Cousins day out

On Sunday, Leah and I left the kids with Jason and headed out to see some sights. It was just easier given the sites we were going to see and it also was going to coincide with Ali's nap. We had three things left to see on Leah's must see list. We headed up to Petrin tower but once we got there seeing it was enough. Neither of us felt like climbing all the steps to get to the top of the tower. Since we were up there though I suggested we check out the mirror maze. We had never been to the maze but I had heard about it so it was great to be able to check it out before I bring the kids. We had fun in the mirror maze so I can imagine how much fun it will be for the girls when we bring them. After you go through the mirror maze you come to a room with funny mirrors. They make you tall, short, fat etc. Here is an example of us looking very short. We had some good laughs and then headed out and off to the Strahov Monastery. We realized when we got there that it was closed for lunch hour so we decided to get lunch as well. We ended up in a small cafe near the castle and had lunch and hot chocolate to warm up. We decided after lunch to check out St Vitus Cathedral since Strahov wasn't going to be open again until 1pm. As we got to Hradcanske Namesti it was very crowded and there was some event. Then we realized it was skiiing! I never expected to see skiing in Prague. They had brought snow in and made a race course for cross country skiing. It was crowded but we got through and went to St Vitus. After St. Vitus we headed back through the crowd in Hradcanske Namesti. The crowd must have doubled in size since it was nearly impossible for us to get through the crowd. We finally did and made it to Strahov. After Strahov we stopped for one more hot chocolate and then headed home. It was a fun day out.

Showing Leah the sites

Today Leah, the girls and I headed up to the castle. Leah wanted to see St Vitus and didn't really care about the rest of the castle so it was going to be an easy trip. I was surprised at how many tourists were at the castle. There aren't nearly as many as the summer but more than I expected. I guess I will have to wait for January for Prague to be empty. Anyway, we got up to the castle and took pictures and got to the cathedral and I noticed the doors were closed. Unfortunately for us the cathedral had just closed. I thought, oh well, another day. We decided to head down to the Charles Bridge. As we headed out into Hradcanske Namesti we had to wait for the changing of the guard. It was interesting to watch since we hadn't seen it before. While in Hradcanske Namesti I did my job as an excellent tour guide...."that house is famous.....i think it is maybe the arch bishop's house. That house is also famous....I don't know whose it was but I like the art on it". Leah was very impressed with my guiding skills. (HaHa) Anyway, we headed down into Mala Strana and Leah took pictures while the girls and I slowly walked. We headed across the Charles Bridge where Leah stopped to buy some gifts. By this time it was getting late and it was dark and cold so we headed back to the tram and home for dinner. It was a slow start to the the wonders of Prague but we all had a good time.

Things I've learned from my cousin

When we were younger I did not like my cousin. This is for no real reason other than she was 6 years younger than me and followed me everywhere. I, of course, wanted to be with the big kids who probably hated having me tag along after them! It wasn't a big deal though since I did not see my cousin much. She lived in Connecticut, which for Rhode Islanders might as well have been Florida. I saw her at holidays and the family gathering at beach week. The last time we saw each other was at beach week 2 years ago. It was the first time that I had really spoken with Leah since we became adults. I was surprised to learn that we had things in common and I enjoyed my time with her. I regretted that I couldn't spend more time with her but I had the kids to take care of and naps etc. and she was just in for a couple weeks from Uzbekistan so she had to get in all her visiting.
Being so close we invited Leah to join us for Christmas. I was excited that I would get to spend Christmas with some family. I have realized since Leah has been here that it is also an added bonus for me since I have found out things I didn't know.

1. I like my cousin and we really laugh a lot
2. There are things about us that are just from our moms' family.
3. Even though we didn't see each other much growing up we have a lot of the same things to laugh about that happened in the family.
4. She didn't go to American University as I had been told
5. I learned my other cousin has moved in with his girlfriend and the girlfriend is having their baby in a week!!! (Keep in mind I talk to my mother multiple times a week and this had NEVER come up!!)

There is more that I have learned and I'm sure I will learn even more over the course of the next week. I'm glad she is here. Even with the cabinets falling this has been one of the best Christmas' ever.

Enjoying the holidays with a BANG!!!

You can see the picture....did you think, "earthquake"? Well, not quite. As I was walking out of the kitchen the cabinets decided they had been on the wall long enough and wanted to come down. They came crashing down with a very loud crash. Unfortunately for me I was in the kitchen when it happened. The cabinets landed on me so I was under the heap of mess you see in the picture (although not at the time the picture was taken). Luckily I was the only one in the kitchen at the time. After I found myself under the cabinets I yelled for Jason who was having his sleep in day. He was already out of bed because he had heard the crash (as had, apparently, everyone in the building). He came to the kitchen and asked where I was since he couldn't see me. The "under here" helped him out and he lifted the cabinets off of me. I got up carefully since I happened to also be at the point in the cabinets that housed our glassware so there was a lot of broken glass on and around me. I was dazed and uncomfortable but I immediately went next door to our landlords apartment. I think I was probably in a little bit of shock since looking back on it I probably could have waited a minute before heading next door. I went next door with my pants soaked in wine (which had fallen from the cabinets and shattered all over me) and covered in broken glass to try and explain the unbelievable. They saw me and new something was wrong. I tried to explain but even if she understood the words it just wouldn't make sense. How do you explain that kitchen cabinets came falling off the wall. It just doesn't even sound believeable. Our landlady came back to our apartment with me to see what I was talking about. She saw the destruction and with a "Jesus Marie" gave us hugs and said she was sorry. She went back and got her husband and her son to take pictures and talk to us. They insisted on bringing me to the hospital which I had to agree was probably a good idea. Before we went to the hospital though she insisted that we have breakfast at their apartment. It was very nice of her but unnecessary. Our landlord brought me to the hospital and spoke Czech to everyone so it was easy for me. While we were at the hospital Jason, our landlady and the cleaning lady from our building started cleaning up the mess. My x-rays showed that everything was fine. They gave me a special cream for my arm and bandaged it up. I wasn't really sure what the cream was supposed to do but I left it on for the day anyway. Sleeping was not ideal but it is a little bit better today so in a few days I'm sure I'll be able to rest my head back on a pillow.

