Buona Pasqua!

Happy Easter everyone:) Well, I'm a day late, but in Italy the Holiday is celebrated on the Monday...so today! We have a great Italian friend named Giorgio...anyone who has come to visit knows him well. For those who haven't, he is in his 70s and speaks NO english at all! I speak very little Italian, but understand a lot, so I can usually put together enough words to limp through conversation. Today however, I did not have the skills:)

Giorgio is very hard to talk to over the phone. When he is with you, you can use his facial expressions, hand gestures etc to figure out what he is talking about, and over the phone you don't have that. Also, being in his 70s, he's not very technologically savy...so he has a tendency to yell into the phone...which makes it muffled and hard to understand. I try to avoid to phone with Giorgio if I can, but sometimes it's not possible.

He came over the other day and invited Kevin and me to eat Easter lunch with his family today. I gladly excepted, but Kevin had to work, so I would be going solo. Well, this morning, I went on a run with the girls. Giorgio had said to meet at his house at 12 and we would drive out to his other house (in the country) and have lunch with his family. I was literally running when my phone rang (I had it in the little pocket of my shorts). I saw it was Giorgio so I answered it, thinking there would be some kind of change to the plans for the day. He just wanted to confirm I was still coming, which I said I was and I would be at his house at 1200. About 10 minutes later he calls again...I am still running... He asks to meet at "undici e mezzo". Well, I am totally out of breath and trying to keep up with the girls who are still running, so I say "si, si, no problema" and I hang up. I finish my run (7 miles by the way) at around 1100 and head home. I get home around 1130 and check my email, thinking I have until 130 to meet Giorgio...well at 1140 he calls to ask where I am. It occurs to me then (an only then) that undici e mezzo means 1130!! NOT 1:30!! I am totally late, and I smell awful from the run!

So, I tell him I'm so sorry, and I will be there in 10 minutes. I run upstairs and take the fastest shower of my life and start drying my hair. I get my hair mostly dry, throw on some clothes and run downstairs. As I'm putting my shoes on, Giorgio rings my doorbell. He says it's no problem and we head out to meet his family...I officially got totally ready in 16 minutes!!

Lunch was fabulous and huge! I love hanging out with Giorgio's family, we are very lucky to have Italian friends to teach us about the culture and feed us awesome food:) I ran out so fast I didn't have time to grab the camera, so there are not photos of our Easter, but it was still great!

Spring in Italia

It is possible I am the worst blogger ever. It has been forever, but I guess that's just because I feel like there hasn't really been anything exciting going on. We have just been hanging out enjoying the wonderful spring weather, taking walks around the neighborhood and exploring the mountains. Here are some photos from the past few weeks.

The first one is our favorite neighbor:) This goat is on my running loop, and he is always standing up on these rocks. He climbs down and head butts the fence if you stop and try to talk to him:)



This is on an evening stroll Kevin and I took around our house. This old church was built in the 1400s. It one of my favorite things.



Bo is also enjoying the warmer weather. He and Rocky are getting along much better, I think the winter just made them both stir crazy in the house.



This is a flower on a shrub in our front yard. I think it's a tulip magnolia, but I'm not really sure. I love the colors!



One weekend we took as hike up at Lake Barcis. It was still a little chilly that day, and we thought it might rain on us, but there was some cool mist over the lake, and there were lots of wild flowers on the trail (though none of my photos of them came out that great).



This is the plum tree in our front yard. This was a few weeks ago, the flowers are all gone now, and it is totally covered with leaves, but when it was blooming it was COVERED in bees! It was so cool, and it smelled amazing!



I was trying to get Rocky to smell the flowers too, but I'm not sure he gets it:)



Yesterday we took a hike up into Dardago and went rock climbing with some friends from the squadron. The weather was great, and we had a much bigger group show up than we usually do, so it was fun to spend the day outdoors!



So, while I don't really have anything particularly exciting going on, we have been enjoying a beautiful Italian spring:)