Italy connections and loves

1. New friend. I met Guilia at Josh's gymnastics class. Her daughter Hannah is in Josh's class. She's from Italy and when I heard her reading a book in Italian to her younger daughter I told her my Dad served there and that started our conversations. She's really nice and has even said she'll teach me to cook more Italian dishes.

2. Risotto my favorite way. Risotto is one of my favorite foods- its an Italian rice dish my dad taught me to make years back and I love to make from time to time. Last time I made leg of lambe I chopped up and froze some of the leftovers so I could throw it in Risotto- so this week I made it with some lamb and some fresh snipped spinach... can we say DELISH?!

3. Artichokes. I also steamed two small artichokes the night I made the risotto- the two flavors complimented each other wonderfully. Jake was umming and aahhhing the whole time he ate. I'm glad we seem to have a lot of the same favorites.

4. Life is Beautiful. Might as well throw this one in as well. It is such an amazing movie- if you haven't seen it- go rent it!!!! A wonderful film- but I saw this when I was in Guatemala. Since the film is orginally done in Italian, and we rented it in Guatemala I watched it with Spanish subtitles- it was the first time I realized that I can understand quite a bit of Italian if I focus.