We have found places to put everything so that our kitchen is at least usable. We will have to have new cabinets installed as well as new counters and flooring. The cabinets broke the counter when they fell and also took big dings out of the linoleum flooring. In addition to the dings in the floor there is also a giant yellow stain as well as a purple stain. I guess linoleum doesn't like wine, vodka, vinegar, balsamic vinegar and oil sitting on it. We still have to figure out how we will deal with the damage to our glassware, kitchen table and new counter/drawer thingy we just bought but I'm confident it will all work out. For now we are just trying to enjoy our Christmas.

On a happier note, Leah (my cousin) arrived on the 23rd from Uzbekistan. She will be here for 10 days. It is great having her here. It is the first time we have ever been together as adults without any parents/aunts/uncles around. We are having a great time hanging out. I'll post more about what we do over the next week.

Little Monkeys

Sofia has been learning a lot of new songs at school. She teaches me the songs she learns. It is fun for me to learn her songs since I remember doing the same thing with my mother. I also remember getting frustrated when my mom couldn't remember the words I just taught her so I really try and focus when Sofia is teaching me (and try to be understanding when she gets frustrated). Here is one of her songs...it is also one of my favorites. Just click on the picture below to play the video.

Winter Wonderland

It has been quite cold here lately but we haven't had any snow. I keep hoping to wake up in the morning to see the ground covered with snow but nothing yet. Today the girls and I had to bring Watson to the vet since his ear is bothering him again. The vet that we use is in Bila Hora which is about a 25 minute tram ride from our apartment. As the tram started to head away from our stop and further out of the city I noticed in the distance that the trees at the top of the hill looked white. I wasn't sure if they were really white or if it was just fog. As the tram continued the ground and all the trees where covered in snow! It was so beautiful I wish I had had my camera. the girls were excited as well. It was all I could do to keep them moving so that we could get to the vets office. Once we were done at the vet I let the kids and Watson play in the snow. Sofia kept trying to make snow angels even though there really wasn't enough snow for that. It was weird to see the different weather conditions but very enjoyable.

Christmas rush

Here it is, December 19th, and I have not finished my shopping. That is putting it nicely...it isn't that I haven't finished it is more that I have barely started. You would think that this isn't a big deal but I know that come the weekend my shopping will get limited. I have to get my gift shopping done and my food shopping done. I decided to cancel my Czech lesson for tonight and go into town and do some shopping. I want to finish the gift shopping done so that I can do the food shopping tomorrow. Luckily I pre-ordered the meat so I can pick that up on the 23rd. I was surprised that they even have pick up on the 23rd since most shops are closed on Sunday and then shops are closed the 24, 25, and 26th. I guess since the shop I ordered the meat at is a shop that caters to expats they are open. I will be happy when it is all done. It is not like me to leave everything to the last minute.

We have also been pretty busy this week with dr. appointments, vet appointment, and grooming for Watson. Today was Watson's grooming. He desperately needed to be bathed and to have his hair trimmed. While we waited for Watson the girls and I hung out at a playground. It makes me laugh when I think, "I can't get anything done b/c I'm playing at a playground.". I guess if that is my only complaint I can't really complain. The girls had a great time even though it was freezing out. I've learned to be wise in my dressing of the girls. They go out with many layers and when it is cold like this they go out with snow pants on. I don't want to hear "I'm too cold" so I bundle them up. Now we are home and I'm exhausted so I guess I better try to rest before my shopping frenzy tonight. :)

Photo Updates

I have finally gotten all caught up on getting our photos uploaded to Smugmug, the photo site we use. For about the last year and a half I have been uploading photos to the site for everyone, including ourselves, to enjoy but since this summer I began to fall behind. Today I spent a lot of time going through photos from Autumn and Winter and our two week trip to the Loire Valley and Tuscany. I still need to go through and add captions to the photos but now that they are uploaded I can slowly work on doing that.

The autumn pictures include photos of Sofia's first day of school, school trip to the pumpkin patch, girls' haircuts, Halloween, Thanksgiving and a variety of other photos. Click here to see our autumn photos.

In October we spent one week in the Loire Valley, France and one week in Tuscany, Italy and had a fantastic time and took lots of pictures. Click here to see photos from France and click here to see photos from Italy.

I also have our most recent photos uploaded now, including visiting friends, the girls trimming the tree and visiting Santa as well as Sofia's school Christmas party. Click here to see our most recent winter photos.

Enjoy!

Sound of Music

I'm excited because the girls are watching Sound of Music. I love that movie! I have waited for them to be old enough to watch it and yesterday I was playing the soundtrack for them and they were excited about that so I put the movie on. I told Sofia that it is in Austria and she was excited since her friend, Kiera, has been to Austria. She wants to go to Austria so she likes seeing a movie with scenes from Austria. Tonight for their pre-bedtime movie Sofia asked for the Austria movie with the kids in it. My heart rejoiced and I eagerly put the movie on. As they were watching it I started to sing along with the nuns as they were singing the "Maria" song. Ali said, "No mommy! It is only for the Muns!" It was all I could do not to laugh. Apparently the "muns" from the airport are still in Ali's memory. We will have to work on her pronunciation of Nun.

Santa

Sofia's school had Santa come to school and they sold tickets to see Santa for 60Kc per ticket. This seemed pretty cheap to me and an easy way to have the kids see Santa. Ali was a little afraid of Santa and wouldn't look at him or talk to him. She really didn't even want to go into the room with him. Sofia was a little shy but not nearly as much as I thought she would be. Santa eventually got her to talk a little. He asked her what she wanted for Christmas and she responded with, "presents". He told her that he is sure he can take care of that. After seeing Santa and receiving a lollipop and a small present we headed downstairs to the bake sale the PTA was holding. The kids enjoyed a chocolate muffin and their lollipop. An added bonus for me was that they were also selling used books at the bake sale for 30Kc a book. This was very exciting for me since I read a lot and buying books here is expensive. The cheap books are at least 180kc so when I get a chance to get 30kc books I jump at it. I bought 5 books so I won't have to venture to the bookstore this month.

