Week #7: February 18-24

Ciao!
It's hard to believe that my journey here in Florence is half over. It's a very sad feeling but am excited for the next weeks coming up! This coming week will be midterms week so I have been very busy with classes. Since our photography teacher, Gloria was sick all last week we have gotten behind in class. Monday we developed our shadow pictures and started printing them. I wasn't totally pleased with how the pictures turned out. I had underexposed most of my pictures so I needed filters to print most of the pictures. Tuesday I spent quite a few hours finishing up my shadow prints (even though they aren't do until Monday, Feb. 25).

 I also had my last group meeting of Firenze Journey until after my spring break. I am sad there won't be one this coming Tuesday. Wednesday I was totally busy with classes all day and between one of my classes Sarah and I booked our trips through Florence for Fun to Venice and Cinque Terre. Both are in April. YAY!! Finally Thursday rolled around and we were back at Tina's house cooking again. We made three kinds of pasta: Pasta Alle Zucchine e Pancetta, Pasta with Walnut Sauce, and Pasta With Radicchio. We also once again made salsa verde...yummmm. For dessert we made custard and ate the chocolate we bought at the Chocolate Festival last week. We also made this dish of steamed cauliflower that was topped with Besciamella and bread crumbs. Besciamella is three simple ingredients: Butter, Flour, and Milk (and of course salt and pepper). All these dishes were so unbelievably simple to make! I didn't try the Pasta Alle Zucchine e Pancetta because it had bacon in it. It was pretty much just bacon and zucchinis. The Pasta with Radicchio was probably my favorite. The bitterness of the Radicchio partnered up with the sweet wine was wonderful. In our custard we added orange zest and it turned out delicious. The food is amazing like always and I got all the recipes once again. Can't wait to cook all these meals for my family!

Since my week was pretty busy with school I thought I would share the itinerary my Aunt Margaret sent me:

Thursday, February 28 is when I meet up with my aunt and uncle. I will be finishing up my last midterm around 3-4pm. I stay with them at the hotel for 3 days and we will be exploring Florence together. I can't wait to show them around the city I have fallen in love with!

Sunday, March 3 we leave Florence and head to Lucca for 4 nights. Three of the days involve leisure touring around Lucca, Pisa, Viareggio, Siena, and Livorno.

Thursday, March 7 we leave Lucca for Perugia. We spend two days touring around Perugia. Aunt Margaret said this place was highly recommended so I am excited to explore it.

Sunday, March 10 is when I am dropped off in Florence and have to say good-bye to my aunt and uncle :( I am sure we will have many wonderful memories to share though.

I cannot wait to explore all of Tuscany with my Aunt and Uncle! I just have to make it through midterms week. Sorry I don't have an exciting weekend to share with you all. It has been rain/snowing here in Florence so I have decided it's probably a sign to stay in and focus on my tests for the week. I promise a lot of stories when I get back from spring break! Ciao ciao!!

Week #6: Feb. 11-17

Hey everybody,
Time is going by so fast here in Italy. It's already the middle of February and it feels like just yesterday I was the scared girl who was just getting off the plane. Spring break starts in a week and a half though and I am really excited for that. Maybe I will write a short blog this week about the plans my Aunt and Uncle have while we travel together during my spring break. Here are some of the highlights from my week:

Tuesday:
My morning routine consists of making eggs for breakfast and checking my emails and all that jazz. Tuesday morning I had gotten a very exciting email about doing some work and a possible internship this fall in Superior. I had emailed a woman with the Superior Council for the Arts a couple days earlier, letting her know who I was, where I was going to school, my major, my future goals and I had just asked that she would let me know of any volunteer work in the community or any open positions at the North Ends Art Gallery. I was so blessed to have gotten an email back about meeting her in May to discuss more on the kind of stuff I will be doing and talking about this intern job. I really have Diana Randolph to thank for helping me with all my questions with the art field and always giving me good advice. I am super happy about this possible intern job!! After the excitement about the email, I went to the Tuesday Market with my friend, Sarah. I got a new coat for only 2 euro and two shirts and a vest, each a euro a piece. I love that market!! So many amazing finds! Tuesday night was another day with Firenze Journey. The group just gives me one more thing to look forward to every week. Everyone is so happy and kind in the group and it's just a lot of fun.

