for quite a while. When travel finally started to open up in 2021, we visited Tamarindo for the summer. As our time started to come to an end, the idea of going back to the hustle and bustle of long work days and cold and grey winters just didn’t make sense. Cue the kick start of our decision to rent out our Toronto home and come back to Costa Rica for a year. (We’re still here after 2 years now…)
As teachers in Tamarindo, a highly populated expat community, many families who also made the move away from their home countries (mostly Canada, USA, and various countries in Europe) needed English schooling for their children. My husband Joe and I also strongly believe in schooling in small groups in highly explorative, inquisitive, engaging ways which the traditional school setting often can’t provide, so we opened our home in the heart of Tamarindo to be a learning center that focussed on just that. We named it “Schooled Away” as families can join us for extended vacations, semesters, or for as long as they like. We will keep them updated and on track with their back- home schooling if that’s what they’d like or we can build a fun, individualized program for them. We’re outside and exploring and getting our hands dirty just like it should be in traditional schools.
In addition to that, I am also a Beautycounter (currently on hiatus) and Shaklee ambassador. Health and wellness is something I am extremely passionate about so being able to share clean products that are also science backed fills my heart. As a teacher, I love to learn and I love to educate and many people are not aware of the toxins in the products that are sold on the shelves. But clean products of the past often didn’t measure up performance wise, so when I found these two companies, I wanted to spread the word. Clean + performance! Yes, please!
While working these businesses, I am constantly baking up healthy snacks and treats for my kiddos. Do I like baking? Nope. But I DO want my kids eating healthy and not bugging me for a snack every hour on the hour. So I would bake up my organic, gluten free, veggie packed muffins for them a couple times a week. Friends would enjoy one when they visited or their kids when we had playdates and I would often hear, “These are delicious! You should sell them.” To which I graciously accepted the compliment but shrugged off the idea of yet another business.
Cue the reality of how expensive Tamarindo is, and it was showing no signs of slowing down, and I decided that I might as well start doubling and tripling my recipe and offering them to families around town and bringing in a little extra income while again offering a service I could be proud of. Enter: “Vittoria’s Healthy Muffins.” (Super creative title, I know.)
And then most recently, I got involved in yet another job involving health and wellness. At the time, I was only playing soccer here once a week (I’ve been playing my whole life and am a pretty skilled player who used to play very competitively) and while I was learning to surf and going almost every day, some days my “surfing” didn’t entail much exercise. And can I also mention that I had never gone into the ocean further than mid-thigh ever since seeing “Jaws” when I was four and so learning to surf was maaaaajoooooor for me. I’m still scared, but I do it scared. Which seems to be a theme in my life, lol!
Across the street from me is a fitness studio and so I let Jess (another female business owner) know that if they ever needed a spin or HIIT instructor that I was able and ready to step in. After a few weeks of training and designing killer classes with awesome playlists, I was ready to go and have been having a blast doing it ever since. I am not a fan of EDM music, which is what you’ll find 99% of the time in Tamarindo, so this is my chance to play DJ and you better believe I am including all the 90s hip hop and 2000s pop music I can!
And there you have it. A 42 year old mom, daughter of Italian immigrants, living in a third world country with her two kids and husband, running 5 mini businesses and hoping I am doing right by my kids with this decision we made to try something a little different.
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
Ummmmmmmm, no. I mean, to begin, we were majorly delayed out of Toronto waiting over an hour for late people, causing us to miss our connection in Houston by only 7 minutes and therefore having to stay overnight and fly the rest of the way the next day. Only to arrive and not have our bags arrive with us and then find out they were sent on another flight and bla bla bla. That’s child’s play. Then we get here and quickly find out that after having bought our condo here, an open aired night club opened right across the street that blared music (my fave: EDM) 6 nights a week until 2;30 am. The “beautiful” floor to ceiling windows in our condo were paper thin and would literally rattle to the music. Any requests to turn it down were ignored and when I tell you that it was like the DJ was spinning at the end of our bed, I am not exaggerating. My kids mostly slept through it, but we could not. Many sleepness nights (well, until 2:30 that is, then we could finally fall asleep) followed by exhausting days trying to get internet and phone hooked up in a country where you don’t speak the language, and electricity and water switched over and such and such.