Aspiring actress

Sofia had her first acting experience yesterday. (Well, I should say her first formal acting experience since she performs all the time at home!) Her nursery class put on a performance of the Nativity for all the parents. Sofia had to say, "Mary and Joseph stayed in the stable and baby Jesus was born." She was a little distracted at first b/c she wanted to know what I was holding. (I was holding the baby brother of one of her classmates.) Anyway, the play got started and Sofia stood there quietly awaiting her turn to speak but it took too long and she started to stare off around the room. When it was her turn her teacher had to say her name a few times before Sofia realized it was her turn. It was very funny. Once she realized it was her turn she did a good job. They sang some songs and then the play was over. It must have been exhausting for Sofia b/c she fell asleep on the couch after school yesterday!

Holiday Spirit

As a follow up to Mary's post I wanted to post to say that I too am feeling truly in the holiday spirit now. The last couple months have been very busy at work but now that the city is filled with lights and music and we now have our Christmas tree and decorations up I am enjoying this great time of year. It will be sad not being around all of our extended family for Christmas but being here and enjoying all the fun, and sometimes not so fun, challenges of a new country has really brought us together as a family so this will be a special Christmas season.

Dinner with Friends

After we moved to Prague two of Jason's colleagues in Maynard also decided to make the move. We finally got together for dinner with one of them. Kelly, her husband, Alain, and their children Paige and Colby invited us over their apartment for dinner. They have decided to live in Prague 2 which is across town from us so we hopped on the tram and headed over. Sofia and Ali were a little shy at first but after a little bit they had a great time playing. The girls were happy to see Paige's collection of princess dresses and shoes. While the kids played we enjoyed adult conversation with our friends. The girls were also entranced by Kelly and Alain's cat. Ali kept looking for the cat who wisely removed himself from the reach of the kids. We had dinner and then let the kids watch a movie while the adults finished eating and talking. Ali obviously was very comfortable by this time since when I happened to look into the tv room I noticed she had taken her pants, tights and underwear off! Oh well, at least she is comfortable with her body. Unfortunately she also peed on the floor. Luckily it was a wood floor and Kelly and Alain were very understanding. Paige was very cute too. She said, "that's ok, I have accidents sometimes too.". All in all it was a fun night. We will have to have them over to our apartment next. Jason and I realized that we have never had anyone over our apartment for dinner so we want to change that.

December in Prague

December in Prague is wonderful. At the end of November you see all the workers out preparing everything for December. On December 1st it is magic...all the Christmas lights turn on and the tent is set up at the end of our street with performances daily. Christmas music is played on speakers all the way down our street so you can hear music when you step out the front door. Old Town square is all decked out with lights and the giant Christmas tree as well as the vendor huts and the stage for performances (The high school kids from Sofia's school will perform a concert there this month as well.) Wenceslas square has its tree and vendors and so does Namesti Republiky and Andel. There are Christmas celebrations all around the city like the one at the end out our street. It is amazing to me how much Christmas is celebrated here. They have added more stuff to the celebration at the end of our road this year. This year they have included a nativity scene, an ice rink, a food stand, and a telephone hut to call baby Jesus. Yes, call baby Jesus. The Czech tradition is that baby Jesus brings the presents on Christmas day so the kids ask baby Jesus for presents. As we walked by yesterday they appeared to be having an old car show. It is nice to have such a festive atmosphere around.

"Wait your turn!"

You always see dads on TV who are the long suffering males in a house full of women. We have joked about it in the past that that will be Jason when the girls are older. Unfortunately for Jason the "when the girls are older" has already started. The other day Jason asked Ali if she had to go potty. She said, "no". He asked again. She said, "no". So Jason said, "ok, Daddy is going to go potty then". Ali immediately ran to the potty, pushed Jason out of the way and said, "Wait your turn!". Poor Jason. Being pushed aside for the bathroom is already happening. (The only upside is at least she did actually use the potty.) By the time the girls are teenagers we will have to make sure Jason has his own secret bathroom.

1 year anniversary

It was one year ago today that we arrived in Prague. It is hard to believe that a year has gone by. It is hard to even remember those first few days in Prague. We arrived bleary eyed off the plane and we were met and transferred to our apartment. I had no idea what to expect since I had never been to Prague before. Our apartment was empty. Our stuff hadn't arrived from the US. Everyone spoke a language we couldn't understand. We had left all our friends in the US but we were still happy and excited to be here. A year later many things are different.

We are still happy and excited to be here. Comparing today to a year ago is amazing. We were at a birthday party for our friends children and therefore we were surrounded by many of our new friends. Hard to believe we have made that many friends since we arrived. We had to go across town to go to the birthday party and we knew where we were going. We didn't have to worry about how to buy a ticket for the metro or where to get off the metro. We didn't need a stroller to get there. (We still use the stroller at times for Ali but a lot of times we can no go stroller-free). Our apartment is no longer empty but filled with our stuff. We have finally begun to truly decorate and even have curtains up now. We still can't understand a lot of the language but we can speak some and understand some. We have also learned enough to make ourselves understood in many situations. The language isn't nearly as scary anymore. We have figured out the grocery store (mostly) and where to get hard to find items (this sometimes means having it shipped from the US). I can even offer newcomers to Prague helpful hints....who would have thought I would be able to do that??

We are looking forward to our next year in Prague. We have found a place where we love to live. Yes, there are things that would be easier if we lived in the U.S., but there are a lot of things that are easier here. Coming here we have found many things to the thankful for. We have a nice apartment, great landlords, wonderful friends, a beautiful city at our doorstep, a great school for the kids, a teacher that Sofia loves, and babysitters for our children and our dog. Jason and I get to have a date night every Friday and we get to exercise in the morning without having to get up at 5am. We have children who get to experience a different culture here in Prague as well as the chance to travel to many different countries (5 in the last year). Sofia figures out how far things are by how many planes it takes us to get somewhere. For example, Spain is two planes and a car. Sofia gets to go to school and have kids in her class from all over the world. There are children from Prague as well as Mexico, Holland, Great Britain, Italy, Russia, New Zealand, and the US as well as a teacher from Canada and a teacher from Scotland. Ali will have the same opportunity in school next year. For now Ali gets to play with her friends that we have met over the course of the last year. They are also from different places...two friends who are Czech/American, a friend who is Czech/Australian, and friends from the U.S.

I will keep posting on the blog to keep everyone updated on our adventures. Please feel free to leave comments if you have questions or want further detail on a post (or if you just want to say hi). Thanks for reading about our adventures.

