Family Time

The families are here!!
First KG's mom and Ty's mom both came into town! KG's mom, Jarka, was really nice. She only spoke Czech so we didn't know what she was saying but she was always smiling, so she has to be nice. She stayed with us for 11 days. Her and KG have the same mannerisms, they walk the same and they laugh the same. Ty's moms name is Mrs. Brenda. She came all the way from Hawaii and she has been staying with us for three weeks. Mrs. Brenda and Ty are not that much a like. Mrs. Brenda talks really proper and half the time people don't know what Ty is saying. I love having Mrs. Brenda here she reminds me of my mom. It makes me really miss my mommy!! In Hawaii they call people Aunt or Uncle if you are older, even if you aren't related. When Ty's mom go here I called her Mrs. Brenda and they thought that was the best thing ever. I didn't think anything of it, I guess it's a southern thing.

One night after we ate dinner at the Buscharini we went outside and Mrs. Brenda taught me and Eva how to hula. It was really hard because you have to be graceful, something that I am not! You have to roll your hands like waves while you take two steps to the side and move your hips with the step. Then you go the other way. You can even go to hula school in Hawaii.

Coach Tony was the next. He is the head coach at TSU and my boss. Him and Monica flew into Rome for a few days and then they came to Forli on Saturday to hang out and watch the game. They had a little mishap on the train on their trip from Rome to here and ended up in Milan! It was a four hour detour but they made it! Of course Coach Tony acted a fool and yelled VERY loud the whole game!! I heard a few 8 is greats chants during the course of the game. After they game we went to eat and then out to X-Ray. At X-Ray he continued to act crazy and entertain everybody! It was so great to have them there. They headed to Venice the next day. On Monday me, Ty and Mrs. Brenda met them in Venice and hung out for the day.

Trip to Venice

Now my sister, Krystal, and our friend Tiffany are here. The day they arrived me and Ornella went to the airport in Bologna to pick them up. We left early to make sure we didn't get caught in traffic. We got there at 10:30 and their flight was supposed to get in at 11:15am. Turns out they missed their flight in Paris and they weren't getting in until 2:30pm. We had no way of knowing that so we were at the airport for 5 hours waiting! They finally got here and Krystal's bag got lost!

The next day was much better, we took a trip to Venice. And on Friday we took a trip to Florence. When we went to Florence we were the ultimate tourist and got on one of those double decker tour buses. We even rode on the top! When we were riding around Tiffany thought it would be a good idea to stand up and take pictures. Two different times Tiffany got hit in the head by a tree. One time she had twigs in her hair. It was sooo funny! Tiffany has been our entertainment for the trip. When we were at dinner she asked Ty who the president of Hawaii was. Ty was like Barack Obama. We had to remind Tiff that Hawaii was in the United States. The same country she lives in!

Ty's box
Ty has been waiting for a month and a half for a box her sister and law sent her for her birthday. It was sent on May 8th and it just got here on the June 16th! Ty got sour candies in her box that I love so she gave them to me. At first I thought what a nice friend. Then I looked at the ingredients and I think Ty might be trying to kill me. Ingredients: sugar, wheat flour, clucose, syrup, water, acidulants, acidity regulator, emulsifier preservatives, flavors, artificial color. I paid attention in nutrition class and my teacher said the first ingredient listed is the most.



Sunrise and Sunset
We went to the beach today, we were there for a while and I noticed that the sun wasn't going down. I felt like I was in Alaska. I was really curious about this so I asked one of my teammates what the deal was with the sun. She was saying in June and July the days in Italy are really long. So I looked up the time of sunrise and sunset on weather.com. Turns out the sun rises at 5:29am and sets at 9:02pm. I like that the sun stays out long but I don't like that it comes up so early! I've been having to wear one of those sleep mask to bed! I also noticed that the temperature is 77 degrees here and it feels like 76. In Houston the temperature 92 and it feels like 99! The sun rises at 6:20am and sets at 8:23pm. What I'm thinking is that everybody in Houston should migrate to Italy to escape that heat!!

