Two big Sunday meals

Sunday morning, Ugo invited us for a cookout at their home that evening. They are wonderfully social and have invited us a number of times, usually with short notice, but thus far unfortunately I have not been able to make it there. Dee went once without me in April, when I had a bad cold. So we really wanted to go this time. They were inviting other American families to come start festivities around 4 or 5pm. We brought a change of clothes with us to church, assuming that we would go there directly from church, after a few activities that you will read about below.

Sacrament meeting was quite good, with Chris getting confirmed by Elder Canfield. Sorella Huber and her daughter Mailea, who is leaving for BYU this coming week, each spoke in Italian, doing a nice job with content and language. Then they had several teenagers bear brief testimonies about their experience at the Italian FSY (For the Strength of the Youth) Conference this week. Dee and I had just been commenting to each other that they don't seem to have youth speakers in Sacrament Meeting here, so they proved us wrong! Apparently FSY is very similar to EFY (Especially For Youth), but EFY has a trademark on the name, so internationally they change it. Not sure if it is just in Italy, but the kids had a wonderful time. It was quite hot outside, and the AC was doing fairly well until midway through the meeting when some of the Italians in the back opened the window, warming it up. Our two cultures will never agree on air conditioning! 😀

My temple prep lesson went very well, though Rhenald couldn't make it because he had to teach the English Sunday School class. He team-teaches it with Irene, and she had done it three times in a row and wanted him to do likewise. Dee offered to cover for him the next two weeks so that he can attend my final two lessons, and he was very grateful. She is wonderful; even though she doesn't love teaching as much as I do, she will do anything to help me out. In our lesson we discussed ordinances and covenants, and I think that the points were covered in an interesting way.

The bishop of the ward prior to Ugo was in town on vacation from Paris with his family. As you can imagine, there were a lot of hugs all around from friends who remember him fondly. After the third hour, his wife, when she saw my name tag, said "oh, your wife taught Relief Society. How did she learn to speak Italian so well?" People here are always surprised when a senior sister speaks the language, and Dee is really good at it. Several people commented to me how much they enjoyed her lesson, and she felt good about it.

After church, our partying ward had a lunch to honor the old bishop. Everyone stayed around. The Canfields now want to change to our ward once I explained that we eat like that fairly frequently! There was a great spread, with a lot of variety and plenty of food for everyone.

 

 

After the lunch, we drove Sorelle Nelson and Harmon home so we could do an apartment inspection. That is a new assignment we picked up from the Balzottis to try to offload them. It is not far from the chapel, so it is fairly easy for us to do. They inherited the place a few weeks ago, from the Spragues and the Simoncinis. It is a very nice apartment, particularly compared to their prior one, and they love it. Everything was in great condition, with only a few minor issues to report, such as a missing gas detector. It is five flights of stairs up (about 2.5 floors) without an elevator, which is not as high as we had been led to believe, so Dee made it up the stairs just fine in her regular shoes, which she wore to church as a test. She is doing very well. We also took a few minutes to preach the gospel of backup to Sorella Harmon; Sorella Nelson already got the lecture a while back. I will bring a USB on-the-go cable and flash drive to Sorella Harmon next time we see her.

After all that, it was still too early to leave for Ugo's, particularly because we assumed it would start much later there than he had projected. The local wards had thrown them a curve by changing schedules from morning to late afternoon, meaning that people would arrive much later. So, even though it was a 25 minute drive in the other direction, we drove home; that allowed us to change to casual clothes more easily. Dee also took a little nap, well needed after being up late the night before to finish her lesson. We finally left home about 4:45pm, arriving at the Peregos place at 5:30pm, without hitting much traffic at all. It was nice to have some time alone to visit with them, particularly Jenna, who had hurt her back on a trip to Albania last week and didn't even make it to church. Dee helped slice some stuff up while we talked in the kitchen, with Ugo starting the barbecue outside below. The guests, the Woods and the Olmo families, each got there about 7pm, with several teenage kids in tow, which livened things up nicely. The men cooked a ton of meat: steaks, sausages, and arrosticini, which are skewers with mutton, like this:


There was far too much food, so everyone was stuffed. The company was also wonderful. We left 8:45pm, later than we wanted to be out but about what we expected. It was worth it.

Brothers Woods and Olmo at work

One of the best parts was that Levi spontaneously gave me a hug! I think this is due to two things: having lots of interesting activities during his Primary class, and offering to knit him some gloves with a Kraken on them. A Kraken is a sea monster, like a huge octopus. He can hardly wait!

I wore my flats to church all right, but afterward I switched to my tennis shoes with orthotics for the evening. My foot still swells since it's in the healing stage.

The fridge died at our California home, and the new one was supposed to be delivered Friday. Then Sears rescheduled to Saturday. Then, their truck broke down and they said it was cancelled. But they showed up anyway. Rich had no fridge for several days. Sears gets the prize for going above and beyond.