We are sick

There isn't much going on here since we are all sick. The girls and I have been sick for about a week. We all went to the doctor today. I was a little worried about bringing the girls to the pediatrician since I knew that pediatricians here do not deal with kids ears. I was worried that she would send us to an ear, nose and throat doctor. The reason I was worried about that was because I know that the Czech method for dealing with ear infections is to pop the ear drum. I am not on board with that method so I didn't want to go to an ear nose and throat doctor b/c I didn't want to deal with the argument. Luckily our pediatrician just listened to what we said and checked a couple things on the girls (although not the ears) and decided to write prescriptions for a lot of medicine...Augmentin plus ear drops, nose drops and eye drops for Ali and Augmentin plus an expectorant for Sofia. My doctor wrote me a prescription for Augmentin as well as some gargling solution. Jason is also sick but not as sick as the rest of us and since his just started he hasn't needed to go to the doctor yet. I went to the pharmacy on the way home from the doctor. It makes me laugh when dealing with hospitals and pharmacy here since there idea of expensive and my idea are nowhere near the same. The pharmacy was concerned about me having to pay for all the medicines. The way that our insurance works (since we have the foreigners insurance) is that we pay upfront for all prescriptions and then anything over 100Kc we get reimbursed (that is about $5.50USD). While it is nice to get the money back the prescriptions here are so cheap that I'm not even concerned about it. We got 7 prescriptions for about 1000Kc or $55. In the US that would have been a minimum of $70 if you consider a $10 copay per prescription. The reality is that I'm sure some of them wouldn't have been generic and would have cost more then $10. It is just another interesting difference between the US and the Czech Republic.

Thank you Auntie Carlene!!

The girls love getting mail. They love cards. The really love when packages come in the mail. Yesterday a package came from Auntie Carlene. It was all the girls could do to wait to get upstairs so they could open it. We got upstairs and I let them sit on the floor and tear into the envelope. Sofia knew right away that it was an apron. I don't know how she knew. I can only guess that she has seen aprons at school. She wanted to put it on and, of course, Ali wanted to do the same as her sister. They loved that it was Santa and a snowman. Sofia asked why? I told her that Auntie Carlene sent them so that they could help mommy make cookies for Christmas. The eyes lit up and she asked, "Can we make them now??" How could I resist. Here is a short video of the girls with their aprons. Just click "Play" and hopefully you will have sound on your computer as well so you can hear the girls.

Happy Thanksgiving!!!

No, the Czech's do not celebrate our American Thanksgiving but we did! Our friends hosted a Thanksgiving dinner for about 70 people. I thought it was suppose to be about 40 but there was definitely more than 40 people there. In order to have enough food to feed everyone many people made food. We were tasked with making a turkey. I thought, "no problem". Then the reality started to set in.

My friend gave me the turkey to prepare. When she dropped off the turkey she said, "there may be feathers still on the bird that you need to take out. Also, the neck may not be cut off like they are on American turkeys so you may have to trim that. Also, keep in mind that the ovens here are convection and not like US ovens so the turkey won't take as long to cook.". At this point I thought, "oh my! What did I get myself into??". I brought the turkey upstairs and put it in the fridge. It did fit on the bottom shelf of the fridge as long as I took everything off that shelf and moved the next shelf up. I decided to see if it would fit in the oven. It did fit but just barely. I realized I needed a pan to cook the turkey in so I measured the oven and went to the local kitchen shop. It took a little bit but I found a pan and headed home. I went to put it in the oven to double check that it would fit and guess what? That's right. It didn't fit! It was just a hair too big. I decided I would wait until the morning and head to Tesco to find a new one. I asked Jason if he could stay home from work on Thanksgiving day rather than take a half day so that he could help me with the turkey. I felt like this needed to be a team effort. He agreed to stay home after he checked his work schedule and saw there was nothing critical. I was very thankful! I headed to Tesco in the morning looking for a big roasting pan, although not too big since it had to fit in our oven, and hopefully a turkey roasting bag. We had hopes of brining the turkey but we didn't have anything big enough to hold the turkey but I couldn't find any turkey roasting bags. Since we couldn't brine the turkey we decided on putting salt, pepper, butter and herbs under the skin o the turkey to keep it moist. So, after I plucked the feathers out of the turkey, Jason put the butter/herb mixture under the skin and we put it in the oven. the turkey barely fit in the oven...the legs were actually touching the side of the oven. It all worked out great and we had a nice moist tasty turkey when we were finished. I took the turkey off the bone and we brought it to our friends for dinner.

We had a great dinner with all the fixins...turkey, sweet potato casserole, mashed potatoes, gravy, cranberry sauce, stuffing plus a lot of pie. Sofia had her first taste of jello and loved it and Ali had a chocolate chip pie which she thought was very good. The kids had fun playing with the other kids that were there. Clark and Lucy's rooms were definitely not as neat and tidy when we left as they were when we arrived. All the kids had a blast playing in their rooms. It was a great Thanksgiving and a great time to say thanks for having such great friends in Prague.

Cooking frustration

We finally have our stove working again. I was excited to be able to use it and decided to make meatloaf with sweet potatoes and asparagus. I bought the meat yesterday at the grocery store and went to eh potraviny near Sofia's school today to get sweet potatoes and asparagus. All was ready to start making the meatloaf. I took the meat out of the refrigerator and opened it and my hopes were dashed...the meat was BAD!! How can this be?? I just bought the meat yesterday! Well, apparently you can have the package date and use by date the same. I have been burnt on expired products before but it has been kept to the dairy aisle. I am always aware of the use by dates on dairy products because of that. Now I have learned I have to be the same way with meat from the grocery store. Another reason to just go to our local butcher. Oh well, I guess we will just have to wait until tomorrow for meatloaf.

Birthday parties

A few week back I brought Sofia to her friend Anna's birthday party. This is the first birthday party that Sofia has gone to. Jason stayed home to watch Ali since the party was during Ali's nap time and Sofia and I hopped in a cab and headed to her friend's house. I had looked up the bus schedules but the bus times on Saturdays to Nebusice are not ideal and come less than 1 an hour so it didn't really work. The party was a princess theme so Sofia got to wear her princess dress outside the apartment again which she thought was fun. We arrived at the house and Sofia was excited to see the house decorated for the party. There were party games for the kids to play. Sofia took part in some of them but not all. Some of them were interesting to me since Sofia's friend is British the games were games that I had never seen. After the games were done, food and cake were eaten the kids headed out into the backyard (or garden as it is called here). Sofia's friend had a big trampoline in the backyard. I told Sofia she couldn't go on it but when I went inside she disregarded me and went on it. When I cam back outside I went over and took her off the trampoline. After a little while of every other child on the trampoline I caved and let Sofia go on with her friends. The trampoline was completely screened in so was as safe as a trampoline was going to be so I decided to not be so overprotective. She had a great time jumping around with her friends. At the end we ended up catching a ride back home with one of her friends who lives near us. It was much better than going to wait for the bus!

