Are those all your shopping bags?????

Okay so let's cut to the chase, Milano was my heaven!  I got of the train and fell in love, not only at the station but with all the black leather pants, black boots up to your knees, mini-skirts, black scarves in 70 degree weather, I absolutely loved the chic-ness of the whole place.  I would live in Milan in a second if I could.

Once we arrived at the shopping section of the city it was all over from there.  Courtney and I with wallets in hand made our way through the 8 million tourists and began our trek to find me some purchases to lug back to the states.  My goal for the day was to buy a Louis Vuitton purse and a matching belt to go with it. Only to my surprise they are expensive, even in Milan.  I was expecting like anywhere from 250 Euros and up, but in order to get the number to come down to my range of money the purses kept getting smaller and smaller and smaller!  Eventually I decided that rent/car payment/weekend in vegas for my 30th/spa treatment for my return home, all were more worth it than the purse and belt.  I mean there are always knock off's :(.  I was saddened by this reality and moved on to try and find the next best thing.  Prada, Gucci, Dolce, Furla.  Well in the end Furla was it.  We made some purchases and broke the bank pretty much.  I enjoyed my purchasing as well as the time with my friend in this magical shopping city.  It was a great day overall.

Amongst the shopping there are a few things to note.  We found the twin of the cafe/restaurante from the movie "It's Complicated," with Meryl Streep.  Literally this place was identical.  It had brioche and cookies and a full menu with teas, cocoa's and milk and honey.  So adorable.  Courtney and I stopped on our way back to the train station for a treat.  They had the cutest shopping bags that you could purchase but we decided against it.  Would have made a cute gift idea.  Anyways so the funny part of the story is that this cafe was soo expensive.  I got a cioccolato caldo, "hot chocolate" and courtney got a "latte cioccolato" chocolate milk or something.  So we get them and mine literally is bittersweet chocolate warmed up to steaming hot.  It was beyond bitter.  Courtney's as you can see was the size of the table and was pretty much hot milk with cocoa powder sprinkled on top.

14 euros later, we ate a crepe and fruit and drank what we could of the hot milk and steaming bittersweet chocolate from our cups.  We laughed all the way to the train station about how much we paid for hot milk and a melted chocolate bar, hey it is Milano!

We did get to see the sites, shop alot and enjoy an expensive cup of hot milk!  Why not, you only live once right.

Okay well I must have some tea and sit down and do some writing, it's been on fire since I have been here, so I want to work on that before I have to go out and purchase some produce for the week.  This week we have no classes and we are workshopping it all week at multiple farms and areas in Florence.  Tomorrow is truffle digging, so I will post pic's and keep you posted on my travels.

Ciao ragazzi!