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I’ve told you before that when my husband wanted us to be a host family this year, I agreed. We have been notified that we are accepted to receive Alessandro, a 16-year-old boy from Italy for the coming school year. All we know at this point is that he is quite the soccer player, has pets at home, and sounds really nice.  He will be here August 6th and will stay with us 10 months.

Since we’re a bit long-in-the-tooth and set in our ways, we’re looking for things we need to change in order to be the best host parents possible.

Of COURSE we plan to encourage him to be active in as many things involving school as possible. Classes, sports, clubs, new friends, outings, etc. We will encourage him to bring friends home or spend time at their houses. We’ll look for fun things to do and places to go. WE will also try to be as active in his life as we can – a real change for us. :0)

• Since we’re retired, we’ve gotten into the habit of setting our alarm for 8 a.m. each morning, mainly doing THAT because we have pets depending on us to let them out, feed them, etc. It’s also nice to be up in case the mailman drives up our driveway because something is too large for our box, or we get a delivery from Fedex or UPS. But we realize that this won’t cut it for our new roles as host parents.

We have decided that we’ll be decadent and slothful until July 1st, at which point we’ll start setting the alarm for 7 a.m. August 1st we’ll start setting it for 6 a.m.  Alessandro will be here on August 6th and school starts on August 13th, so we should be ready – with our Circadian Rhythms in sync, hopefully.

• We’ve been eating ‘weirdly’ compared to what a 16-year-old boy from Italy may expect. We’ll check with him, of course, to find out what he normally eats, favorite foods, and do some adapting. In the meantime, we’re going to change to the Keto-After-50 eating plan – a modified version of the regular Keto plan, designed to be easier on old folks. We’ve basically been eating a lot like this already, but have been having only salad in the evening, or splurging and having chicken and soup over rice – a big no-no on ANY smart eating plan….

We’ve also been eating only poultry and fish, and we’ll expand that to include beef and pork again, but use Keto recipes. I can also cook pasta for Alessandro (and probably my husband, who refuses to eat alternatives) but “I” will try zucchini noodles or cauli-rice with my portion. (The only concern I’ve found is that I need to do a bit extra on supplements to help me handle the higher fats without a gallbladder.)

I’m sure we’ll add a whole bunch of other changes to our list as we get closer to the time Alessandro arrives, but I think we have a good attitude and are starting to adapt. (I’m checking to make sure soccer and basketballs are aired up, badminton set is intact, board games are available, checking our sports channels on TV….. )

I’m happy to hear my husband thinking about what we need to do. He seems energized by the changes we’re making, thinking about things we can do to make our ‘temporary son’ (or grandson) feel welcome and happy.