ciao italia!

this is my last post!

it's a pretty chilly day here. supposed to rain all night (hopefully it stops by 5 am-that's when we will be leaving the hostel). we just got back from our last walk around town. excluding tomorrow morning on the way to the bus station of course. we found out that there's an airport shuttle every half hour, and it's about a 10 minute walk to the station. $4.50 for a bus ticket is a lot nicer than $25 for a cab. 

our trips to siena & san gimignano were slightly less thrilling than we hoped. we walked around siena and ended up getting lost-kameron's little saying has become "we get off the train and wander around for 30 minutes, and then spend the next 2.5 hours finding our way back"...and trust me, that really did apply to basically all of our adventures. we didn't actually make it to san gimignano unfortunately. we got off at the correct train station, but for whatever reason could not find the town. instead we wandered around poggibonsi for awhile-feels like the italian version of anamosa or tiption according to kameron. 

on friday night we ended up finding this awesome restaurant called trattoria nerone. we weren't planning on going out, but we were both hungry and decided we could try something new. it was sooo good. we had the best bruschetta EVER and the rest of the food was amazing as well. kameron ordered stuffed rabbit...interesting. i tried it, and it wasn't bad, but not thrilling either. he also had these great roasted potatoes (what is getting in to me? i like potatoes?) we liked it so much that we ended up going back last night (saturday) for our final meal. we climbed michaelangelo's point for a final view of this beautiful city, and then came back to our apartment. the plan was to stay up late and then wake up late today, to try to get closer to being back on american time, but that didn't happen. i got tired too fast! 

today we have packed and cleaned up our apartment. it is so weird to see it so bare. we are grabbing our final italian pizza and bruschetta tonight from downstairs, and then probably spending a decent amount of time on the terrace before getting up at 4 am tomorrow. that will be interesting haha.

and because i enjoy making lists, here you go

things i will miss:

1. gelato from the "bermuda triangle"...the best flavors of gelato ever! coconut grove & nut lao

2. bruschetta from trattoria nerone-for not eating/liking tomatoes before coming to italy, i sure did eat a lot of bruschetta. i will admit that i picked a lot of tomatoes off though :) at least i tried!

3. truffle sauce!

4. italian style pizza

5. the san lorenzo leather market-never fails to amaze me at the random things found here. also never failed to amaze me at how persistent the leather merchants are.

things i will not miss:

1. euros/the conversion rate. the bronze coins are completely useless, and the conversion rate stinks.

2. ham. i have had enough! haha, at least for awhile.

3. $14 laundry. i dont mind doing laundry, but $14 to do it? no thanks.

4. the train-takes you to amazing places, but makes me soo nauseous.

5. our bunsen burner "stove"...useless for doing anything but cooking pasta and removing wine labels.

see you tomorrow!!!!

ciao :)

emily

school's out!

the last day of class was today! woohoo! haha no, to be honest it was a little bittersweet. or at least from my end...i think kameron was glad to be done. i learned soo much in my class, and enjoyed every single day. i was so excited to finally get to bring home all of my projects today to show kameron. and he even seemed impressed (or he pretended to be)! and i even asked my mom for jewelry tools for my birthday. does that make me a nerd? haha :)

tuesday was AMAZING! our chocolate & wine tasting was so awesome. we ended up trying 13 different kinds of chocolate, and 3 different kinds of wine. we learned that there are 3 different types of cocoa beans, each responsible for different kinds of chocolate. my favorite was chocolate covered orange peels...sounds weird, but they were so good! kameron's favorite was a pistachio kind...i liked it a lot too. we tried 3 kinds of wine that were from 3 different regions, and all were pretty sweet. kameron didn't care for any of the 3 much, but i loooved bricco magno. it was really sweet, and apparently there are only 35 producers of it worldwide! there were only 2 other people in the group with us, a couple from phoenix. it was nice to have such a small group :)

tomorrow we are off to siena & san gimignano for the day. it should be a fun and relaxing final trip for us. i will try to update one last time before i come home :)

love love love

emily

halfway through our last week of class! we both have a final on thursday though, so that's a bummer. we both got a's on our first tests though, so i think we will be alright ;)

this afternoon we are heading to a wine & chocolate tasting. i'm excited! more for the chocolate than the wine though, haha :) as for the rest of our final week, we plan on definitely going out to dinner saturday night and then up to michaelangelo's point. we might take a day trip on friday to siena and another small town (i can't remember the name) just for something to do. we may also go out on thursday night, just to celebrate the end of classes. then sunday is pack pack pack, home monday :) we leave florence at 730 am so we will definitely be going to bed early on sunday night!