Thursday:
CHOCOLATE FESTIVAL! For Food as Culture class, we went to the chocolate festival here in Florence right outside of the Santa Maria Novella. First thing we all tried was the hot chocolate. I think I was the only one to finish it. It was really thick compared to the watery stuff we have in America. This was pretty much just melted chocolate with maybe a little bit of milk. It was so delicious, I got the dark chocolate hot chocolate. There were samples of many things but after that hot chocolate I was starting to get a sugar rush. We also had these croissant type things with nutella in the middle. It was so amazing. I can't remember what it was called though. I got pictures of some friends eating one though so I will post at the bottom of this blog.

Friday:
We were lucky to have sunny weather most of this week, unfortunately Friday I was feeling awful. I don't know if I just soaked up too much sunshine or if it was the chocolate from the day before but I was just feeling crumby. I some how tried to fight it off though and ended up making my way to the Pitti Palace and the Boboli Gardens. I really enjoy venturing off on my own sometimes. I do it a lot. I really enjoyed the Pitti Palace, I wish I could have taken pictures because it was absolutely beautiful inside. I wish I could live inside the palace. After I made it through all the exhibits in the Palace I went outside in the gardens but was just starting to feel real awful and decided maybe I should head back and call it a night.

 

Saturday: 
I was feeling fantastic again and got up bright and early and started crossing off more places on my museum card. I started off by going to Chiostro dello Scalzo. It was only one room so my time there was really short but it was so beautiful and simple. It was just a little courtyard with some frescos. Then since I realized it was by the San Marco Museum, I went there next. I was supposed to go there for a class one day but I was late to class and the museum had closed. Once again, no pictures were allowed but I managed to sneak a few. It was another beautiful place, but I wish I would have been there with my teacher so I knew exactly what I was seeing. I then went to the Bargello with my roommate, Emily, and my friend, Sarah. I got to see Donatello's 'David'. I was so excited, plus I got to cross another museum off my long list! YAY! We also stopped by the Duomo again. Sarah is a tour guide there so she wanted to give us a tour. I dedicated February as my museum month since tourists aren't too bad yet and after February the weekends are packed with trips. After spring break I only have like a month and a half also. Sad thought.

 

Sunday:
Today was a very chill day. Took my time this morning. I wanted to run but my shins have been awful since I have had the same training shoes since June. I know better then to run in shoes like that but they don't sell asics here so I am going to have to deal with the crappy shoes until I get home and can buy some new ones. After making my smart decision of not running, I went for a long walk instead to the Piazza Michelangelo. I found this Rose Garden on my way there though. Obviously there were no roses bloomed yet but it was a very beautiful little garden.

Only about a week and a half until spring break and I am getting antsy! :) I am sure those weeks during spring break I will be too busy to post but once I get time I will keep you all posted. I should have a lot to share! I am anxious to see my Auntie Margaret and Uncle Mark and to share some amazing memories with them. I'll be sure to post on week #7 this Sunday :) Ciao Ciao!

Week #5: Feb. 4-10

Hey Everybody,

I realize this one is a little late. Week #5 was basically class Monday through Thursday and the weekend I explored the parks a little more. I also went to the Uffizi again on Saturday, February 9th with my friend, Sarah. It was her first time going there and her favorite painting, "Birth of Venus" is there. Her facial expression was priceless when she finally got to see the painting. The highlight of my week was definitely on Tuesday so I thought I would focus on that. I will include pictures from La Cascine park (since that was where I spent a lot of time this weekend) at the bottom this blog.


Tuesday: Feb. 5, 2013:
Tuesday was the start of Firenze Journey. Firenze Journey is a bible study group for people who speak English who are living in Florence. It is mostly study abroad students that go to the group so I have met a lot of new, great people. I am the only one from SRISA who goes to the group so it is kind of nice to see some new faces on Tuesdays. The people who run the group are Danielle and Cody Wilbanks. They are two of the nicest people you will ever meet. We all meet at their house on Tuesday's at 9 pm and usually start out with a delicious snack that Danielle has made and talk with each other then get right into the bible. Cody decided for this semester (since we only have a small period of time here in Florence) that we are going to focus on the Book of John. A lot of people in the class know so much more about the Bible and Jesus. I know very little compared to them, but am happy that my friend Lauren informed me of this group so I can start to learn more. God has blessed me with such a wonderful opportunity, studying here in Florence, I want to grow in my faith and praise him for this amazing journey. Here is the website for Firenze Journey in case you are interested to learn more about it : http://firenzejourney.com/

Week #4: Jan. 28- Feb. 3

Another week has flown by in the wonderful city of Florence.
It started out as a rough week trying to figure out where my financial aid is but things were solved so there is nothing to stress about anymore. Probably was nothing to stress about in the first place. Moving on from that topic... Some of the highlights of my week:

Wednesday:
I made my first successful print in photography class. Although, that doesn't sound super exciting to most, for someone like myself who is passionate about the subject it was quite the accomplishment. For anyone who has ever had to go out and take the pictures (keeping in mind you need to adjust the aperture and shutter speed to get the right image), develop the film, and having to actually print the image, knows how hard it is. It is so time consuming. I really feel like I am learning a lot in the class. The negatives I had weren't horrible but they weren't good. I was taking pictures with a lot of white backgrounds which confuses the camera into thinking that the image is too bright. So I would change the aperture or shutter speed to what the camera said and most of my images turned out gray with little contrast. That was another downer on the beginning of the week.