It was great that Sofia has this birthday party to go to since Ali went to her friend Natalie's birthday party on the Thursday before. Sofia was sad that she missed Natalie's birthday party but knowing that she was going to another party on Saturday and that Natalie's mom, Joanna, sent home a favor bag for Sofia helped her accept missing it.

We went to Owen's birthday party last weekend. Ali and I had gone shopping for Owen's present which took a little while since Ali couldn't decide what we should get. I finally had to make an executive decision. We came home and wrapped up the present and put it on my bureau. When Sofia saw the present I told her it was for Owen's birthday party. Everyday after that she would ask me if we had gone to Owen's party. I think she thought she was going to miss it like she missed Natalie's party. I had to keep explaining that we were all going to Owen's party. On Saturday morning when I told her we were going to Owen's she was all excited. It was fun for all of us. The kids got to run around and play and Jason and I got to talk to our friends as well. The party favor bag included gummy treats which the kids loved. I have heard so many times, "gummy from Owen??".

We have another birthday party coming up for their friends Lucy and Clark. Both kids (and Jason and I) are looking forward to Lucy and Clark's birthday party. It is fun to see the kids play together especially on special days.

All these parties are good for me to see so that I will know what I'm suppose to do when Sofia's birthday comes around.

Potraviny

We don't really have stores in the US that are equivalent to a Potraviny but they are like a mini market...bigger than cumberland farms but not a full supermarket. I often go to the potraviny on my street to pick up small things. Today was my second time going to the potraviny near Sofia's school. It is a great Potraviny that my friend Shanna told me about. It has stuff that is hard to find elsewhere. I imagine it is because they get a lot of business from expats but I really don't know. Anyway, I went there today and picked up sweet potatoes, baby asparagus, chocolate covered raisins and baby carrots. I know, it doesn't sound exciting but when you live here those little things are something to write home about!

1st snow!!

We had our first snow of the season on Sunday. I always love the first snowfall of the year. When I saw it I quickly opened the patio doors so the girls could see it too. They were very excited. Sofia wanted me to leave the doors open while they ate breakfast so they could watch the snow. I told her it was too cold and she could just watch it through the window. I have been waiting for the snow to come. The weather has been very rainy lately. It pretty much rains every day. When it isn't rainy it is just cold and gray. It has just felt like snow on so many days that it was nice to finally see it arrive. It only stuck to the ground for about an hour and then it turned to rain but it was fun while it lasted.

Another Ikea trip...

Jason and I had been thinking about moving to a new apartment but we have decided we will stay where we are. With the decision to stay in our apartment was the decision that we finally had to decorate and really make it into our space. With that in mind we decided a trip to Ikea was needed. We secured our babysitter for the Sunday. Saturday night we measured everything and went through the Ikea catalog and website. We made our list of what we needed along with measurements. We wanted to make the trip as short as possible. That is a laugh! I'm convinced we just can't get out of Ikea in under 5 hours!!! I don't know what it is. When we went before I assumed the long time was becuase we had the kids with us and we didn't really know what we wanted. I was wrong. Apparently there is something about the store that makes it impossible to get in and out quickly. We left our apartment at 9:45 and got back at 4:15. We thought we would speed up the process by taking a cab since it takes about an hour to get to Ikea by metro. Thank goodness we took a cab or it would have taken another hour out of our day. I was grateful that the kids were not with us since I was exhausted which means they would have been miserable. The good thing though is that we got everything we needed (although we had to make a couple substitions). We brought as much home as we could and shipped the rest. With the stuff that we brought home yesterday the apartment is already looking better. I can't wait to get everything else delivered. I am at home now awaiting the Ikea delivery people. Once it arrives, let the building begin!

Dinner

Last night Jason and I finally went to Cantina Mexican restaurant. We had tried to go there repeatedly but I always forget to make a reservation until Friday. Whenever I would call on Friday they would already be completely booked. This week I called on Wednesday to make the reservation and was finally able to get in. I was looking forward to eating there since I had heard it is the only good Mexican food in Prague. We had tried other Mexican restaurants and knew how bad the food was so anything would be better. We got to the restaurant and it was packed. I had never been before and didn't know how big it was. It is not big but they cram a lot of people in the space that they have although you don't feel crowded. Maybe if we had 4 people at our table it would have felt crowded but with just the two of us it was perfect. I ordered fajitas and Jason got a burrito. We were both very happy with our food. It was nice to finally have good Mexican food. We both had margaritas which were very tasty.

Hail

Before we moved to Prague I think that I had seen hail only a few times in my life. Since we have lived here I have seen it a lot. I don't know what the weather pattern is here or why they seem to get more hail than we had in New England but it is just another difference. I often enjoy the hail storms since I am usually inside and can just enjoy the patter on the windows and seeing the balls of ice on the patio. Today was a different story. I went out for my morning run with Watson this morning. When I left our apartment it was not raining. By the time I had reached Letna park it was drizzling and by the time I was through Letna is was starting to rain pretty hard. I was still fine with running in the rain even though it was raining hard. There is something fun about running in the rain. As I started up the hill running past the Royal Gardens at the castle the wind really picked up and I had to run with my head down because the wind was whipping up leaves and dirt. At first I was thinking that I was just getting hit with pieces of leaves but then I realized it was hail. I was still willing to keep running but as I neared the entrance to the castle the hail really picked up and even with my head down it was stinging my cheeks. I had to draw the line at enduring pain so I decided to head for home. I think Watson was happy with my decision as well since he did not seem to like the hail at all.