this past thursday we went out to a few pubs. the first was an irish pub, and we ended up leaving pretty quickly after getting there, because of a fight between an italian man and woman. he ended up slamming her head into a wall and at that point we decided it was time to move on. then we went to a scottish pub-the fish pub- and ended up staying there for a little longer. then on saturday we went to pisa for the day. it's such a small place! we went to the leaning tower and took some pictures, and then got lunch at a little pizzeria near the tower. it was really good! the tower was really cool to see too, it leans a lot more than i expected! after that we just wandered for a while before heading back to florence. sunday we went to dinner with my step cousin and his girlfriend, who are backpacking through europe and just happened to be in florence. and last night we went to the free farewell dinner from the school. there were a ton of people there, and i think not quite enough food. but kameron and i both tried pâté...i didn't like it very much (surprise), and kameron said it reminded him of hash. at least we tried it!

have to go get ready for the chocolate/wine tasting!

see you monday!!

hello!

i still can't believe how quickly our time here is ending. we only have 5 days of class left! i won't lie, i am really excited to come home. i do like it here a lot, but i have too many exciting things to tell the people at home :) and i cannot wait to have chips and salsa from carlos o kellys...haha. the plan that we've developed so far for our remaining time is this: tonight we do laundry for the second and last time, tomorrow night we are going out to dinner and maybe a bar, this weekend possibly go to pisa and/or the beach, next tuesday go on a chocolate/wine tasting tour, finals on thursday, maybe cinque terre that weekend, go out to dinner and up to michaelangelo's point and then home! 

this week so far, we have spent a lot of time up on the rooftop terrace. after dinner the beginning of the sunset is so beautiful, and the view of the city is spectacular. there's usually a nice breeze, and it's just really relaxing. and it definitely beats sitting in our little room. kameron had a test on monday, which i'm pretty sure he got an a on :), and i finished 3 projects this week! i got to do an extra wax project because me and a few other girls finished up our wax rings early. so now i have a bezel set ring, some bow earrings, a wax ring, and a wax starfish pendant :) i have to take the wax to get cast in silver tomorrow, and then i've only got one project left. crazy!

more later!

xoxo

emily

the end of another great week

i can't believe that we are halfway done with our adventure! two weeks from the very early 

hours of tomorrow morning we are kissing this beautiful city goodbye. time flies!

we ended up going to venice on friday, which was awesome! it's the most adorable little place, and definitely a stereotypical italian town. there were no cars in the central part of the city, because the streets (or sidewalks, i guess?) were extremely narrow, and all the buildings were colorful and really tall. it was kind of like walking through a giant maze. pretty cool :) there was blown glass everywhere! so many things i wanted to buy, but glass would be a little tricky to get home. and also, there was a lot of high end shopping...very cool to see :) side note-a trend here in italy seems to be men wearing purple moccasins...im trying to convince kameron to get a pair but he's not to excited about that idea ;)

venice is probably my new favorite place in the entire world. we ate at a super cute/nice water front restaurant when we were waiting for our gondola ride. kameron had a seafood pizza, complete with like 4 WHOLE baby octupusses (octopi?)...and yes, he made me eat one. it wasn't that bad, but not something i'd choose to eat on a daily basis. we got on our gondola around 330 pm, accompanied by a singer and an accordian player. SO COOL! when i booked the trip i kind of didn't want a serenade but there was no option not to have it. but i think we are both kind of glad they guys were there. they were both amazing, and so many people stopped on the bridges to watch/listen to them :) after our ride was over we walked around the city for a little longer, and then went and caught our train a little early. 

