As I begin another full weekend, I wanted to share a little about what happened in the last first because it is definitely worth telling. After a wonderfully productive meeting with my professor, I took the train to back to Siena and spend the evening with my bestest pal Filippo. We made burritos thanks to the luck I had in finding a box with the shells at the grocery store on the way into the city. I had a hankering for Mexican for a while, but sometimes international ingredients are difficult to find in Italy. (But that's the best part about living in Florence, which is far more international than tiny Siena! Well, kind of, but I am sure there will be reason to discuss this later in the year.) So after dinner and episode of Treme and Modern Family, we went to bed. The best part about being with Filippo is we can spend lots of time together doing nothing special...and that we have, willingly and enjoyably. That might not sound like much of a virtue considering we are discussing friendship, but the man is a saint for what he's put up with over the last three years we have known. 

Saturday we did a lot of studying and I did a little Skyping with my super savvy grandparents during the day. In the evening, Filippo and I visited the Siena Art Institute, sister school to Siena School for Liberal Arts, where I studied Spring 2009. It was the inaugural event of the new school and was full of all kinds of wonderful art and brimming with lots of new folk and some of my old favorites! If anyone (not just traditional university students) is interested in studying art abroad at any level, this is a great place to check out because they do all kinds of really stimulating work in all kinds of medium, such as print-making, photography, creative writing, visual arts, and (my favorite!) book art. They will also host various professional international artists each month, starting in the new year, who will be making all kinds of connections with the community. For this exhibit, they collected over 4,000 postcards internationally that were on display Saturday. Here are some pictures I grabbed on my phone from the event:

Poi domenica... la vendemmia! (For those of you non-Italophones: Then Sunday… the grape harvesting!) I went to this same vineyard to work last year and it was, without a doubt, one of my very favorite days of 2010 (which you can read about here), so I was beyond thrilled to get an invitation back this year. Our Siena group was up and moving early, but when we got to San Quirico a little after 8 am the professionals were already on the third row. So we donned our gloves and got to work cutting the bunches off the vines. I always enjoy myself, but I can tell you that the company makes it great and the very short time I have to do this work makes it better. I'm not one adapted for lots of physical labor, but a little does the body some good.

But you know what makes the experience the best? Lunch! Because we were such an awesome group, we were able to finish the (relatively small) vineyard by noon. After a little bit of time chatting and playing with the cutest little one there ever was, I sat myself down to better food than you could imagine in your dreams. And if you think I'm kidding, I purposely skipped breakfast to make sure I was ready and then didn't eat dinner, breakfast, or lunch following.

We had pastasciutta (phenomenal!) for the first plate. Then there was goat (YUM!), rabbit (so, so tender!), and chicken (which looked great but I couldn't force myself to eat any more in that round). Beans and tomatoes that were ever so fresh and good. Perfect peaches from the trees in the grove where we sat. Cake and this awesome marmalade-Nutella-banana sweet thing which I've named Heaven. Plus on top of the wonderful wine that I helped to harvest last year, we had a little spumante for Gabriele's birthday, some arrancello, and un caffe'  to help digest all this goodness. And, I'll confess, after a productive morning and a great meal, this happy camper gets sleepy and quickly. I couldn't even keep my eyes open for the ride home!

So don't color me shocked when my time in San Quirico has made it on my "Best of 2011" list. If anyone is considering a trip to Italy, this farm hosts people in the cutest little house a little outside of Siena. It is in a really beautiful area off the beaten path, which is the best way to travel, and would be a great place to stay when exploring the Tuscan countryside for a steal. You can check out their information here (and see this album with some pictures of yours truly!) and have as wonderful an experience as I had! Alla prossima!