We were open to the Pura Vida lifestyle, in fact, that’s what we were looking for. Moving away from the ways of the hustle and bustle BUT trying to get something fixed? Ha! Good luck. Most times no one shows up after waiting all day at home, or they show without the tools needed and then its days and days trying to get them back and then something else is the problem and a new part is actually needed and then it’s “fixed” but then two days later it’s not working again and then you’re told that you are now not within warranty anymore so each visit will cost you more even though you initially called within the warranty and they were unprepared and now it’s on us to pay…I hate to sound like a negative nelly, but these things can add up to feeling like major stresses in your life when what would usually be a simple fix, is now taking up all of your time and energy when you’re not sleeping and trying to acclimatize two kids to a new life and get a learning center off the ground…fun times. BUT even with those things happening, we always had the ocean we longed for and an insanely stunning sunset to bring us back to gratitude that we had the opportunity to even give this a shot in the first place.
As time went on (I mean, we still have dripping ACs and rattling windows (after a change of owners the blaring music is now only 3 days a week, not 6) and we now have some pretty good ear plugs -God forbid there’s a fire alarm because I will not hear it.) we’ve met the best of friends and as homeschooling parents, are always tying to keep our kids surrounded by other kids and schedule playdates and involve them in programs etc. Tamarindo (mostly because it is so expensive) is a very transient town and so keeping a steady group of friends for my kids has been a challenge. Families come and go and that can be hard when you’ve met a new bestie.
And I mean, due to it being so expensive here (electricity is atrocious and when it’s 32 degrees morning, noon, and night you need AC) I need to charge $30 USD for a dozen muffins because the ingredients are so costly. I haven’t even factored in the cost of running my oven (don’t tell my husband that) so I am barely even making a profit and many can’t afford to purchase them at that price. It’s a tourist town so they are the ones here to spend money but they don’t know about my muffins and those that live here are often also being as frugal as possible, like me.
Fact of the matter is, it’s tough here. If you’re not working remotely and making your back home salaries, it’s a challenge to keep up. Hence the 5 businesses I’m running.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work? What are you known for? What are you most proud of?
As a kid, I only ever wanted to be a teacher. 17 years in and I still pinch myself and have a beaming smile when I walk through the halls of a school. It is not lost on me that many do not love their day jobs and I do! As a teacher by trade and by heart, all of my other endeavours have spawned naturally from that passion. I love to learn and I love to teach.
So when deciding that I wanted to start a family, I wanted my body to be the healthiest it could be. That’s when I learned how unsafe so much of what is being sold is for us. I tried all the natural stuff and it sucked. And when I finally got pregnant, I broke out bad. And nothing was safe to use to help it and my clean makeup that I tried to cover it with wasn’t cutting it. So when I found Beautycounter (a Californian, female owned company) and it was safe to use and it worked, I was ecstatic and wanted to share it with my friends and family. There’s that learning and educating piece. Fast forward a few years and Beautycounter is currently on hiatus. So several other Beautycounter leaders vetted a bunch (100!) other companies that we could align with to continue to provide our customers with the clean skincare and makeup they had come to know and love and as you can imagine, 99 of them failed our safety and performance standards except for Shaklee (another California based company) who passed with flying colors. So I am now able to feel proud about the company I am aligned with and continue to provide my friends and family with clean skin are and makeup and also a whole other umbrella of products too because Shaklee also makes vitamins and supplements and cleaning products etc.
I think what I am known for is my no BS character. Maybe it’s because I’m a fiery Italian or because I’m a scorpio, I don’t know, but what you see is what you get. I’m authentic and I want the best for everyone. I want you to be healthy and happy and if I can help you with that, great. If you’re not interested, no judgement, go on your merry way and you do you.
I am most proud of the fact that there hasn’t been a challenge I haven’t tried to work through.
I put myself through university by working in an industrial air conditioning factory, got into a top teacher’s college, got a teaching job in a new city that I wanted to live in, birthed two healthy children, and packed them and a husband up to move to a new country. I have no regrets or “what ifs” because I haven’t walked away from anything without giving it my best shot.
While some may sit back and lick their wounds, I give myself a time period to do that too, but then I suck it up and get to work. Build ACs if I want to be a teacher. Study my ass off if I want to get into a top teachers college. Wait tables in a new city while I substitute teach and try to secure a permanent teaching job. Eat Nutella sandwiches for dinner for a year to pay off my student loans. Take on 5 businesses to try to make a life in a new country work for my family.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.schooledaway.com/. shaklee.com/site/vittoriadicesare
- Instagram: vittoriascleancounter
