Now That is COOL

Another busy intense weekend...

On Saturday I slept in and then did my weekend chores. I had to buy bread at the local bakery instead of going to the veggie and fruit market. I am friends with the women that run the bakery and love TRYING to chat with them while I wait for my bread. When the kids got home from the pool we had a simple lunch with the all five of us which hasn't happened on a weekend since the beginning of September! It was nice to eat as a whole "family". After lunch I met Barbara and her two girls and Balbina at OUR park. Parco Valentino is our favorite place to go so we decided to take the girls and let them run around and work out some energy. At 6 we went back to their house and started baking chocolate cake and I made oatmeal chocolate chip cookies. The only bad thing was the recipe called for a stick of butter and apparently the sticks are bigger here cause the cookies were as flat (and greesy) as pancakes (but still tasted good). Andrea and I went out for pizza so that we could finalize plans for our trip next week. Next Thursday is All Saints' Day and there is a 4 day weekend. Andrea, Barbara and I are going to Florence, Pisa and Sienna. I am really looking forward to it. After dinner we went back to Barbara's and finished watching a movie they were in the middle of and then sat around and talked until almost 2 in the morning.

Sunday was jammed packed. In the morning around 11, Pat and Alberto's friend, Luca, picked me up and we went to an art exihibition of contemporary African art in an old Fiat warehouse. Some pieces I really enjoyed but overall the art was not my taste. Lots of bright colors and surprisingly lots of glitter paint. We also went to the permanent collection which I loved. There were a few Matisse, Picasso, one Manet and one Renior. These painting were much more enjoyable for me than the African art. We ate a quick lunch in the food court and headed to Superga, a little town or suberb of Torino located on a hill overlooking the whole city. We went inside the huge church and walked up the 1000+ stairs to the roof for an amazing view of the city and surrounding areas. I had to get back to the city because I was meeting Barbara and Balbina for a night of fun. We met at the bus station and went to the other side of town to one of the three Olympic Ice Palaces to see a gala ice skating show with the famous skaters and the 2006 men's gold medalist from Russia. He was amazing and the first routine he did was to a Pavaroti song that literally made me cry. Many of the skaters danced to Pavaroti and other Italian opera songs. It was great to actually see some of them in person after I have watched them for so many years on tv. After the show we went to our favorite pizzeria and talked with the owner while we ate. Barbara and I ended our night with gelato even though it has been getting really cold here lately.
A very cool weekend-in more ways than one!