Day 4

Jenna:
Today was an incredibly long day, and I am almost to tired to type this (it's about 3:30 am here). I say almost though because I am slightly obsessed with blogging and I don't mind staying up a little later to give everyone the update on our travels.


We woke up late and I ended up missing out on my favorite breakfast (luckily I have one more day to enjoy it) and ended up stumbling out the door at around 11 to meet up with a friend of my Mom's for lunch and shopping. She is this adorable little Italian women, born and raised in Rome, and not only did I love meeting her and spending time with her, but it was so nice to be able to ask a few Italian grammar related questions that had been bouncing around in my head since we got here. I know you are all very disappointed but I STILL don't have my Mom speaking Italian on camera. It is definitely my goal to capture that before we leave. Lunch was delicious, and I ended up getting millefoglie (the dessert, not gelato). That is one dessert that I can't really understand the absence of in the U.S.

It was very nice having a tour guide for shopping, as she steered us away from the really expensive designer shops and ledus towards the unique and authentic Italian ones. We discovered a fantastic Italian brand of shoes, Campers, and I found this adorable size that I would be wearing right this moment if they only had them in my size. We visited the Trevi fountain, and were shocked to see huge crowds. The crowd was so huge it was kind of difficult to appreciate the beauty of the fountain. We left after just a few moments. But not before I took a picture of myself proudly wearing my backpack backwards to prevent anyone from stealing things from me.

We came back to the hotel and fell asleep once again. Seriously the Italians know what they are doing with this siesta thing. I forced myself out of bed to shower and get ready for our Rome "Bridal Shoot". We left the house at around 10 pm and headed over to the trevi fountain. We left so late at night because we wanted to avoid the crowds as much as possible. Rome is a city full of people who must never sleep because the streets were full of people even at 1 am! I of course received lots of "Tanti Auguri!", which means congratulations, and lots of strange looks with people asking me where my groom was. We got lost on the way there, somewhere we took a wrong turn, and this sweet couple ended up catching up with us as we wandered around and guided us right to the fountain. They were so nice, and it was a great opportunity to really practice my Italian. I was able to carry an entire conversation with them!

We thought the crowd might have died down around 10:30 when we arrive at the fountain, but we were definitely wrong. There were about half as many people there, but that still meant hundreds. As many of you know, I am someone who enjoys attention, and I am not afraid to smile and pose for the camera, but this was a completely different experience. People were cheering, seriously clapping. Several different times. Many people stopped to ask what we were doing, and even more stood around and took pictures of the crazy bride wearing her dress in the middle of Rome in the middle of the night. We were both definitely very nervous getting started, but I think we were both blown away by what we ended up getting out of the whole experience. In some ways I think it was good to start with such a public location because it allowed us to get warmed up very quickly and lose any inhibitions we might have had when we started.

After we had our fill of the fountain, we moved over to this very iconic looking Roman building, and then ended the night in front of the Coliseum. It's hard to tell which set of photos will end up being the best. These photos are definitely worth the effort it took to get the dress over here.