Pre Trick or Treat

Before we headed out for trick or treat the girls and I headed over to our friend's house for dinner. The girls had fun playing with their friends as well as eating pizza and cupcakes. What more can a child (or adult even) ask for. . . friends, pizza, cupcakes and a night ahead filled with candy. Just to make sure the kids were ready for their adventures in trick or treating my friend Shanna held a practice. Here it is...although you will see only Sofia (with her friends) since Ali was still busy eating her cupcake!

I'm Ariel!!

The girls were thrilled when a package came from Grammie (Jason's mom) today. I waited until Ali was down for her nap before I opened the box because I knew I would never get her down if she saw what was inside . . . the much longed for Ariel costumes!!! I had to call the girls Ariel...., "no mommy, I'm Ariel not Sofia. Do you like my pretty long hair?" They have been having fun dressed up and pretending to be Ariel. It is kind of strange to see them with long hair. I just kept thinking well at least if they dye their hair when they get older they should look ok with red hair.

Trick or Treat

Halloween is not an important holiday in the Czech Republic. I'm told it migrated over here in the last five years or so but at most is celebrated with costume parties. Trick-or-treating is not generally done here. However, we had a desire to have the kids take part in that classic American tradition and luckily there are places where trick-or-treating occurs. There is a development in the village of Nebusice commonly referred to as Little America. This is a development, near the International School of Prague, filled with American, English, and many other expats and that's where many expats go on Halloween. We took our two princesses over there with some other American friends. Since the girls spend so much time dressed as princesses getting them ready for Halloween was really quite simply. The development itself is nice although very odd in that sense that you could be in a new housing development most anywhere in the US; it doesn't feel Czech at all. Sofia tends to be a bit shy at first around strangers in new situations like this but after that first house and she realized that simply knocking on a door and saying "trick or treat" got you candy she was on a mission. She lead the charge door to door, actually pushing open a door at one house and had a great time. We saw some of the other kids from Sofia's class so that was fun. Ali did well too. As we were leaving for the night some older kids set of a fire cracker. While that seemed to scare a bunch of younger kids somehow Sofia and Ali thought it was quite funny and Ali talked for a while about how she liked the fire cracker. The only down-side of the night was that the kids got a lot of small popsicles and other hard sucking candies and not much chocolate. The only reason I really cared was because it didn't give me much interesting stuff to take from them that night.

Women in My Shower

(Finally, a new entry from Jason) I go to the gym a few days a week. The gym is right across the road from the office so it's very convenient. The other day after working out I took a shower and I was a walking out of the shower when a woman, probably in her 20s, walks by and begins restocking the paper towels and cleaning the sinks. As others go to and from showers she begins to squeegee the floor of the shower room too. This doesn't bother me at all and nobody else seemed to care one bit that there was a woman walking around amongst men changing and showering but I realized this was yet another "you wouldn't see that in the US" event. It made me laugh to even think of what would happen if a gym in the US asked a female worker to clean the men's locker room while it was full of people.

This actually happens quite often, but this is the first time I got around to writing about it. I know I haven't blogged in a quite a while but I am going to try to do better about blogging about the little random things I encounter here that are different or interesting. We'll see how I do...

Recent thoughts

I am still running and I try to run every other day. As I run I am free to think about whatever I want. It is a nice time to day dream. Anyway, one of the things I had posted about before was the metronome in Letna Park. I wondered during the summer, when it was working, if it was only turned on in the summer. Well, this apparently is the case since the metronome has not been working since the beginning of September. The other thing that I love to do while running is watch Watson sprint across the fields at Letna. There is just something beautiful about Watson running at full speed. There is such power and grace in him it just makes me smile every time.

Since we moved here I have tried all different kinds of toilet paper. I have avoided the brands I recognized like "kleenex" brand since it was a lot more expensive. I figured I would just use what the locals use and I'm sure most people aren't using the most expensive toilet paper. Some of the toilet paper was terrible and some were ok. I've decided two-ply is really the ideal. One ply is not thick enough but 3 ply is just too much. Anyway, the other day we needed toilet paper and the store I stopped at only had the kleenex brand. Well, the actually isn't true. They had a lot of scented toilet paper but I refuse to buy scented toilet paper. So, I broke down and bought the Kleenex brand toilet paper. It was so nice that I don't think I can go back to the regular local toilet paper! I guess I will have to spend $1USD more per 4 pack.

What was that loud bang??

Well, that would be the glass on our oven door shattering! While we were on vacation our landlords had a new stove installed in our apartment. We (well, I) were very excited to have a new stove. No more using a match to light the burners and being able to fit more than one dish in the oven was very exciting. So you can imagine my disappointment when the oven broke. I have never seen such a thing happen. I was cooking pizza and about 20 minutes into cooking it we were this loud bang. None of us were in the kitchen so we headed in to find out what had happened. I was thinking, "did the salami explode and force the oven door open?" I got to the kitchen and there were a couple of pieces of broken glass on the floor. Jason had been thinking along the same lines as me and thought the broken glass was grease from the salami. Then we opened the oven door. We opened it only part way though because all the glass on the inside of the oven door had shattered and had fallen down and therefore we couldn't actually open the door very much.

I walked next door to our landlords apartment to let them know what had happened. Marie was home but Josef and Milan were away for the night so we talked for a little and decided we would just wait until morning when Josef could come over. Marie was very nice and offered to let me use her kitchen to make dinner but I told her it was ok and that we would figure something out. She then went to her freezer and took out some frozen goulash for us but again I told her it was ok and we would be fine. It was so nice of her to try and make sure we had dinner. I went back to our apartment and told Jason we would have to wait until the morning. We just moved on and my Czech teacher arrived and I had my Czech lesson. At the end of the lesson our bell rang and it was Josef and Milan. Marie must have called them to come home from wherever they were! I was very surprised. They are such nice people. They looked at the stove and took some pictures. We chatted for a little bit and then they headed home. We will see how long it takes to get our oven fixed. I'm not expecting any speed.

New stores...

