December

As we near the end of the semester this week, we have been working on a number of miscellaneous assignments and have also had and will have a few celebrations. Our Italian class is now over; we took the final exam yesterday. We've been working on preparing for our exhibition, which will be held on Friday evening, to showcase the work from the semester. We've been cleaning out the studio space to use for the exhibition; the business students and people from the town are all invited. It should be a nice way to display and celebrate our competition boards, photos from our trips, sketchbooks, and preliminary work.

December 3rd, yesterday, was, of course, my Birthday! It was an amazing day all around, despite having to study for and take the Italian exam. In the morning, when I went downstairs for breakfast, there was a note for me saying "Happy Birthday Louisa! Go to the fireplace room." I was confused, but, when I went in, I found Chloe and Ashton with a fire in the fireplace and playing Christmas music. They had set up a wonderful breakfast of homemade granola (courtesy of Chloe), a yogurt from the grocery story my sister tried while she was here, swiss hot chocolate, orange juice, bananas, bread, and nutella! I obviously couldn't have everything, but stuck with the granola, yogurt, and hot chocolate. It was such a nice way to start the day and made the stress of the Italian exam that was to occur later in the day fade away. It was so Christmasy and warm; I couldn't have had a better start to my Birthday! When I came back to my room, my roomates had set up snowflake Christmas lights on my bed with some chocolates and the gift David sent with my mom; they, of course, also had Christmas music playing!

The rest of the day itself with dedicated to our Italian exam and cleaning up studio some until it was time for our fancy, belated (Italian) Thanksgiving meal. We all ate together in the main classroom and enjoyed a 'fall' salad, turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, and a 'semifreddo' dessert. I wasn't expecting them to serve the individual ice cream birthday cakes that are normally given to people on their birthdays, as it was such a big and nice meal to prepare for so many people. I was definitely surprised when Kristina, one of the servers for the evening, came in with one; they had a single candle lit and sang Happy Birthday, the tradition here at the villa. It was a little overwhelming with so many more people at dinner, including our professors. I was glad that the Thanksgiving meal happened to be on my Birthday though; it was nice for everyone to be excited to get dressed up and enjoy a meal together.

After the dinner we had to do a little more work for the studio exhibition, but after went over to the girls' apartment to hang out and have some fun. Lindsey and Will had prepared a version of Jeopardy with questions all relating to us here in Riva. There were categories like 'Mi Casa e Su Casa' for things that happened in the villa, 'On the Road Again' for things during our travels, 'Shin' Diggin' for the celebrations we have had, a 'Miscellaneous' category, and one called 'Birthday Girl' with questions about me. It was so much fun to look back on some of the things we've done throughout the semester; even though we are all looking forward to going home at this point, it did make us a little sad to think that so soon we won't be living and experiencing this together.

Overall, it was an amazing Birthday! Everyone put so much time and thought into everything; I couldn't have asked for more!

The next few days we are finishing up the seminar project, of course having the exhibition, celebrating a few more Birthdays, and enjoying the rest of the time we have here as much as we can! Tonight, we get to roast chestnuts over the fire again!