Wonderful Landlord!

I had to do laundry and go to the commissary on Sunday.  So Howard and the girls decided to take another load of stuff to the house.  Howard is leaving Monday for DC and I think he feels bad I will be here to do all the work.  He comes home Friday but we have to be out on Saturday morning.   Plus it was nice to have some Dad and daughter time.  So I sent them on their way.  They got to the house and started unloading stuff.  They had gotten everything in the house and Genardo, the landlord showed up.  He started showing Howard how to use the satellite TV service that he installed for us.  He also showed him some other things in the house.  Genardo does not really speak English, so as Howard said ,”I think I understood about a quarter of what he was talking about today!”  Genardo took the girls in the backyard and had them pickign eggplants and tomatos.  Then he told the family to get in his car, he wanted to show them something.  He took them to his orchards.  They got to pick fresh figs, walnuts and apples.  He showed them how to eat the figs, which Delaney LOVED!  He also showed them that walnuts grow in a green fruit that you peel open to reveal the nut inside.  Then he cracked it open with his teeth for them to eat.  He then showed them his apples.  He had yellow and red apples.  So Happy September, my girls got to go apple picking!  Too bad they didn’t have their apple hats!!  They came home so excited about their adventure.  Genardo told them he would teach them Italian if they taught him the words in English!  He was even growing mace, which they taught him is corn.  Although this corn was only good for chickens=) He even told the girls they could help him in the orchard anytime they do not have school.  Blythe is so excited about that.  Now Saturday can not come soon enough!  Genardo is really making this whole experience worth while for us!!

Hopefully he will let me take his picture soon so you can see what he looks like!!

Fun Family Day!

We decided to run the family 9/11 memorial mile run.  The girls were upset we didn’t run the mud run last month, so we felt obligated to follow through with this run.  We went over to the start to sign up before the race.  The girls found some friends and started playing chase in the grass.  We figured they would use all their energy  and not want to run.  But when we got lined up with all the other families, the girls were excited.  They shouted, “Go!” and the girls and their friends took off.  Howard, James and I did all we could do to catch up to the children since they did not block off the street.  Blythe and Xander were running together.  Delaney and Allison started together but then Delaney started to slow.  Howard stayed with Blythe and I stuck with Delaney.  Blythe and Howard ran the whole way together!  Blythe was happy she even beat Xander.  When they passed the first loop, they all grabbed water.  Xander stopped to drink it but Blythe and How kept on going.  He said that he was hoping she would want to stop because he did but she didn’t!  Delaney walked a few times but she always kept moving.  We caught up to Allison on our final half of loop.  The three of us girls ran across the finish line together.  It was a lot of fun.  The kids were so proud of their accomplishment!!  They rested for a bit but then ended up playing on the playground for about 30 minutes while James (Xander and Allison’s dad) ran the 5K.

We came back inside and got cleaned up and packed some things to take to the house.  We hoped to take things over slowly so that we didn’t kill ourselves trying to move everything at once.  It was fun going in the house ourselves.  We all can hardly wait to have space to spread out!!

Then we met our sponsors at the Cuma Archeological ruins.  The city of Cuma is the most Anciet Western Greek colony.  It was an amazing place.  Built into the side of a mountain, this colony was really impressive.  Unfortunately, we forgot all of our cameras.  We were so excited about taking things to the house we forgot to think about what we were doing after.  Fortunatley, we went with our sponsors, and Keith brought his camera.  So pictures will follow shortly.  We forget how close we are to the water until we go to a place like Cuma.  The colony must have been a port at one time.  The views from up here were outstanding.  We were not thinking this was a big walking area.  So after running a mile, we must have walked another mile or so around these runins.  The girls were troopers and seemed to enjoy the outing.  We then ended up at Lago d’Averno.  Our sponsors had never been there and we heard it was pretty.  We ended up walking around the perimeter of the lake.  I so wish I had a podimeter on today.  I am sure we walked 3-4 miles by the end of the day.  It was a fun walk with some really neat winerys on the side of the lake.  Nothing was open but we got to see some beautiful grapes growing!

Since everyone was now throughly tired, we headed out to dinner.  We went to a neat little restaurant called Old Friends.  The food was yummy!  The girls had great pasta and I had really good veal and mushrooms.  Dinner was great but dessert was outstanding.  I had heard their choclate mousse was good, that was an undetstandment!  It was so rich and creamy, your spoon could stand up in it!

 It was such perfect ending to a fun family day!

