Easter

Italy being a Catholic country takes the Easter holiday pretty seriously, but not necessarily the day in itself. All schools are closed for Good Friday along with many shops. Then after Easter, on Monday there is what's called Pasquetta- Little Easter which is also a holiday. So if you're lucky you'll get a nice 4 day weekend. 

We had wanted to take a road trip through Switzerland and France but the weather forecasted rain and so we decided to use the time here to work on moving into our new house. 

They aren't big on the Easter Bunny and they don't hide eggs but they do like their chocolate. They have large giant chocolate eggs that have a little gift inside. 

We bought a Kinder Easter egg early and opened it. The gift inside was a donkey bracelet which to be honest was disappointing. After going to church in Bologna and then driving down to Poggibonsi to have lunch with the in-laws we were gifted another giant Easter egg. Some people are lucky and get lots of eggs which I suppose is similar to an Easter basket, however I have no idea how these kids eat so much chocolate! It's hard to finish one egg between 2 people! I snapped this photo from the house of one of my private lessons. There are 9 eggs plus a chocolate bunny.  

This past week Luca also played his last 5 on 5 soccer game. Him and his friends have formed a team and they play once a week. This year they were practically un-defeated and made it to the playoffs. I went to see him play for the first time with this team, but unfortunately they lost in a shoot out. Luca is the goalie so it wasn't so much fun seeing them lose, but it was definitely an improvement from the last season!  

Spring

As I've mentioned a few times now, Spring is in full swing! The weather has taken a turn for the better and next week it'll even get up to 75º! It's been so beautiful with all the trees blossoming. I've tried to take some pictures, but it never really captures the beauty all around. 

A couple weeks ago we drove on up to Villa Ghigi up Zona San Mamolo. We brought macchia with us and it was nice just meandering around the large park and macchia really liked it because there were a whole bunch of other dogs to meet! 

Luca found an organic, local fruit and vegetable delivery service. It's called Il Biologico Bologna. In Italian biologico means organic. You can see what produce they're offering and which farm it comes from. It's not all necessarily local from Bologna or the Emilia Romagna region, but it comes from Italy. You can choose how many kilos you want to order and if you want 1/4 fruit and 3/4 vegetables or any combination. They give you the option to leave out 3 items that you don't like or want and you request a few too. 

We asked for 4 kilos worth of produce 1/3 fruit and 2/3 vegetables. If you become a member they deliver it to your house, otherwise you can pick it up at one of the delivery locations. It was 15 euros and once we picked up our order we decided that it's rather on the pricey side. The fruit was delicious but we received some leafy green vegetable that we can't identify and three fennel that we don't really like so that was unfortunate. We're not sure if we'll get more produce from this organization again. 

My birthday came and went and we decided to celebrate at a new restaurant/bar that recently opened. It's called BAGS and it's at the end of Via d'Azeglio. It used to be a bar that offered a great aperitivo because of its nice buffet but it closed down and this new american-style local opened instead. I celebrated with friends on a friday evening. Unfortunately there was mix up in reserving a table and so we had to stand at the bar, but it was alright. I was taken aback as I was also showered with gifts which was completely unexpected. 

 Then on the morning of my birthday Luca took me back there to have their american breakfast! It was hard to choose between eggs and bacon, french toast, or pancakes but I decided to go with the pancakes!

Luca was going to make me a cake, but I had wanted an american style birthday cake, but he claims he only knows how to make italian style cakes and so instead he got an amazingly delicious mille foglie from the famous bakery Regina dei Quadri. 

I had a wonderful long birthday weekend and I felt very loved! 

I haven't able to add to the blog as much since I've started working more. I also started and after school activity for 3-5 year olds. It was expected that around 20 children would enroll so we'd have just an hour. It turned out that 62 students enrolled!