"I'm Behind, Rewind"

WHOA WHOA WHOA....

Welll. So much for staying on top of this whole blogging thing. It's definitely been over a week now. And, of course, so much has happened in that small amount of time! Let's see... where did I leave off.

Okay, Thursday.
Thursday I woke up early(ish) because we had to be out of our rooms by 9 o'clock. I got up and got ready and took my bags to the room where we were storing them. Then I went downstairs and got some breakfast. The rest of the day I spent eating, taking pictures, and relaxing. Katie, Maggie, Amanda and I took a nice walk and had a snow ball fight which was fun. After that we spent some time in the TeaRoom just talking and relaxing. When it was time to head home, we all piled on the bus. I sat up close to the front, and let me just say, that was a terrifying experience!!! I do not know how we got home without hitting anything because it was close just about every single turn we came within inches of a wall or a car or the edge of a cliff. Eventually I had to just close my eyes, and turn on my music. I sat by William on the way home, and he slept most of the ride too. (though he had a bit more of an excuse since he'd actually been skiing all three days, and took a pretty rough fall on the second day).
When we got home we had dinner and unpacked. The rest of the night... I honestly don't remember. But I know I was exhausted for some reason.

..Friday..
Friday morning I had my first class at 9, and finished up with classes by lunch time. After lunch I got ready and then my group was shuttled down to the bus stop where we took Bus 6 into Florence. We waited in a piazza for our onsite teacher to join us, and then we headed to an artisan's shop. The artist that we visited works with metal and has some big clients in the US. He makes logos for clothing companies and designers, makes jewelry, and SO much more. It was really neat to see his shop where he has worked since he was between fifteen and seventeen years old. He was the sweetest man, too! I loved looking around his shop, and I loved listening to him talk about his work. He didn't speak English, the passion with which he spoke made it obvious that he loves what he does. After we were done at the shop we went to get a cappuccino while we waited for our next onsite teacher to meet us. When she arrived we finished our drinks and then headed to the shop to make our Carnevale masks. The young lady who was the master at the shop had already prepared the masks for us to decorate. She showed us the steps in creating them, and it took me back to making the plaster balloon when I was five. Decorating the mask was a lot of fun. I wish I were more artistic because some of the designs people made were so cool, but overall I was pretty happy with how mine turned out. :) After we were finished with our masks, about 7:30 if I remember correctly, we were free to go get dinner in Florence. Me, Kyle, Katie, and Maggie headed back to Scandicci where we had pizza at one of our favorite little pizzarias. We went back to Scandicci because I was supposed to meet up with William, but I couldn't get my Italian phone to work. We ended up running into him and Jenna at one of the bus stops on the way back to the Villa, so it all worked out.

Saturday...
What happened Saturday. I can't remember.. THIS IS SO FRUSTRATING!! I know we had classes until lunch, but after that I have no idea what happened. Hmmm. It's possible that I went and got groceries with Amanda and William Saturday afternoon and made it back in time for dinner. After that... I don't know.

Sunday!
Sunday we were going to go to Florence for worship, but we ended up staying in because of the snow. We had our own church service at the Villa and then Bible. At six thirty we had a song night with some members from the Florence church and the mayor and his family. Then we had dinner with a ton of people, and then we had a concert. A band called Metamorphosis came to the villa and played for us. They were wonderful!! They played jazz and some traditional Italian songs for us. Afterwards we had snacks and just socialized for a while.

Mondayyy
Monday morning we headed out to one of the local high schools in Scandicci. We had a "language exchange" with them. They helped us with our italian homework, and we helped them with some english homework. We also taught them a song. Lean On Me. haha. It was an interesting experience. I got paired up with a young man named Mirko.  He was nice, but shy. His English was good, but he seemed a little hesitant to use it. As the class went on he seemed to get a little more comfortable with it, and he definitely helped me with my Italian homework. After that we headed back to the Villa for the rest of our classes and lunch. After lunch we had a few "free" hours before we had dinner. Dinner was basically a party! The kids from the high school came and had dinner and played games with us. It was a lot of fun. I met some friends, and even got invited to go to a pub with some of them. I played soccer with one of the guys for a little bit and found out that apparently girls don't really play soccer in Italy. It's a guy sport. SO he was impressed ;) haha. Another thing that I've noticed is that EVERYONE in Italy smokes. We walked out of class while everyone was on break and probably between 70-80% of the kids there were smoking. Some even took smoke breaks during class. It seems to crazy to me. Anyway, Monday was a good day.

TUESDAY - SAN VALENTINO
Actually, I have to go get ready, so I'll tell you about Valentines Day next time!!! :)