Face wash
I ran out of face wash so I figure I would go to Conad and get some. Then I remembered I don't read Italian. I couldn't tell what was face wash or lotion, it was a lot of confusion so I didn't get anything. Ty had also been looking for face wash so she walked down to another store by the square and she got some of those wipes for you face. She thought it had to be the right stuff because it was on a display with Penelope Cruz washing her face. Well when she tried to use it that night, they didn't lather. That wasn't going to work. I took a trip to the same store the next day, I saw the display and picked a bottle of what I thought was face wash. I asked the lady at the desk but she didn't speak English. I pointed to my face and she said si. I though finally I found some. When I got home Leslie read the bottle for me. Turns out I bought face lotion to help reduce wrinkles!

Triple Play!!

Triple Play!
This weekend we played at home against Legnano. Irene was the starting pitcher and she was throwing a great game. We were up by one run in the top of the 6th inning. We had no outs and a runner on 1st and 3rd. Leslie came into the game to pitch. The first pitch she threw the girl up to bat bunted the ball. Leslie fields it looks the girl back at 3rd and throws to first to get the 1st out. The girl at 3rd takes off for home, Sabro our second baseman throws home to get the second out (Ty almost got her headed taken off by the throw!). The girl that was at 1st rounds 2nd and takes off for third. Our catcher Eli throws her out at 3rd. We got a triple play using only one pitch! It was awesome! It was perfect throws all around, we looked like we knew what we were doing!! We played really well and won both of our games. It was a good Saturday.

Saturday night we went to a place called X-ray and we did a little bit of celebrating. At the end of the night I was one of the few sober ones left so I got to drive home! It was 3am so there were no cars on the road and KG was there to help me out. I only stalled out once,the car was horizontal across two lanes, but the rest of the trip was good and I parked really good!

Italian National Team

Last weekend we took a road trip to Milan to watch the Italian national team play. It is about 4 hours from Forli. We saw them play the Czech Republic, France and Bollate, one of the teams in the Italian league. It was fun but frustrating because I was with people that only spoke Italian. I had no idea what was going on for 2 days! Ornella was there and she can speak pretty good English but she can't translate from Italian to English. Her first language is Spanish but she knows Italian well. She hears it in Italian, translates in her head to Spanish so she understands and than she would try to translate from Spanish to English so I could understand. She had a hard time doing that, which I understand. So I didn't get too much info. Someone would say something in Italian and everybody would laugh and I would just be lost. Sometimes I would laugh just to fit in!

Watching the team play really got me wanting to get on the team. I have to get this husband thing worked out. Leslie already got me two pair of socks that the team wear that say Italia on them. With my socks I feel like I'm pretty much on the team all I need now is to get married! Since y'all are my family and friends you have to help me pick. I've narrowed it down to 2 since I didn't know number 3's name. Email me your votes!

Ivano is our team trainer and he gives really good massages! He enjoys surfing and he is learning to speak English. He is actually pretty good. I can have a conversation with him and not get frustrated. He is about 5ft 9 and is very nicely built.

David is a bartender at pride and always makes really good drinks. He is a softball fan and comes to our games. Interesting fact about him is that his mother is Italian and his father is Ethiopian. He also speaks pretty good English. David is about 5ft 8 and is also very nicely built.

Almo

There is a pizzeria by our apartment called Almo. Me and Ty go there about 3 times a week, its really good! There is a really cute older couple that work there. The guys name is Almo. When we walk in they already know what we want so they just start making it, they are really nice. They always try to talk to us in Italian but we have no idea what they are saying! So me and Ty just smile and nod. I think that Almo thinks if he keeps talking to us we will eventually understand what he is saying. They could be telling us we are idiots and we would have no idea, we would just be smiling back a them!

Washing Machine disaster!!
Our washing machine broke!! And that's not good when there are five girls living in a house with five smelly uniforms. Like the cars in Italy, the washing machines are also very small. I think they made the washing machines small so they could be transported in the small cars. Since the machine is small you can only wash so many clothes at one time. So our washing machine is running around the clock. When you see the washing machine open you have to hurry up and throw your clothes in because you don't know when you will see it open again! When our washing machine went down for the count we all naturally assumed it was from over use. Within a few days Bomba had someone over to fix it. It turns out ONE bobby pin broke the machine. I think it took the guy a good three minutes to pull it out and it was running again. We all blamed it on each other!