It's Allllll Over

The 2012-2013 season came to an end last night in Val Pellice. Oh WELL! The highlight of playoffs was definitely beating Renon, so this wasn't unexpected, just slightly disappointing.

Not sure what the next three weeks hold for us (aside from skiing, some last few glasses of prosecco, dinner with friends before we go our separate ways, and the dreaded packing up of the apartment) - our flight home is for April 8, but since this is Italy, we don't know if they'll change our flight for earlier or just leave it as is. We'll see. In any case - ci vediamo presto, USA!

And Then There Were Three

Time for a playoff update! We are one of the three remaining teams left in the 2012-2013 season....and we're in the midst of a semi-finals battle against Val Pellice. The game tonight is super important since ValPe leads 3-1 in the series. Yikes! (The other team left is Asiago who swept Brunico in 4 games and is waiting to see who they will meet in the finals which start next week).

This is not a picture from the game! I take very few pictures anymore since I normally am looking at/cuddling with Baby Gracie. But the actual game looked something like this, with Ryan about to score, probably.

On to the Semi-Finals!

We won! In Renon! I had my hands over my eyes for most of the game because I was SO nervous, but I did take a few pictures and this video of our fans going crazy towards the end of the game (and I DID see Ryan score two goals)! Onwards and upwards - to Val Pellice we go!

This is Sunday Lunch in the Dolomites

Well, obviously we WON on Saturday night, so we're not home eating kale.....but that's okay because this is how we do Sunday lunch here.

Sunday lunches are one thing we'll miss when we go home (not soon, hopefully). Game 7 is tomorrow night (Tuesday) in Renon. Audrey and I are breaking my rule of "I NEVER go to Renon" and we'll be there for Game 7.

Coste

Okay, now that we've been in Italy for six months this time around, I get the feeling that we're starting to miss some foods from home. This is something that neither of us wants to admit to out loud because it's just wrong to say "Gee, I'm really getting sick of spaghetti carbonara" - really, you just can't say that in Northern Italy.

But lately Ryan has been making references to Garbanzo - weird, but YUM - and I've been thinking about spicy tuna rolls and....kale. I didn't used to like kale all that much, mostly because we never had it when I was growing up. (My cousin Isabel, on the other hand, apparently ate kale all the time and from the age of six on claimed that it was her "favorite food", which I also thought was a little weird at the time). Now I get it.

When we left Italy last year and went home for the spring and summer, I bought kale maybe four times a week. And when we would go up to Steamboat for long weekends, and I would discover that Ryan's mom was cooking it, I would sneak up behind her in the kitchen and say "I LOVE kale!!" and then grab some out of the pan. (And then eat it all when it was finished cooking).

Anyway. By now you may have realized that we don't have kale up here in the Dolomites. The other day though, I was determined to get some leafy greens, so I went to the store and picked out this bunch of...leaves.....and then I had to Google what it was when I got home. In Italian, it's "coste".

There isn't too much about coste on Google, let me tell you. But it was unanimous (from the two posts I could find) that it's chard. It doesn't look like the chard we get in Safeway, but it's chard in Italy, so I'm settling for that. I tend to put it in everything now.....soups and pastas and sometimes we just eat plain old coste.

**This post was part of a homework assignment from a food writing class that I'm taking. If anyone is interested in hockey, Renon leads the series 3-2, Ryan is back playing tonight, and they need to win, otherwise we will be home shortly to eat kale.

Favorite Words + Phrases

We get asked a lot how our Italian is coming along and the truth is this....we tried to take some classes. We tried to get a workbook or two. We tried to do some verb flash cards once a day. We tried googling things on Google Translate. But the truth is - we're self taught. Good thing or bad thing? Not sure (although nothing too weird has ever happened when we ask for something at the grocery store, bank, pharmacy....so we must be doing something right). Here are a few of our favorites:

Scivoloso - super fun to yell to the other team when someone slips on the ice (*image via Cortina Hockey)

Il Dolce Far Niente - the sweetness of doing nothing. This is generally the first thing that Italians learn how to say, I believe.

Spritz Aperol, per favore! Can't live in Cortina without knowing this one...we learned this on Day 1 last year. (And sometimes there is even a giant one in the center of town).

Quando Voi or FINALMENTE! (As in: FINALLY I learned how to drive!!)

INCINTA!! (What we screech whenever someone tries to give Audrey or Stacy a glass of wine, raw meat or an unpasteurized cheese....which is daily).

And last but not least.....Vincere. The verb "to win". Because that's what we're doing. Playoff series #1 is officially tied due a due. (Image also via Cortina Hockey, and if you can read Italian - like we can - you can read all about last night's game there too!)

Lots of Excitement

We had yet another snow storm this weekend - surprise, surprise! I guess this is a clue for me to get up skiing.....

But....instead we stayed in, made more white bean chicken chili, played Monopoly AND the most exciting thing - visited baby Gracie on Saturday, who is adorably perfect.

The second most exciting thing: Cortina won in overtime on Saturday night so the series is now 2-1! The fourth game is at home tomorrow night so everyone keep your fingers crossed please! As they say....Forza Cortina!