hopefully i will remember to update this again in a few days!

miss and love you all :) :)

emily

definitely falling more in love with italy every day-i know i said that already, but this place is wonderful!

after recuperating from our trek through rome, we got to relax some more-tuesday was an italian holiday, so we didn't have class! it rained both sunday and monday, so that was kind of a bummer, but tuesday was a little nicer. after having a day off, it's weird to know that after tomorrow it's the weekend again. oh well, can't complain about that :) 

kameron's class continues to take him around florence, which has been pretty convenient. he finds little shops and supermarkets and remembers where they are, and then we go back later haha :) he always has cool stuff to tell me about the city when we are walking around. i finished my first ring on monday, and finished cutting the silver for my earrings today. it's going by quickly! i can't believe that after this week we are halfway done with our time here. 

our trip to venice has been moved up to friday. it's supposed to rain saturday, so i was lucky enough to be able to move the reservation for our gondola ride. we are just going to do a day trip, we've heard it's a pretty small place and can definitely be done in a day. i'm so excited :)

today after class we walked around for a pretty long time. i found this huuuge diamond ring on the ponte vecchio-it was gorgeous, and more than likely close to being about a million dollars. kameron found some sweet cuff links too...i think they were 2600 euros? haha we can dream right? we picked up some lemon fanta (so good!) and ice cream, and now we are just hanging out for the rest of the night. update soon :)

love love love

emily

when in rome...

we just got back from our 2 day trip to rome :) 

yesterday morning we took a train into rome, and walked (mostly) to our hotel from the train station. kameron thought he had booked a hotel near the center of rome, but it turned out that it was actually about as far away from the center as you could get. we were close to the vatican city though, so it was nice to be able to find our hotel and do the vatican city yesterday, and then rest up for our HUGE day today. we left our hotel at about 10 and took the subway into the center. we got out and about around 11, and walked straight until 7 pm! we saw so many amazing things, like the pantheon and the roman forum, and of course, the colosseum. we actually got to go in to the roman forum and walk around, which i think kameron loved :) i have to admit that i am pretty impressed with his navigating skills-we had no idea where the hotel was yesterday (he got us almost all the way there walking), and today he got us pretty much everywhere we wanted to go without really getting lost. so good job babe :)

i would write more about that, but im exhausted, so it will have to wait!

next week we have no class on tuesday-it's an italian holiday. then on saturday we are going to venice for the day and on  a private gondola ride (!!!) (and my lovely little bro turns 8)...other than that im not sure what we've got coming, so stay tuned ;)

love love love,

emily

i think my mom is bored at work and needs something to do, so she asked me to update this :)

we are on our 3rd day of class, and both love our classes. kameron gets to go to a lot of cool museums and things which i think he likes a lot :) its fun to have him tell me what he's learned as we are walking around florence. and i'm almost done with my first project! so that's really exciting.

we are in the process of doing laundry for the first time. it was a whopping 14 euros for 2 loads to wash and dry. i think we will not be doing laundry again for a while! but it will be nice to have fresh clothes :) 

we bought train tickets to rome today! we are leaving on saturday morning, but coming back late saturday night. the tickets were kind of expensive, and most of the hotels are pretty pricey too, so we are going to do our best to see as much as we can in a day. it should be fun! 

we also shopped the san lorenzo leather market today. it's completely packed with everything you could imagine, and i was a little nervous about buying things. most of the stand owners will negotiate price, and for some reason that freaks me out a little...i don't know why, i'm just weird. but i ended up getting a few things for really cheap, and it wasn't scary at all! kameron hasn't bought anything for himself yet though :( he does have his eye on some shoes though! we seem to have developed a bit of a routine also. kameron gets up at 730, takes a shower, wakes me up, we go to class, come home, lay out for about an hour on the terrace, go out into the city, come home, cook, and then lay around. its a pretty easy life :)

miss & love you!

