Visitantes

Over the past month, we've had a lot of visitors, and it's been so much fun! Matt and I have loved seeing our family and friends and getting to show them where we live. It's really helped this last part of the year go by fast. Here is a summary of the last month.

First, the whole Robertson family came to visit!

In Madrid in front of the Royal Palace

We went to Madrid for two days, got to see a Real Madrid futbol game, Salamanca for one day, ate at Cuatro Postes (the Hotel here in Avila where Matt eats all his meals with the team and where Matt and I lived for the first 3 weeks we were here), walked on top of the wall in Avila, went to Matt's basketball game, and just enjoyed hanging out together. 

Here are a few pictures from their trip:

at the Real Madrid game

The Cathedral across from the Royal Palace in Madrid

A Cathedral and statue in Salamanca

Brothers at the train station

On top of the wall in Avila with the Cathedral in the background

The next week, my mom came for a visit. On the day she flew into Madrid, there was an organized general strike in all of Spain - crazy! The trains weren't running because of the strike, so we had to wait until 4 pm to catch a bus back to Avila. We saw some of Madrid with her suitcase in tote, got some tapas, and crashed that night. We went back to Madrid for 2 days later in her visit, got to do the tour of the inside of the Royal Palace (my favorite thing!), went to Salamanca for a day, ate at Cuatro Postes, walked on top of the wall and went in the Cathedrals in Avila. 

Tapas in Madrid near Plaza Mayor 

Plaza Mayor

Hot chocolate and pastries in Avila

On top of the Wall in Avila looking down at a Cathedral

On top of the wall in Avila, different Cathedral in background

A city building that used to be a palace in Madrid

In front of the Royal Palace in Madrid

The Royal Gardens

Eating lunch with some of my English teacher friends, Carol, Diana, and Sylvia

My mom was here doing Santa Semana, or Holy Week, leading up to Easter. In Avila there are processions every day with a band and people carrying floats with statues representing different things about the Holy Week. We got to see several of these, and they were pretty cool to watch. It was strange though because the costumes everyone in the parade wears are basically the same hats that were worn by the Ku Klux Klan, which is freaky, but they have no relation to each other. Here, these hats and robes are worn in all different colors and are associated with the Holy Week celebrations. 

A week after my mom left, our friends Heidi and Ian came to visit for a couple days. They came to Madrid for a few days, then Avila to see us, then went to Barcelona for the rest of the week. We were so excited to see them! I can't believe you guys made it to Spain to see us. Unfortunately the weather was awful, rainy and windy and cold, I hope it was better in Barcelona! This is the only picture I have from their visit, I guess we took all the pictures with their camera.

Heidi and me at a coffee shop

Thanks so much to everyone who made a trip to come visit! Matt and I have missed family and friends a lot this year, so it was great to see all of you! Who wants to come visit next year? Who knows what country or city we will be in - start saving now! :)

Weekends

Weekends are my favorite time over here, especially when Matt's games are on Friday. He gets Saturday and Sunday totally off, so we get to hang out for two days straight :). I'm not very busy over here, but he is! He lifts weights on top of 2 practices on Monday, 2 practices on Tuesday, "only" one on Wednesday, weights again and two practices on Thrusday, one a shooting practice, and then a game on Friday or one practice Friday and game on Saturday. (Or something pretty close to that schedule.) So he is worn out most days during the week, the coaches work them really hard.

So weekends we take it really easy, watch movies and pretty much stay in the apartment almost the whole two days. This weekend, on Saturday I went to Cuatro Postes, the hotel where the team eats, and ate lunch with Matt. This was a treat for me to have a good meal prepared by someone else. Then we came back to the apartment and did nothing, it was great. We played on our computers and got on Skype with our families and watched some TV. Oh, and I started this program to learn basic Spanish free through my library in Florida, so we'll see if I can stick with it. It's about time I started actually studying Spanish, not just picking up on random words a few times a week.

This morning (Sunday) we made a big breakfast, which was delicious. In Orlando we used to cook breakfast on Saturday sometimes, but we haven't eaten anything but frosted flakes since we've been in Spain. We made eggs and pancakes and had orange juice, it was great, definitely going to become a Sunday tradition. Then we watched the Sunday service from Church of the Highlands live, which is so awesome to be able to watch the worship and everything. After that, we watched the Justin Bieber movie, Never say Never, which I actually really enjoyed, it was good. For the rest of the day we've just been on Skype with our families and relaxing. I did fold some laundry so that was one productive thing.

So that's a glimpse at our weekend. Sounds lazy, I know, and it is for me, but Matt really deserves it after a hard week, and honestly just needs to be off his feet for a couple days. It definitely makes Monday harder though, when we both have to get up at 9 (oh so early), me for an English lesson and Matt for the first of a 2 a day (really 3 a day if you count weights) practice. That's a glimpse in our life, I'll give you a glimpse into a weekday later, maybe a Wednesday when I have 4 English lessons to make me sound busy :).