        
Thursday:

Three words... Food as Culture. Sometimes I think I am in a dream when I go to this class, it is just too good to be true. Three credits to learn about food and to eat, I am totally down with that. We had to meet at our teacher's house at 9:30 am for class. Originally we were going to make pasta and custard but plans changed so instead of custard it was apple crumb and decided we were going to make pasta another day. We made a delicious meat sauce, apple crumb, crostini with salsa verde, and a salad with fennel and oranges. By the way, I have the recipes for all of these fantastic foods so send me an email at cmichele@uwsuper.edu if you would like them. They are all super easy. Along with making these different dishes, the previous week we had bought five kinds of olives at the Market Centrale. Tina, the teacher, had also bought five kinds of proscuitto and cheese. The five kinds of proscuitto were: Proscuitto crudo, Mortadella, Proscuitto cotto, Salame Toscano, and Sbriciolona/ Finocchiona. The five cheeses were: Goats cheese, Taleggio, Pecorino, Asiago, and Provola Affumicata. The unfortunate part was that I forgot to take notes on which one I liked best, but the good part was that I really enjoyed all of the different proscuitto and cheese. There was one proscuitto that was just too raw and gooey for me though, it was the texture that grossed me out. There were two different breads we had also, Pane cotto a Legna (cooked in wood oven without salt) and the Schiacciata. We were in the kitchen preparing the food from 10ish to noon, so by the time we had set the food out we were like hawks swarming the table ready to eat. I was so focused on the cheese that I never tried the olives, shame on me. I'm not a big olive fan, but I am in Italy so I NEED to try as many as I can

.

                     

For Italian Renaissance we met at the Duomo and looked at the doors of the Battistero di San Giovanni since we have been studying them in class. We also went inside the Duomo and saw the tomb of Filippo Brunelleschi, the man who designed and made the Dome. The cathedral is so massive. One of these nicer days I am going to go to the top of the dome. A few people in my class have done it and said it was breathtaking. After the Duomo we went to the Orsanmichele Church. This building was originally a grain market and when walking into the church you can tell because of it's wide open space like the markets I have been to in Florence. You can also see on the walls where they had the grain come down from the top floor. It's hard to explain and I wasn't allowed to take pictures. I took some pictures of the outsides of the building though. 

Friday:
Friday I went to the Uffizi Museum with my my roommate and a friend. Before we got there we were super hungry so we stopped for some food at the Gli Stuzzichini del Corso. I got a sandwich with proscuitto and mozzarella. It was amazing. Then we enjoyed our food at the Palazzo Vecchio. The Uffizi is so big, we actually didn't make it through the whole museum because we decided we were going to go to the Pitti Palace and the Boboli Gardens as well. By the time we had gotten to the the Pitti Palace to get our tickets they had stopped selling tickets. My roommate brought us to this tea shop called Tealicious where there are a ton of flavors of tea. I am not a tea drinker but some of these teas smelled amazing. 
Saturday was rain all day so I got my normal run in and did homework and relaxed. 

                        

Sunday:
I woke up early and got my run in like every other morning, and then decided I was going to adventure on my own to the Boboli Gardens at the Pitti Palace. I have so many pictures from the gardens, I fell in love. I actually didn't make it through the whole thing, so I am going to try and go their every week. I get in free so why not? :) After a couple hours of walking around I headed back home, skyped family, did homework, and called it a night. We had another "Family Dinner" last night at our place, the food was really great like usual. I had eaten before it though so I didn't have much. Plus I had more Italian homework I needed to get done. 

The days really do just keep getting better and better. I am planning a few trips with some friends. The destinations are to Verona/ Lake Garda, Cinque Terre, and Venice. They are all day trips but to places I really want to go. The only other one I HAVE to plan is Rome. I must see the colosseum! :) I am anxious for my Aunt Margaret and Uncle Mark to get here at the end of this month! I can't wait to explore Italy with them, and they picked out some great places to travel! Can't wait!