The Piscias: My First Host Family

I was so excited/nervous/anxious to meet my first host family! I knew that meeting them would make my whole UWP experience more real! Even landing in FL and meeting other girls in the cast didn't quite make UWP feel real, but going home with someone else besides my parents set the wheels in motion for this journey to begin!

For those who don't know, host families are our homes away from home while we travel for 6 months, and some of the best moments and greatest learning happens with our host families! To meet our host families, UWP assigns us "host codes" that change theme every city! Since we're in Lakeland, FL, our host codes were Florida themed! My code was "Bottle-nosed Dolphin," and I recognized my host parents rather quickly! You never know what you're going to walk out and see...sometimes people dress up as the code. Sometimes they hold posters. Sometimes they could act things out! I didn't know what to expect. But there were Jessica and Edward Piscia (Pee-sha) holding pictures of themselves swimming with dolphins from a recent cruising excursion! Perfect! 

We're famous! They posted this on the UWP Facebook page!

 They made me a cute welcome package with fun things! I was especially happy about the balloon!

I was giddy with delight when I read that my host family would have a kitty cat at home! And a cuddly kitty, too! Mortisha is a very gorgeous girl who loves to cuddle and talk to me...just like my weirdo cat, Clawed (well, he talks. He doesn't cuddle!)

She's staring me down, but I'm pretty sure she was sick of me taking her picture at this point.

 We put up a cot for the second girl that the Piscia's will be hosting, and Mortisha has already claimed it as her own. She won't be happy when Jolien shows up tomorrow and needs a place to sleep!

Now...my host family house. I am proud to say this has potential to take the cake for my most unique host house...and it's my first one! We'll have to see how the rest of tour pans out, but I think my first experience may be my most unique!

While we were driving home, Jessica and Edward mentioned they don't live in a "traditional" house. I thought, "Cool...wonder what it could be!" Then they said, "Well...we live on commercial property..."  I was slightly more confused. Then they said they lived at a storage unit facility. HUH?!? 

We pulled up and...here's where I live...

Come to any crazy conclusions yet? That's right! My host parents opened up a climate controlled storage unit and there was my bed! All ready to go! How nice! =)

JUST KIDDING! Don't worry, Mom. I don't live in a storage shed! =P Edward is the manager of the storage facility and one of the perks is that they live on the property in a private residence. It's attached to the office, but it's a seperate, two-bedroom home! It's great! So...yes. I'm living in a storage unit, but I'm still in a house! =)

Jessica works a few different part-time jobs and both Jessica and Edward LOVE Geocaching (for those of you who don't know, geocaching is like treasure hunting with the technology of GPS! Look it up here!) I'll have another blog concerning our geocaching adventures!

We've already been talking about the various host family day adventures we can have, and I'm happy to report we'll get to geocache (I've already had my first taste today!), hit up the drive-in movie theatre, maybe go to Daytona Beach (and visit Jessica's awesome rocket-scientist grandma!) AND GO TO DISNEY WORLD! AHHHHHH! So excited! I can't wait, and I'm only 1.5 days in! =)