A view nearby our home

We made it to Italy! And what a first week it has been!

We arrived in Italy evening of Oct 9th, after a long redeye flight from Atlanta, Georgia to Istanbul, Turkey. Then boarded another plane in the late afternoon for a quick two-and-a-half-hour flight into Rome. It was on the second flight where the initial shock of selling our home, saying goodbye to our loved ones and friends, had finally worn off and I felt that sunken feeling of “what on earth did we just do?”. We had no home, no furnishings and only the items that fit into our pieces of luggage that remain our property for the next, who knows how long. It was a scary and bizarre reality, and I had the thought of boarding another plane back to Georgia and telling the buyers of our home and new owners of our dog, that we changed our minds. Instead, I took a deep breath and tried to scroll through something decent to watch to occupy my very weary mind.

Once we arrived in Rome, we breezed through customs, found ALL of our luggage (blessing!), and maneuvered our way to the rental car. After about 45min of convincing the rental guy that we really weren’t interested in any other vehicle than the one we reserved online, we were handed the keys and overloaded our luggage and ourselves into the smallest Corolla station wagon you can possibly imagine. Seriously, our trunk was stuffed, and the rest of our bags laid at our feet. Even I sat in the passenger seat, crisscrossed as there was nowhere else to put my legs. Then it was an hour drive to our new “home” Airbnb in the dark and on winding, narrow roads. So grateful Phil was alert enough to function and drive!

Our wonderful hosts greeted us warmly at the late hour of almost 10pm. They gave us a brief tour with some instruction then left us to ourselves. We brought in our things then stumbled into bed without the slightest awareness of how cold the house actually was, until the next morning. With temperatures in the 50’s, all tile floors, and no central heating, (not to mention the jet lag) we were reluctant to get out of bed. It was our grumbling tummies that did the trick. We headed to the local Cafe’ where our kids experienced their first taste of a European buttery & chocolate croissant. Truly Devine! Then on to our first experience at an Italian grocery store.

We struggled with some of the labels but for the most part we did alright. I oohed and awed over all the options of farm fresh produce! Seriously, most of the produce isn’t packaged or imported, so it’s all loosely sitting in bins or on shelves for you to weigh and bag yourself. It’s a beautiful thing, minus the extra prep time before dinner. I do miss my fancy kitchen gadgets that help shortcut a lot of the prep for me, however, if this is how the locals do it, then that’s what I’m doing too. My goal throughout our travels is to collect recipes from the people in each place we visit. I want to learn how to make it with the methods they use and have a diverse collection by the end of our trip.

The first place to ventured out to is the Rome Temple. I was really excited to share this beautiful place with the kids. Phil and I took turns doing initiatory while the other explored the visitor center with the kids. It felt great to be back!

Sunday approached and we needed to decide where we were going to attend church. We are 45min from two Rome wards and just under an hour from our area ward. We also knew the Rome wards had some English and Spanish, with Italian speakers and that sounded more ideal to me. But we decided we didn’t want to crisscross ourselves out of ward boundaries again and really wanted to give our kids a true cultural experience, so we drove an hour, to the East coast of Italy for church. I think most people thought we were the typical visiting tourists, but they were friendly and kind. The Missionaries were very willing to translate for us as well. By the end of church, I felt overwhelmed and was ready to tell Phil that we would do just fine attending the ward closer to us and with more English speakers, until I saw how quickly our girls’ made friends with the adoring Italian girls their ages. One of the moms of the girls found me and we were able to exchange numbers and information so we could schedule playdates. This truly made all the difference! She also learned what I do for a living and had asked me to contribute to their next Relief Society discussion on the topic. I needed this, and God knew I needed this. So, we have our new ward and while the drive is quite a sacrifice, I think it’s going to be worth it.

This past week on Tuesday we found a nearby olive orchard and factory that manufactures olive oil, so we took the kids for a lesson on how olive oil is made. It was loud and hard to hear the tour but really fascinating to see. Of course, we left with a bottle of our own to enjoy at the end. For us, it was dinner time by the end of the tour, so we thought we’d stop at a local restaurant for dinner. However, the locals don’t open restaurants until at least 7pm or 7:30pm. I forgot how late the Italian like to stay out at night. We did find a small pizza a pasta place that must’ve barely opened their doors because their ovens weren’t heated yet. Regardless, they willingly gave us a table and we enjoyed a fresh pasta meal and real Italian pizzas. So good!

It’s taken us about a full week to adjust to the new time zone and we still working on learning how to speak and understand Italian. We’re learning about the trash service, like how everything gets recycled, has its own bin, and particular day it gets picked up. We’re learning that you give a different “hello” to the people we hardly know (salve) vs. closer family or friends (ciao). We each have our own set of house slippers to keep our toes warm and are adjusting to how the laundry works here as well. My girls have jumped right in to searching the yard for various creatures they can capture, like lizards and snails. They have even tried to convince us we need to adopt a cat that won’t leave our yard and have already given the name of Shylow.

I do need to mention how impressed I am with how resilient my kids have been with adjusting to our new lifestyle. We are in full swing of homeschooling, each of the kid has their daily job, as well as helping with meals. They have truly been rockstars!