Yay for coffee!!!

So today was officially my 2nd day of school in Italia! And the only class I had was Current Trends in Italian Cuisine. Which was amazing. Its about a 3 hour class and Im so excited for the semester so we can start cooking all this great italian food. The best part about it was that my professor owns the cafe upstairs so he took specialty coffee drink orders for all of us and it was on the house! So it was my first latte since i have been here and it was fantastic! hahah Coffee aside from straight doppios and black coffee is hard to come by around here :P

A lot has happened the last couple days and I dont even know where to start. I was trying to keep track of things to jog my memory...but that obviously wasnt very effective hahah
Starting with Sunday: Kristen, Hannah, and I went to an Episcopal church service about 2 miles from our apartment. Its called St. Josephs Cathedral. It was absolutely gorgeous and was a very traditional service. The church and service both reminded me of Cathedral of the Rockies...so it made me feel a little at home! The next sunday that we are not traveling the girls and I are going to try another Christian church that is on Sunday nights and more geared towards college students. But either way they are in ENGLISH and im sooo happy to have a place to go. Oh and St. Josephs has a college night dinner on Wednesday nights...so we will be going to that a few times while we are here hahah

Lets see...later that day I felt a little homesick. I dont know what my deal was, but a lot of mixed feelings probably taking in everything from the first week! But the girls and I went shopping and I bought some new heels hahaha so I was very happy :)

That night we all walked to this random square in front of Santa Croce. Apparently it is tradition for the children in Italy to have a lantern lighting procession at this time every year. So that night all of these parents showed up with their children and all of the kids had these brightly lit lanters (some had real candles inside....dangerous hahah) and there was a street band and everything. Basically all the little kids danced around everywhere and the whole town stood around the band in a big circle just enjoying the music. Later on everyone formed a procession and followed the band walking and dancing down random streets (Maddie and I went to get gelato and missed the end of the procession hahah but we saw the gist of it!)

Then last night was the 2nd night of the lantern lighting. So all of these families gathered on the bank of the Arno River and the kids brought their colorful lanterns once again. My roomies and I stood on the bridge with a bunch of other people that were watching. But all of the families took turns loading and unloading from two boats that had Christmas lights on them and a GONDOLA! So for the first time I got to see real people taking a real gondola ride hahaha. The city is sooo romantic especially at night and sooooo beautiful!

Oh and I had my first two classes, Italian and Flamenco, yesterday. They both went really well and I have them again tomorrow! I love that classes have started and I have a schedule to go by now haha but its so nice to be able to walk around the city every night and enjoy all the people. Plus all the tourists are gone at night so you can actually get through the streets haha. Oh thats another weird thing. Here people eat at about 9 o'clock at night....Kristen and I went to eat at 6 the other day and the restaurant was empty. So they are night owls for sure. Okay ive got to head back to the apartment to make pasta!!! But ill write again soon!