Autumn - time to say YES

I never thought I would be one to be seeking or obtaining wisdom from Hollywood films, and certainly not ones with Jim Carrey.  Yet, here Shane and I are, sitting on our couch, watching 'Yes Man' and drawing some uncomfortable parallels...so we started saying YES to a lot of things we wouldn't normally....

• 500 euros spent on a 6 sommelier wine course that we lasted 4 weeks at - the Italian education system is alive and well in all aspects of education, even at the CAE equivalent. 3 hours spent listening to how to describe the color and bubble ratio of a wine according to the certified Italian sommelier standards with not even a drop to taste until 10:50pm was just too hard work for us...unfortunately we thought we were signing up for a wine TASTING course...that would work in any language. You live and you learn

• Yoga - very nice couple of evenings spent at the local gym doing hatha yoga. First 2 weeks were false starts. Spent 15 minutes driving around to find the gym, to no avail,  and decided to get my own dose of relaxation at the local gelateria, best 4 euros spent almost to date. Once I got to the classes they were great, however Shane pointed out in our passing of the yoga teacher in town a slight creepiness to the yoga teacher which got to me at the end of one class. During savasana I noticed my head was very hot, then my face, then my ears...I had to stop myself from doing that uncontrolled laugh that I still remember from being in church at my Catholic girls school when something funny happened and you had to be quiet...our yoga teacher was passing through the room and practicing reiki, which is a really nice gesture, and was an enjoyable experience, but slightly uncomfortable at the same time...

• Latin dancing Friday - we get to head to our friends' house, let our kids run wild for 3 hours while we eat and drink, and then maybe spend 30 minutes dancing in our friend's attic. I love the drinking and eating, but I love the dancing more...thanks Simon for all your expert tips on how to move our hips :)

• Volunteering at the school - a great opportunity to connect with the school and share what's so great about Australia. Makes me realize how lucky we are to be Australians, how great it is to be a kid, how lucky I am to be able to help these kids with their English, even just a little bit, and encourage some of them to think about a world outside of Biella

It could be that we have more time to notice it, but people have made time to invite us into their lives here...dinners and lunches don't need to be a Masterchef affair to have a good time. I'm going to remember that you don't have to always do something perfectly, you just need to give it a go, and the worst that can happen is you spend 500 euros to learn the words for bubble ratios in wine.