Nostalgia.

Lately, I've been thinking about my time living in a little Italian city, if you're new here, I spent 9 months (or so), working as an au pair in a small city in Northern Italy as part of my gap year.

Sometimes, on rainy days when there appears to be nothing to do and no one is up before 1, I find myself looking back at old photos and wishing I was back there. I thought I'd share a few with a bit of nostalgic rambling to go with it as well as some anecdotes of things that only happen in Italy/Cremona. Hope you don't mind! 

Something that always used to confuse me was the signs telling you that you were no longer in a place. 

So, I know I'm not in Cremona, but where am I? Logical, right?

Horses in the park, one Sunday morning, the type of random activity that is unique to Cremona, along with 

the promise of Water Polo flash mobs and pop-up Lego exhibitions.  

One of the highlights of my stay was meeting a life-long friend in a bookshop who I miss so much but

until we can afford to see each other again, we will have to stick to skyping and letters!

The spiral staircase in my host family's apartment, I loved it throughout the seasons, it was always so picturesque and pretty. 

I miss making elaborate meals with my two american friends, incorporating foods that we all missed - the evening pictured above was mac 'n' cheese, homemade chicken nuggets and roasted veg - so good!

Looking out over the city on my penultimate morning.

Oh how I miss the Italian Gelato - but it never made sense that we ate it when the temperature was -9 outside. 

My favourite tea shop, which was always our meeting place for catch ups and tea that I cannot find anywhere else - Blueberry Cherry.

Tisneria - our favourite bar where D + Me always got catcalled at for our funny accents. So happy that D lives in London now!  

Seeing the Torazzo (the tower in the city) poking out above the buildings and using it as a guide to find my way around the city. 

The sporadic antiques market which sold so many old cool cameras that I wish I had bought!

Finding contraptions such as a pringles vending machines and M trying to work them out. 

The funny little things my kids used to do like kissing windows on the way home from school cause he could see his own reflection in it. Think we might have a future heart-breaker on our hands now. 

River trips and having fun with C. I do miss those friends of mine! 

Ellie x

A Snapshot: Sunny Sunday.

This weekend, the sun has finally re-appeared in the West Country after the storms that have been happening all week. I had a glorious lie-in which I really appreciated cause sleep is always good especially when we stay up until the early hours talking.

The morning was spent with my flat as one of my flatmate's parents have been visiting and they very generously decided to cook a roast for us which was delicious and so lovely to have a home cooked meal that I didn't make. Once we were suitably stuffed and had given some roses to the parents as a thank you, we had fun listening to old songs and catching up with a friend we don't see too often. 

After that, I met up with one of my best friends who lives next door to go for a photography walk, we walked about 4 miles in total and ended up right at the edge of Plymouth where the ferry leaves for Cornwall, we even found a welcome to Plymouth sign to pose by and even though we got a bit lost and didn't actually find the place that she was looking for, we had a great time along the way chatting, talking photographs and watching the sunset.

It was a really lovely way to spend a Sunday afternoon, and afterwards, we headed home for a bit of BAFTA watching, a quiz with all of the flat and a bit of socialising. The night ended with me falling asleep on the sofa at 3am and being rudely awoken by my flatmate throwing water at me, which escalated pretty quickly into a full blown water fight. Oh dear. But somehow, I still love 'em.

How was your Sunday?

A fun little weekend.

Since leaving school a couple of years ago, I have found that weekends are not always what they were built up to be....

Sometimes, here at university, you have no plans or nobody materialises from their room until late in the day or everyone is visiting home or doing other things. 

But, this weekend, we have been making the most of having some much needed time off after a busy week and it has been lovely so thought I would share.

On Friday, we had a five hour lecture session of assessed group presentations where my friend and I accidentally wore matching outfits, which amused our coursemates greatly. Once the session ended, the weekend began :) 

Since it was one of my flatmate's birthdays and also valentine's day, we all dressed up and made ourselves look presentable, and headed out for dinner. On the way there, we were nearly blown away by the gale force winds that are so normal in this part of the country, at one point, my friend Jack had to hold on to me and anchor me down as we thought the wind might drag me away. We eventually arrived safe and sound and had a wonderful dinner with lots of yummy food and much dessert :) that makes me a happy girl! We kept joking that it looked like the 8 of us were on some sort of quadruple date as the restaurant was filled with couples out for valentines meals. We also managed to tag down a waiter to take a photo of us all, only after we had taught him how to use it did we realise that it was still set on self timer from some of our previous attempts - at least that awkward ten seconds made us laugh for the photo! 

We also sang Happy Birthday to my housemate, took silly photos of each other, attempted to use a chocolate fountain with class and laughed at each other a lot - I really do have a lot of love for these flatmates of mine :) 

Favourite boys right there -----^ love their silliness - it definitely helps to keep things light hearted around here :) 

-----^ this last photo of us makes me giggle, I think it shows all of our personalities really clearly :) it makes me smile about these people I have come to know :) 

After dinner, we headed home, en route, we passed a gig in a record store, played hopscotch and us, girls had to hold onto our skirts for fear of the strong winds getting the better of us! 

Later on, we ran into some other friends of mine, did a little bit of dancing and I ended the night with a catch up with a housemate across the hall :) 

Saturday was a busy day! It was my first day volunteering for my course and chatting to prospective students about it and the university. It was a strange position to be in, as I was in their shoes not so long ago, feeling apprehensive and confused about the prospect of university. I was really against university and hated the idea of moving so far away and continuing to study, but after taking a gap year and doing some thinking, I decided to go because I found a course I believed I would like and luckily I do. My course is so brilliant for what I want to do and I actually really enjoy most parts of it. It was cool to get to tell other young people about it and also offer a bit of 

reassurance that university shouldn't be this terrifying thing that is full of unknown - it's actually pretty great :) 

I also witnessed a showdown from two of my lecturers who were fighting about which one of them was more of a man because one of them goes to sewing class, so they started limbering up and pretending to fight. It was very strange - arts lecturers are definitely unique you could say ;) 

After my stint was over, I met up with 3 of the guys who I'm friends with on my course for a debrief of the morning and a really funny walk around campus, I do love their craziness - it keeps things interesting - including one of them shouting about not wanting a free bag, and the other two trying to steal my lunch - how lovely :) 

I then headed back to my flat, which was clean for once thanks to the kindness of one of my flatmates parents, have spent the afternoon chilling out, doing a bit of work and headed into town as well! 

Tomorrow will involve a long photography walk with E, a roast dinner, a trip to the pub and a bit of organisation for the week :) 

Hope you are having a great weekend - how do you like to spend them? 

Stormy skies.

Well it has been a crazy week as far as weather goes. And yes, I do know that by writing this post and I am fulfilling the English stereotype of talking about the weather.

I don't think I really knew too much about bad weather until I lived in Devon. This week we have had storms and floods and 10m waves crashing against the shore.

The train line has fallen into the sea, our road became a lake (ducks started making a home on it), my room became a pool as water surged in from the roof and our little courtyard filled up once more as the rain and hail poured down in sheets. 

So now we are cut off from the rest of the country, I have been told it will take me AT LEAST 7 hours to get home and we have another week of this forecast ahead. At least it won't be as bad as the 9 hour journey W and I had to undertake from our respective Oxford/London to Plym on Monday/Tuesday - I left home at 4pm and we didn't get in until 1am, luckily we occupied each other with funny stories and silly games of marry, kiss, ditch. 

It's been a little crazy - I hope everyone has been staying safe and dry wherever you are! 

<3