Ciao! Da ltalia!

 The fall is not the best time to get pictures of flowers around Rome, but there are still a few that can be found. I see lots of flowers from balconies, but I'm not 100% sure that they are real.  Everywhere you go, you can find fountains like this all over Rome. This one is just down the road from us, about a half a block. They date back to when people didn't have running water and they needed to get "good" water from somewhere.      We have had some wonderful food since we returned to Rome. One of my favorite things to do is order bruschetta. I was amazed at the different types of bruschetta that there is.                          The FOOD! Such yummy pizza, pasta and pannini!                    And of course the dessert!

We took the bus and train to get to the Trevi Fountain. We had not seen it on our visit to Rome 3 years ago, so I really wanted to visit it this time. The Trevi Fountain is beautiful!  Listen to the song!        The crowds are not bad, if fact they are a little depressing. But it is nice to visit when you can actually see the fountain. Just to prove I was there and didn't just download pictures from the internet.

  We went to a city about 45 minutes northwest of Rome called Ladispoli. It poured down rain on the way there and on the way back. But we did have a beautiful view out of the balcony of the Sister's apartment that we visited. I took this picture because I thought the cute tiles placed amongst the bricks was a nice touch. After we visited two apartments, both an Elders apartment and a Sisters apartment, it was time for lunch. Around the corner from the Elders apartment was this nice pizza shop that sold pizza by the slice. It was 1 Euro per slice! Richard's (on the left) had sausage and he said maybe some pear (they like to put pears on pizza). Mine was described as "insalata e polli" so salad and chicken. Richard thought it was chicken salad, but it wasn't like any chicken salad I've ever had. It was REALLY good. I'm glad I took the gamble and got something I wasn't sure about.   On the drive home (before the rain started again) I took a few pictures. ...

 Not a lot of lovely Rome pictures yet. Hopefully we will get out of the suburbs soon. We have been busy shopping for ourselves and the new senior couple that just arrived yesterday. They have to be in quarantine for the next two weeks (sounds familiar, no?). But in the meantime, enjoy pictures of us in front of the temple and around and about. We are planning a road trip soon so stay tuned. This is the chapel we attend church in. Notice the temple steeple behind the church. Us in front of the Temple. Taken a week apart. Richard couldn't figure out how to use my phone so he brought his camera the following week. Our first Monday out of quarantine we went to this restaurant for lunch to celebrate an office birthday. Bruschetta, then a lovely panini with chicken, bacon, tomato and CHIPS.   We finally got our gelato that we had been wanting while we were in quarantine.  Richard got lemon for out first trip and Oreo for the second trip a few days later. I got chocolate m...

 Maybe not the whole of Rome, but our little Bufalino area. We see these little guys all over. We hope they eat mosquitoes.  Richard captured this picture on our balcony. He was like 3 inches long! These are some hooded crows. We had never seen crows like this before. There are pigeons too, but we didn't take any pictures of them.  

 Ok, so maybe "fun" is not the word I would use. It wasn't too bad.  Good : We didn't have to do any grocery shopping. Bad : We didn't get to do ANY shopping. Good : Groceries were delivered. Bad : Nothing! We love and appreciate the Willeys for all they did Good : We had a marvelous view from our balcony. Bad : We could only go out on our balcony. Good : We cleaned the apartment. Bad : We had to clean the apartment. I know that you all want pictures, but since we couldn't go anywhere there is not much to take a picture of. My favorite thing was listening for the church bells. They ring every day around 9am, noon, and 6:30 pm. They also rang on Saturday for a wedding and maybe a funeral? They also ring on Sunday, 10am I think. This place is right across the street from us. It was fun to watch families and other people stop in for a treat or a meal. We are going to go after the office on Monday. For sure!

 It has been an eventful 6 months!  We arrived in Italy on February 29th, exactly 6 months later we arrived again. In Between has been quarantine and new normal while we lived with Richard's mother.  My mother-in-law is wonderful! I can't say enough about her. We do appreciate her allowing us to stay at her home for over 5 months when  we all  thought it would be a month or two, at the most. We worked on things, like sewing masks (Debra), replacing kitchen facet (Richard), planting and harvesting tomatoes.  We also worked for a couple of weeks in the Portland Mission, visiting the missionaries and inspecting their apartments. It was great. We both love working with the missionaries and serving the Lord. One of the projects that we worked on. I couldn't have done it without Loradona. We are glad to be back in Rome. We already miss a lot of you. Ciao!