Sunny Fall Days

I haven't been a very good blogger lately and I need to get back into the blogging game!

Since fall break, I've been exhausted and it hit me two days ago that I only have about a month left in Florence and overseas! That's crazy. I've been away from home for a little over 5 months, and it has flown by. From the amazing summer I had at Castaway, making some of the best friends, to traveling around Europe. When my Mom comes in two weeks, I will have less than a month left and honestly I'm having mixed emotions. I really miss home and my family and friends but I'm never going to be able to do what I'm doing again. Sure I can come back to Europe but I'll probably never live in Europe again. But I do miss life at home. Well anyway, I've been up to quite a bit in the past few days! We only had two days of classes this week because November 1st was a National Holiday called All Saints Day. The night before was Halloween and myself, Kaitlyn, and Britni decided to dress up in 80s stuff (because we didn't have costumes and really it's easy to put on some running shorts, an off the sleeve shirt, and my converse) and see how Florence celebrated All Hallow's Eve....well they aren't very good at it. The only costumes we really saw were witches and ghosts otherwise everyone was wearing black! Terrible, we should out more than we usually do as American girls. We did get to do some dancing but after that, it was a lame night.

Yesterday, I decided to go out on my own adventure in Florence because I've been feeling pretty down the past few days, homesick and such, and I needed to get out of the apartment. I chose to just keep it really laidback and walk until I reached Piazza Michaelangelo. I definately too the long way but it was a beautiful scenic route. I walked along side streets and the day was a perfect fall day, no clouds, sunshine, good breeze, and the temperature was just right where you could wear jeans and a shirt with no jacket, it was great. I walked along pretty streets until I came upon Piazza Michaelangelo. The view was great but the tourists from Japan were everywhere so I decided to see if I could find a better spot to overlook Florence.
I hiked up a little farther and came upon a cemetary at the top of a hill. It was really unique in that all of the tombs were actually tombs and each person had a picture on them. There was also a legit graveyard cat. It was eery but cool. Then I found the church at the top of the hill and it must not be described in most tourist handbooks because there were not a lot of people there at all. It was really beautiful up there. I found a nice bench and laid down and actually fell asleep. Perfection! When I woke up, the sun was still shining and I had a great view of the river and the sun starting to set in the distance. I began to hike back down the hill and thought how I have to return there on a nice day with a book, it's perfect for that sort of thing.
Later on, the school had e-mailed us about a fundraising concert going on not too far from my apartment. My roommate had heard about it too and the two of us decided to go check it out. The concert was to raise money for photoart to be placed in hospitals, pretty neat. They had a guy in college who was a pretty good opera singer perform with a pianist.

Honestly I wasn't too impressed but hey it was for charity. They did have a lot of great American food at the end, such as CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIES AND BROWNIES! Two things I've actually forgotten about because you don't find those anywhere in Italy. They were so good. Jess and I snuck out about half a dozen each and went home to share them with some milk while we watched New Moon. Basically I had a Florence by Day, America by night type of day :].
Today I woke up and got ready to go to the Boboli gardens with Jess and her friend Breanne. It was another perfect fall day and actually hit into the 70s, crazy! It was cold and rainy at the beginning of the week but I guess the weather in Florence is just as bipolar as the weather in South Elgin. Being a student abroad has its perks because we got into the gardens for free :]. And they were beautiful, with the leaves changing and the grass and fresh air, it was the perfect getaway from the smoky air polluted city of Florence. I absolutely loved it. We spent most of the time taking photos, climbing trees, and hanging out. We actually got yelled at when Jess and Breanne were climbing up into a tree and apparantly thats not allowed. The women didn't understand we didn't know italian so while we probably should've been freaked out, we were amused at this woman yelling at us in italian. Luckily we didn't get kicked out and got to take some more fun pictures.

Afterwards, we walked around some streets for a bit and I found the best gelato in all of Florence called Gelateria Lorenzo. Seriously, it was the best gelato I've had, cookies and tiramisu are a great combo!

(Jess and I in front of the church we attended Tuesday Nights)

Then Jess and I went to a coffee date with some of the church group. We met up with Mark and Kate first and soon the whole group showed up and we were pushing tables together. We drank capucinos and ate paninis while talking about Twilight, Harry Potter, Obama, Music, and Football. It was great. I really like that group and Mark is hilarious. We bounce back at each other's humor really easily and it's hilarious. After coffee a few of us, Mark, Mark, Matt, Alison, Jess, and I went to practice some songs for the upcoming church on Tuesday. We had a lot of fun singing some new songs and then Mark and I got into Don't Stop Believing, which was great!

Overall, I had a great afternoon, and tomorrow I'm off to Venice thanks to my parents!

P.S. sorry for the long post but I haven't in awhile!