Pisa- Florence- and Orvieto

We woke up Saturday morning early and drove to Pisa.  It was a six hour drive but such a pretty drive.  It was so neat seeing all the towns perched on the hill tops.  It amazing to think they built right into the stone and these places are still standing.  We arrived at our hotel around one o’ clock.  Our hotel gave us a name of a Panini shop so we went to try it out.  It was like a real American deli.  We didn’t really know what to order.  The clerk recommended the Tuscan salami.  How and I are not huge deli meat people, but we are now converts.  It was so yummy!  The sandwiches were wrapped in paper so you could stroll the streets or sit under the umbrella and enjoy the view.  We decided to enjoy the view.  We continued walking the cobble streets (there was no cars allowed) to the leaning tower.  It was neat to see with the girls.  They had fun taking pictures.  We tried to get the picture that looks like you are holding it up.  We laughed as we looked around and saw everyone doing the same with their family and everyone getting equally frustrated that it wasn’t working.  Blythe’s picture is my favorite.  Two Australian men were talking pictures.  One used his feet to hold up the tower and the other suggested running from the toppling towers.  I asked the girls to try that one.  I think Blythe’s face is priceless!!  We couldn’t go up the tower because children have to be 8.  Guess what Blythe wants for her birthday!?  We then went in the Cathedral.  The gold ceiling was amazing.  I think the girls were more amazed by the real body in the coffin and all the skulls in the church.  We could walk up in the Baptistery, this is the circular building next to the church.  We had a neat view from up there, you could see the tower over the church and really tell it was leaning.  Someone even did some chanting so you could hear how much the place echoed.  It was such a beautiful sound.  Our new friends, the Hatteroths, met us in Pisa.  We walked the city with them and had a nice dinner.  We saw a poster in one of the shops showing doors of Tuscany.  So we decided to start a collection ourselves.  We even refined it a bit and are taking door knockers as well.  We hope to have a nice collection!

The next morning we got up to go to Florence.  We met the Hatteroths at the train station and took the train in to the city.  Xander (who is a day older than Blythe) Blythe, Delaney and Allison (who is a first grader) entertained themselves drawing on the way.  We walked all over Florence.  We got tickets and went to see the David.  The dads did a great job of getting the kids in free.  European union can get their kids in free, 6 and over for us have to pay.  So our husbands said the big kids were six and the little ones were 5.  Blythe was not too happy about it but it saved us some money.  I asked the kids to see how many animals they could find in the museum.  I think they looked at more paintings than we did.  They were hunting for those animals everywhere.  It certainly entertained them.  Then I had made a scavenger hunt of other animals in the city.  I copied it off a walking tour website.  Best idea.  The kids were happy to walk and super excited when they could find the animals we were looking for.  And they made sure to take pictures of each animal.  Now I have to remember to do this everywhere we go!!  We made it to the Mercato Nuovo, with the porcellino (wild boar), Ponte Vecchio, Palazzo Vecchio, and the Duomo.  After we walked the city the kids really wanted to climb the bell tower.  There was no age restriction on it.  We were afraid they wouldn’t make it up and it cost 6 euros a person.  But they really wanted to go and we kind of felt bad since they could not climb the leaning tower.  So we sugared them up with gelato (twix flavor no less!  YUMMMY) and the dads took them up.  I stayed down with Janelle and Jacob (10 months old).  And of course, the dads had the kids be young again so they got in free.  They figured 6 euros isn’t too bad if they don’t make it.  Well the kids were determined and they made it up Giotto’s tower, all 414 steps!  They did it really fast.  Janelle thought we would have time to shop but we made it to the market and we got the call they were just about at the top.   It certainly capped the weekend for them.  We took the train back to our hotel after a really fun day.

We had thought about going back to Florence on Monday, but we didn’t think the children would be up for another museum.  So we read our Rick Steves book and decided to stop in Orvieto on the way home. It was a great decision.  It was the half-way point on drive back.  It was nice to get out and stretch our legs, plus it is a beautiful city.  It is perched on a hill with spectacular views of the vineyards below.  You park and walk up through these narrow roads.  It was what you picture Italy to be like.  We had a nice walk through the city.  We got a couple pieces of pottery and had a wonderful lunch.  Tuscan bread has no salt in it so it isn’t very good to eat.  We found a great Panini place that had focaccia with Tuscan salami.  It was so yummy.  Everyone enjoyed their meal and Howard even had a glass of the local Orvieto classico wine.  It was so good we bought a bottle to bring home.  It was the perfect ending to a great weekend!