Welcome To My Hood

We arrived in Italy on July 6th, on September 15th we finally got the keys to our new Italian home. It was a long, bumpy road and sometimes a very stressful process but we have finally settled  in and can breathe a bit more easily now. The road to get here went from this.... our home in Arizona.

To a two bedroom suite at the Marriot  with free breakfast and free maid service.

To a one bedroom apartment with free breakfast and free maid service.

To a room with only ONE bed for all FIVE of us. Luckily we were only in there for about 5 hours.

To a three bedroom apartment with no tv and no internet and no free breakfast and no free maid service.

And finally to this..... a three bedroom, three bathroom, with no free breakfast, no free maid service, and due to a delivery mix up, no beds for the first week. BUT it's ours for three years and eventually all our things came and now we have beds, and internet, and tv. Still no free breakfast or free maid service but I am slowly dealing with that.

We looked at A LOT of different houses, at least 15, and this was the only one that had a yard. All the others we looked at either had only a tile or concrete area out front or no space out front at all. Being that my kids are still small and need space to play and ride bikes, having a yard was very important to me. Some of the other houses we looked at were bigger and/or fancier but this one spoke to us for some reason and just felt right. Our landlord doesn't speak a lick of English but he's very helpful and with a lot of sign language, we figure things out. It's rumored he's old school mafia so he's well known and very wealthy. He owns several houses in our neighborhood and also a "caseificio," a store that makes and sells fresh mozzarella di bufala, other cheeses, and popular Italian meats. He gives us fresh cheese when we go in to pay our rent!

You know that old saying "Be careful what you wish for?" Well we were wishing and wishing and wishing for our stuff to hurry up and get here, and then it did.....

and that's not even close to half of it.

The kids were able to find the fun in unpacking boxes

Let me take you on a quick walk through the neighborhood! I took these pictures on a Sunday afternoon which is the only time that you will find the streets empty. Most retail stores are closed on Sundays and also everyday between about 1pm-5pm. During those hours EVERYTHING closes for "riposo" which is "rest." Italians take this rest period very seriously. "Bars," which are the Italian version of our Starbucks, and the malls are open, but restaurants and mom and pop stores are locked up tight during that time.

There are fruit trees all over the place. We have access to lemons, limes, oranges, grapes, and blackberries right outside our gate.

Pretty much right outside out door grows a very large walnut tree. Didn't you ever wonder where walnuts came from?

These things are very popular with the local people. As soon as the walnuts were ready, there were a couple of old men that would come by in the mornings and pick up the nuts that fell on the ground or throw sticks up into the tree to knock some down.

So although living here presents it's challenges, like not being able to run certain appliances at the same time or the power will go out, or that it's tile flooring throughout the house which is freezing in the winter and also has to be mopped almost daily, we have all our stuff, we have a routine, we have things to do, and we have a place to call home!