The new mall opened in Namesti Republiky. They have been working on this new mall for a while and I didn't really think much about it accept that the #8 tram wasn't running by it because of construction. I'm not sure if it was the construction of the mall or the construction on the bridge but either way it was annoying. The #8 tram is the easiest way for me to get to Namesti Republiky. Yes, I can take the metro to mustek and walk. I know it isn't far but it was nice just hopping on the #8 and being dropped off exactly where I wanted to be. The first time I found out about the change was when I was trying to go to Namesti Republiky. I hopped on the tram and then realized that it was no longer going where I wanted it to go. There were signs telling what the change was but they were in Czech so I didn't understand them. Now I know better and can decipher when there is a route change. Anyway, the new mall opened last Friday and the #8 tram is up and running back to Namesti Republiky. Jason and I checked out the new mall on Saturday. It is a huge mall with 5 floors of shops. It is a nice looking mall but it is a bit overwhelming with all the people there at the moment. One of the exciting things about the mall is that there is a Body Shop store. While I never thought I would be excited by that I am since that is the only place I know of to get Sofia a detangler spray for her hair. I'm almost out of the detangler spray that I bought at the Body Shop in Munich so the arrival of The Body Shop in Prague is perfect (although I did just order some detangler to be shipped from the US).

Movies

Jason and I have gone to the movies on our last two babysitter nights. I don't know why we haven't done this before since it is fun. We have both been to the movies here in Prague but just not with each other but for some reason it just didn't compute to go to the movies on our babysitter nights. Anyway, we went and saw 1408 (or "Pokoj 1408" as it is called here. Which is just "Room 1408". I thought it was interesting that they had to change the title to say that while in English is is understood) and Stardust. Both films were in English with Czech subtitles. It is fun to read the subtitles at times in the movie to see how much I know and how many new words I can pick up. The theaters here are nice and are all stadium seating. The difference between going to the movies here and going to the movies in the U.S. is that here when you buy your tickets you actually buy particular seats. It is nice to know that when you buy a ticket you don't have to worry about weather the only two seats left are at opposite ends of the front row. We have actually gone online and reserved our seats before we go to the movie. I know it seems odd that we can actually do something online in Prague but this really does work. The website shows the lay out of the theater and you pick the seats you want and then just pick up and pay for them 30 minutes before the movie. You can pay for them in advance and then just show up at anytime before the movie but I don't trust the online capability so much that I give them my money!

More 1st....

Who knew Ali would have another "first" to post about so quickly. Last week Ali walked into our room at about 1am and stood in our doorway. This isn't that unusual and we are working on sleep training with her. What was unusual and was a first for Ali was when she started throwing up! I jumped out of bed and went over to her. She seemed remarkably composed for someone who had no idea what was happening to her. After a couple more throw ups and a couple pajama changes she finally went to sleep and seemed better the next day except that she wasn't eating much. Unfortunately the bug that got Ali went to Jason and then me. It was not a fun time in this house for the last week! Sofia hasn't gotten it yet and I hope she doesn't and that we are in the all clear.

1st haircut

I took the girls in to get their haircut last week. Sofia needed to have her hair cut since she was getting a lot of split ends which make her hair really snarly. Since I was bringing her to get her haircut I figured it was time to give Ali her first haircut just to make her hair a little neater. I wasn't sure how Ali would do so I had Sofia get her hair cut first. Once Sofia was done I put Ali up in the seat and she was ok but very serious. I hoped she would decide it was fine and not go from serious to upset. She eventually cracked a smile and I knew she was going to be fine. Here is a picture of Sofia showing off her haircut and a picture of Ali happy with her haircut.

Back to school

Sofia returned to school after two weeks away and she was happy to be back. She was happy to see all of her friends. Jason drops Sofia off at school and he said that Sofia greeted all of her friends with big hugs and told them that she had been in France and Italy. She had no problem getting right back into the schedule of school.

On Tuesday Sofia had a school trip to a pumpkin patch. Ali and I joined Sofia for the class trip. The pumpkin patch was about a 45 minute drive from Sofia's school. We all got on the bus that the school rented and headed off to the pumpkin patch. It is not what I think of when I hear pumpkin patch. When I hear pumpkin patch I think a big field with pumpkins. Well, this place was just called pumpkin patch. It is basically someone's house. You enter through the gate to their back yard where there are rabbits in cages and chickens in their fenced area, grass and some picnic benches. There was also a big pile of different size, shape, and color pumpkins. The kids had a blast looking at, feeding, and petting the rabbits and running around the yard as well as playing with the pumpkins. It was nice to see Sofia with her teacher and classmates. Sofia really loves her teacher and she spent a lot of time playing with her teacher and the the pumpkins. They served home made pumpkin soup which was very good. Sofia really enjoyed the pumpkin soup but Ali wasn't all that interested. The only thing that mattered to Ali were the rabbits. She loved them so much that she opened up the rabbit pen and crawled in with them!! I was excited when I saw the butternut squash. I think I would have crawled in with them if they had been in a cage!! You just can't get squash here in Prague so when I saw it I was overjoyed. I bought 3 acorn squashes, 1 butternut squash, and 2 of ambercup squashes. Luckily the guy had a bag that I could carry them in otherwise I'm not sure what I would have done to get them home because I wasn't leaving without them!!

Wednesday was parent teacher conferences. This is our first time being the parent rather than the child and it was nice. As a child I was always nervous about parent/teacher conferences even though I was a good student. Now being a parent I can see the other side of it. It isn't about just getting kids in trouble but about giving the parents an opportunity to really know how their child is doing in school. Anyway, since one of us had to be home with the kids Jason went to meet with Sofia's teacher. We were happy to hear that Sofia is doing great. She is ahead on numbers and letters so they are doing some extra work with her so she will be challenged. She transitions from one activity to another without a problem and plays with everybody in the class. Her teacher also said that Sofia was missed while on vacation. It is nice to know that Sofia is well liked.

Thursday was Science day. The older kids had science projects to do and present but the early years just had a dress up day. They had to dress up as something scientific. Sofia went as the ocean. It was a basic costume but she was happy with it. We had her wear one of her mermaid shirts and blue pants and then we pinned fish, crabs, whales etc. to her shirt. We put green ribbon in her hair as seaweed. She had fun and kept the seaweed in even after she got home from school.

