Sammi in Italy!!! (Part 3)

March 9, 2011--Don't faint, but I am actually working on this right after posting parts 1 & 2!

After the pizza party we spent a few more days hanging around Belforte.








Sammi being silly in Sestino (Tuscany)












As we left Toscana (Tuscany) and entered the Marche. This sign is about 3 km from Belforte!

















Larry and Sammi leaving on a hike to Sasso Simone! Now tell me, who is dressed for hiking??

























Sammi with Sasso Simone in the far distance. There and back took about 8 hours!









Where is Uncle Larry?
























Now we are off to Venezia!!







Sammi in the Piazza di San Marco.
















Standing on a small pedestrian crossing bridge.















Believe it or not, we had to look around to find a gondolier who was wearing his hat!














Sammi loved stopping to shop!














Sammi with the Grand Canal behind her.











After returning from Venice we took Sammi and Larry to La Grotta dei Folletti for a tremendous meal of nothing but antipasti. She willingly tried everything--including this bowl of tripe!


















I, on the other hand, only enjoyed the bread and the dessert!














The next day Larry and Sammi headed off to San Leo. I just couldn't face another trip since we would be leaving for Orvieto and then back to the states the next day.

The fortress and/or castle of San Leo.




















Larry and Sammi enjoying lunch.













Nothing quite like using a turkish toilet!










Our last days with Sammi were spent in Orvieto and Civita di Bagnoregio--two of many great hill towns in Italy.







Here is Sammi knocking on a "little" door!




















The beautiful town of Civita where we found the best ever bruschetta!











Sammi and I caught the train in Orvieto to go to Rome early Thursday morning. We went straight to the airport to start the log flight home.

Thanks for taking this journey with us!

Sammi in Italy!! (Part 2)

March 9, 2011--Okay this is a little embarrassing! I started the blogs about Sammi last summer with great intentions to finish once I came back from taking her home. As you can see, that never happened. In fact--I haven't even looked at the blog again. So here it is--part two!

After Rome, we took Sammi to many of the small towns around Belforte. Here are a few:








Frontino





















Urbania











A little festa in Belforte with "I gemelli" Primo and Paulo playing.
















Patrizio trying to dance with Sammi--turns out he doesn't really know how to dance anything other than the salsa!!









Then we went to Siena and Florence for a couple of days.





Here is Sammi in "Il Campo" (Siena) where they hold the palio.


















Me and Sammi eating lunch. Sammi is toasting us with a glass of wine--OK, she didn't really taste it and neither did I! That was Larry's wine.









We drove to Florence and spent the day.








Sammi with Florence in the background.


















Sammi over the River Arno.










Back in our neck of the woods.





This is what a firefly looks like.





















From the mountain town of Sassocorvaro looking over the "lake" in Mercatale.











Primo, Paolo, and Carlo hosted a pizza party for Sammi. They were kind enough to let her help make the pizzas!





Sammi with the twins.



















You start with a rolling pin:














Then you use your hands!















Add some sauce.





















Pop it in the oven!











Finish by eating 10 pieces from 10 different types of pizza!












I had hoped to finish with this blog, but I can see that it would be WAY too long, so now on to Part #!!

Sammi In Italy! (Part 1)

June 19, 2010-- We have just had the most wonderful three weeks possible. Having Sammi here was such a blessing and so much fun! Seeing Italy through her eyes was like seeing it again for the first time!

Speaking of first time--in one day, Sammi experienced her first airplane ride; her first view of the ocean (from the air or on the ground!); her first train ride; her first subway ride; her first squid; and her first gelato! It was quite a day!!


Here we are working on the computer while waiting for our plane in Salt Lake City. Sammi was so amazed at how big the planes were! She was a little concerned that they wouldn't actually be able to get off the ground!



















We are up in the air! Sammi took a lot of pictures of the two of us as we made our way across the world. She was so excited and had this huge grin on her face all of the time!




















Just hanging out at the Paris airport and then back on another plane to head to Rome.






















Larry and Sammi were so happy to see each other and stuck close together on the metro ride.





















I still have not been able to master the getting a drink out of the old Roman faucets, but after one quick lesson Sammi was a master.





















This is the plate that Sammi and Larry shared from the buffet. See the little squid? Yep, she ate it! She loves to try new things, but found out that calamari isn't her favorite! She also had her first real Italian pizza and her first gelato that night!
































On our way to the Vatican we asked one of the Swiss Guards if she could have her picture taken with him and he said OK.























After exploring St Peter's we decided to climb to the top of the dome. I wanted to climb the whole way, but Larry talked us into taking the elevator for the first half. I think I thanked him a thousand times before the day was over! Here is Sammi at the top with Rome behind her.



















Larry and Sammi on the Spanish Steps and then all three of us.

























Sammi is pointing out the Colloseum in case you can't see it in the picture!
























She is determined to come back to Italy so she threw her 3 coins into the Fountain of Trevi!





















I can see that this will be a long blog and a lot of work so I will stop tonight with Rome. I will pick up with local towns, Siena, Florence, and Venice. Stay tuned!!

Spring Finally Arrived!!

June 17, 2010--I'm sure that you realize that spring finally arrived before the middle of June! Even though that is true, it arrived WAY later than we wanted. This was a very long winter with lots of rain and snow.

Just to give you an idea--this was taken the 15th of March!!
















We were lucky that we had planted daffodils a couple of years ago and last year Larry planted tulips. It was so nice to have some color showing! Our pansies survived the winter, but never really grew much.








Here are some of the daffodils. They seemed to have reproduced some since last spring and the flowers seemed as big as before.

















The tulips were so pretty! We found out that the tulips open up during the day and then close up at night! They are even smart enough to know not to open up when it is raining!

















Larry was able to get a great picture with most of the tulips and a group of daffodils all in one!















We also had some marigolds pop up that had died last summer--at least we think they are called marigolds!!
















Our strawberries from last year are doing great. They had spread a lot and were covered with blossoms back in May when most of these pictures were taken. Today I picked our second bowl of berries and they are so tasty!


















The cherry tree has cherries on it for the first time! I was so afraid they would become ripe when I was in the states last month, but they are just getting ripe now.

May:













Now:













Our peach trees are loaded with baby peaches. One of the trees is covered with twins and even one set of quints!! We didn't know what to do about it so we just left them the way they were. They are now big and they still are connected, but one is small and the other is bigger. They look like they will still be small this year, but hopefully they will be as sweet as last year's.

May:

















Now:











There were about 5 blossoms on the apricot tree, but nothing happened so we won't be eating fresh apricots this year! Our pear tree had numerous pears, but the ants decided to have a picnic and took care of those for us! This is what they looked like before the picnic!















The pine tree that Felice gave us has a lot of new growth on it as do the hedges that Larry planted last year.



















Our son Larry planted corn and it was barely poking through in May. It is now a lot taller.

May:













Now:












That's all for now!