1 buon natale!

hello world!

I am finally back in North Carolina and it feels GREAT! It was 70 degrees here yesterday and I was riding around with my sunroof open! But I have to tell you, the journey home was a very long and interesting one!!

I got to JFK around 4:15 PM and after going through the ridiculously long customs line, I got my baggage pretty quickly and met my Aunt Rutha outside. She lives about 5 minutes from JFK in Queens so she didn't even park. Everybody else was like, "Oh Niki, aren't you gonna stay and say goodbye to people??" But I just chucked the deuces and headed on my way! So glad to never have to look at those people again. lol

By the time I got to my Aunt's car... it was already 5:30. We literally left the airport and headed south to VA where we stayed the night with my cousin (her son). We got there around 11, and went to sleep around midnight. I think it was when I got to my cousin Randy's house that I realized I'd left my camera on the plane. :( So there will be no pictures in this post. Hopefully, the airline found it and I can get it back soon.

We slept for about 4 hours and then got back on the road. Now for those of you that don't know.... most people take I-95 south to get from Virginia to North Carolina. But on Sunday, my Aunt wanted to take an alternate route that I'd never taken, which is I-81. She told me that we could take this down to Charlotte and then take I-40 back up to Raleigh. So, I got in the car and let her drive the first two hours assuming she was right, because I didn't know any different.

Little did I know that we would wind up at the Tennessee state border and about 3 hours out of the way. I took over the wheel, found a map at a gas station and chose a highway that would get us back in the direction we needed to go. What I didn't realize, however, is that the highway I chose would lead me over the Appalachian mountains! So I drove about 30 miles and over two mountains before we got back to civilization. lol Luckily, I'm a country girl and I've driven through moutains before. When we finally got over the mountains, I realized we were in Boone, NC... which is about 4 hours from Raleigh. At this point, it was noon, and I had been driving since 8 AM... and I was worried that we would be late to the parties we were supposed to be making that afternoon.

I called my roommate to let her know where we were and not to wait for me. She couldn't believe I'd driven through Tennessee and was now in Boone. haha My dad called a little later and LAUGHED at me over the phone! Gotta love dads ;)

Anyway, we made it back in time to make my cousin Mackenzie's birthday party... and from there I headed to Garner to my friend Bobby's party for a bit... where I saw a lot of my friends from high school and college. I left there and caught up with my Garner Crew and ate MORE birthday cake for Amir's birthday.

By this time, it was like 10pm and I hadn't even made it home yet, I was still rolling around town with my suitcases in tow. When I finally made it back to my apartment, it was so wonderful to just sit down, and be able to sleep in my own comfortable bed.

With that said, I didn't leave my bed until 2pm on Monday. It was fantastic! So so glad to be home, you have no idea!

Tuesday, Christmas Eve and Day deserve their own post, so look for that tomorrow!

I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday.

Ciao for now :)

5 ciao italia!!

You may think you have great weekend plans but I GUARANTEE mine are better than yours!!

I have been here in Florence for 3 months and 18 days... and in about 7 hours I'll be heading to the airport to start my journey HOME!!!! It's been a great time here and I'm truly satisfied with the time I've spent here but I have to say I'm so glad that I am DONE!

Wish me safe travels, and I'll see you in AMERICA!!

ciao! ;)

3 i want this car!!!

"Now things get interesting: BMW, the corporate parent of Mini Cooper, has announced that an all-electric version of the Mini will premiere at the Los Angeles car show in January. Dubbed the MINI-E, the plug-in pocket-rocket will make 204 hp and 162 lb-ft of torque from a massive pack of 5,088 lithium-ion cells arranged in 48 modules, which hog all of the Mini's (already nominal) back seat space. Driving range on a full charge is about 150 miles; owners of the cars will get a high-capacity charger to install on their home electric grid that will allow a full recharge in about 2.5 hours. (Rumor has it that the battery pack is being furnished by Tesla, the maker of high-end electric roadsters.)" - Dwell Daily Blog

6 southern italy part 2: amalfi coast

My weekend was so great I had to break it up over two posts! After we left Pompeii on Saturday we headed down to the town of Veco Equense. This was such a cute little town and we used the free time we had to walk around and eventually have some great seafood. For the rest of the night we just hung out in our gorgeous hotel and Becca read Tarot cards for some of the other girls... we drank cheap red wine out of the plastic hotel cups (real classy!)... it was a good time!

driving into veco equense...

our perfect little hotel...

veco equense at night!

seafood!! the fried calamari and shrimp was so good! i was extra greedy and did not share a bit. lol mackenzie was scared of the shrimp. HA!

later that night....

me being stealthy in the corner,
drinking wine out of a plastic cup,
in my hoodie dress,
slightly resembling a gnome...

views from our rooms the next morning...

me! excited about another day of great weather on the coast.

The next day we moved along to Sorrento where we spent the rest of the afternoon! Sorrento is a gorgeous town with amazing views of the Amalfi coast. Unfortunately, I couldn't really capture all the beauty from the bus ride in but here are a few flicks from the city center and the bay.

view of sorrento from the port! (click for better quality)




I wish everybody who is seeing this could have been there too... These towns were amazingly beautiful and the weather was spectacular. Now I'm back in Florence where its raining and getting cold! Hope you enjoyed the pictures...
Ciao ;)

6 in route + first photos!

I'm now in Florence and it's even more beautiful than I imagined. It took a LONG time for me to get here: I left NC at 6AM on Tuesday morning and got to NY around 10:30. My Aunt Rutha was nice enough to pick me up from La Guardia and take me to lunch and then we spent some time relaxing at her house in Queens.

The bridges and NYC!

My Aunt Rutha and our massive lunch from Joe's Diner!

After that she got me on my way to JFK airport where my flight for Zurich left at 6PM. I got to meet some of the girls in my program there, and I was able to sit with one of my rooomates on the plane which was great. Her name is Becca and she's from PA. The flight from JFK to Zurich was about 8 hours. The plane was nice! They fed us dinner, there were movies to watch on individual little screens and games. I slept (uncomfortably!) for about 5 hours of the flight, and then we had breakfast right before we got to Zurich. Oh and they gave us this swiss chocolate on the plane that was SO GOOD!! Ha! So we got to Zurich at about 7:30AM here, which is about 1:30 AM in EST and had a layover until 12:50. The Zurich airport really wasn't that big but I was able to catch some internet for a few minutes and email back home. The group of us just rested and had a little snack before getting on the flight to Florence.

Inside Zurich airport.

You know you're in Scandinavia when all the furniture looks like this....

Florence was only an hour and a half flight from Zurich so we arrived in what seemed like no time. The plane was much smaller but actually more comfortable than the first!

One of my other roomates, Olivia waiting to get onto the plane!
At this airport, they took us out to the runway by bus and then you board the little planes like this.

Swiss countryside.

Clouds :)

My apartment is right in the middle of the city and I'm so close to everything. We got to the city around 2pm on Wednesday and went straight to our apartments. They recently renovated it so it's pretty great! I share a room with Becca and the room is so big it doesn't feel like two people live in it at all. We have a full kitchen, which has a second shower and sink in it...... but no microwave!! lol

The newly renovated main bathroom....

entrance hallway

my bedroom

chair

closets

view from my window!

I have tons of pictures of the city already!! I will post them later but for now I'm off to dinner with my school group... CIAO! ;)