emily

first day of school!

hi!

today was our first day of class :) i thought it would be hard to sit in one class for almost 3 hours, but it wasn't that bad! i think kameron likes his class so far as well. it sounds like they will be doing a lot of sight seeing around florence, and learning the historical value of each little sector. he already had homework though! i started working on a project already today...we are going to be doing 4 throughout the course. we started a ring today, but will also be doing a pair of earrings, a wax ring, and a bracelet. it should be fun :) 

last weekend, we took a trip to the beach and went grocery shopping...3 times i think :) its hard to find exactly what you want all in one place, so we go into the markets whenever we see one (which is not often). our trip to the beach was not as successful as we had hoped. we took a train to get there, which turned out to be much easier than the tickets/people at the train station implied. also, it turns out trains make me a little nauseous :( after arriving at the cute little town of viareggio, we ended up walking quite a ways across hot sand to get to the public beach. it was about 10 feet wide, and completely packed. there were a few topless sunbathers...awkward...and about 70% of the people were smoking. needless to say, we didn't stay too long. 

today after class we layed out on the rooftop terrace and went on a quest to find my beloved tiffany & co :) we ended with a great pizza and ice cream bars, and now we are searching for possible places to stay for our trip to rome this weekend!

love & miss you all!

emily

hello :)

so i am starting to love this city more and more. we had orientation for school today (boring), but after that we ate at this great little restaurant and climbed a huge hill to see a great view of florence and the sunset. it was amazing! for dinner i decided to be adventurous, and i had pear pasta with asparagus sauce (thanks to catherine finn!)...at first i was a bit hesitant, because really, who eats pear pasta? but it was soo good! i also found another italian favorite...truffle sauce. its really good. we did some grocery shopping at the fresh food market today...a little scary to buy meat there. a lot of it still has the head attatched and stuff. yuck.

tomorrow we are heading to viareggio, the beach. we are going by train, and im a little nervous! ive never been on a train before. im sure it will be fine though. hopefully it will be warm and sunny! thats not been a problem so far...

dont worry, im still eating plenty of gelato!

xoxoxoxo

emily

a view of the city from "michaelangelos point"

another view of the city...the big round cathedral in the middle is the duomo

hi again :) so far i've been online/updating this more than i thought. oh well! today kameron and i walked around florence and tried to figure this city out a little. it is very different from home. the streets are really narrow, so the traffic only goes one direction. the drivers are also crazy...it scares me. a ton of people drive scooters, which sucks because they seem to always come out of nowhere. so hopefully we can both manage to stay in one piece :) also, i found my favorite italian food today. bet ya can't guess what it is...not. gelato :) it's soo good. we also experienced a little incident when we bought water out of a vending machine. i opened it and it fizzed...not impressed. apparently sparkling water is a pretty big thing here, but i think it tastes awful. i don't think kameron was a big fan either. it was pretty hot/humid today also...would have been a great day to go to the beach, but we figured it would be a better idea to figure out our city before we do too much traveling. OH and one more thing-they sell nutella here (obviously), but i have yet to see it in the same size containers as back home. the ones that i've seen here are like gallon jugs of it...awesome! haha :) i really miss home! and i haven't gotten a chance to talk with anyone really, so that's sad. 

i'm sure you'll hear from me again soon!

xoxo

emily

finally here!

so i am finally sitting in florence! i had the intentions to write while i was in amsterdam (for 7.5 hours...not necessary!) but the internet was like 3 euros for 10 minutes. anyway...the flight from minneapolis to amsterdam was soo long, and i sat behind a girl who reclined her seat from the minute we boarded. it was really uncomfortable, and i only slept for 2 hours...but kameron slept for none so i shouldnt complain :) getting to florence was easy, and so was getting to our hostel, but once we got here it got a little messier. the people who work here are not exactly brilliant. i started to freak out but i am feeling a little better now. tomorrow we were going to try to go to a beach, but i guess we will see how we're both feeling about everything tomorrow. im going to bed for the first time in like 2 days now! 

love love love,

emily