Home again

Today we left the apartment after a semi-leisurely morning. Since we had most things packed the night before it was easier in the morning. The kids played and we had breakfast and packed the car. We had talked about going to another small town this morning so we headed off to the town. It was another small town that had been recommended so we weren't sure what to expect. We arrived at the town but we stopped just outside the walls since Ali was asleep. Since she was really tired and we had a flight ahead of us we decided to skip the town and drive straight to the airport. It was a good thing we skipped the town b/c as we were driving away we realized that we had miscalculated our time and we wouldn't have had time to see the town anyway. It was a good thing Ali was sleeping otherwise we would have been rushing to make our flight. We had an easy drive to the airport and found the car rental return with out any trouble. We made it to our gate and I went and waited in line for food. As I was waiting in line my eyes were scanning the bottled drink section. I always scan the bottled drinks area in hopes of seeing a diet sprite but until that moment I had never seen any. I was elated when my eyes landed on the diet sprite! I asked the guy behind me to save my spot and I ran over and grabbed three bottles of diet sprite. I know it doesn't sound that special but when you can't have something it just makes it taste even better. It was a great way to end our time on vacation.

Our flight was uneventful and we landed n Prague. We went to get our luggage which also arrived without a problem and we saw a couple of nuns. Ali was fascinated! At first she was saying, "married!". I had to explain that they weren't married and that it was just the kind of clothes they wear. She didn't seem to get that so I said it is like when Sofia goes to school she wears her uniform. She understood that but she still loved them. At one point Ali didn't want to leave and I said, "do you want to go home with the nuns?". She said, "Yes." and started to walk over to them!! I quickly grabbed her and picked her up. She then kept asking about the "muns". It was hard to keep a straight face when she kept saying, "where are the muns?"

We arrived back at our apartment and it was freezing! Apparently it had been really cold in Prague while we were enjoying glorious fall weather in Italy. We called Petra, our dog sitter, and she brought Watson home to us. Watson clearly had a great time. We are his parents and Petra is his best friend. It was nice to be home again.

Monte San Savino and Lucignano

We had one full day left in Italy and we weren't sure what we would do. We wanted to keep it pretty low key but also wanted to make sure we saw everything that we wanted to see. Jason's parents left in the morning so we hung out with them for a little bit before they left. We decided to would check out two different towns since they were so close to each other. We went to Monte San Savino first and explored the town on our
own at first until we came across the tourist office. I'm glad we went in to the tourist office since there was a peaceful garden we never would have seen had we not stopped. The garden was though a building which looked like the current administrative building for the town. We were the only people in the garden. The garden had a couple of levels and in the lower level was an old stage area where I assume they put on plays. We did some pretend performances just for fun. This picture is of Jason and Ali watching a "performance". The town was pretty small so it didn't take long to walk from one end to the other. After walking through the town gate we found a lovely park with a playground. It actually had three separate play areas around the park. The girls tried out each play area before we headed back to the car.

We headed off to Lucignano following the TOMTOM directions. Following the TOMTOM can often be amusing. We ended up driving down a dirt road that went between fields. We laughed thinking that the farmer must wonder why people have started driving through his field over the last few years since if we only had a map we probably wouldn't have followed that "road". Sure enough though the TOMTOM did not lead us astray and we arrive in Lucignano. We were hungry so we got lunch and then explored the town. Since it was the early afternoon the town was quiet. We strolled around and then sat in a square while the girls ran around and explored the square. While we were resting we got to see a cat toy with a small lizard which the kids thought was interesting. There are a lot of cats in Italy which the kids loved. It is rare to see a cat in Prague so it was fun for them to see cats. We headed back to our apartment and started packing and cleaning for our departure the next morning.

A day without kids

Jason's parents gave us a day off. They offered to watch the kids for the entire day so that Jason and I could explore the Tuscan countryside. We left a bunch of the little towns for this day since it would be easier to make multiple stops without the kids. We headed off to Pienza. It was a very small town and it was relatively flat which was a big change since most places are hilly. There were a lot of cheese shops in Pienza. It seemed to be the majority of shops in town were devoted to Pecorino cheese which was good for us since we love cheese. After wondering through the town and seeing the fantastic views we stopped in one of the cheese shops. While we were waiting in line for cheese I heard a language I didn't expect to hear...Czech! I had to turn to them and ask them if they spoke English. I asked it in Czech which, of course, quickly left me at a loss so they changed to English. It was fun to see someone from "home" while in Italy. After speaking with them for a couple minutes in line we bought some cheese and headed out to find a town called Montisi. I knew nothing about it but someone had mentioned it so I figured we would check it out. There was nothing in Montisi. It was a tiny village that we were through before we even saw any parking. It wasn't ugly or anything. It was just too small to even stop. We decided to continue on to Asciano. The drive to Asciano was beautiful. This area is so completely different to other areas of Tuscany. The landscape is so barren looking at this time of year. The turned over fields look like they could be the moon. (This pic on the right is a close up of the dirt. It was so hard I could walk on it without crushing it!) It is oddly beautiful. We drove by a farmer tilling his fields although I'm not sure what he was tilling as the soil already looked like it had been turned over.

After driving through the beautiful country side we came to Asciano. I can say that is the least pretty town we have been to in Italy. It just seemed like an old poor working town. After walking through the main street we headed back to our car and off to San Quirico d' Orcia.
San Quirico D' ORcia is beautiful. I knew we would like the town when I saw the entrance to the town. (pictured on the left) As I already mentioned I just love walking through the old wall gates. It is like being transported back in time. We walked though the gates and the world is left behind and we are graced with a quiet little town. We walked along for a little bit looking for a restaurant since it was lunch time and we were hungry. The town was so quiet it was hard to believe that anyone was even there but we came upon Trattoria al Vecchio Forno. They were serving lunch in the garden so we headed in. We enjoyed a leisurely lunch. I decided to try the house wine which was fantastic. I love that wine is so cheap in Italy that I don't mind giving any kind a try. I am fairly picky when it comes to wine so I don't want to spend a lot of money on a glass of wine since I might not like it but since most house wine is cheap in Italy I gave it a shot. The wine we had was very good so after lunch we went in search of the wine but of course the only place that had it was the restaurant! Why is it that whenever I find a wine I like it is no longer available?? (I know, everyone else liked it too) We ended up going back to the restaurant to see of they would just sell us a bottle and they did so I at least got to enjoy it again while in Italy. We explored the town and came upon some wine making. It was interesting to see the left over part of the grapes sitting in a barrel as well as on the floor. We tasted some of the wine that they were selling of previous years. Jason liked one of them but they had already sold out of that year so I'm not sure why they were even letting people taste it. Oh well. We continued to walk around the town since it was so peaceful. I love seeing different doors in Italy. They are often very pretty with flowers all around. This door is just an example of the many beautiful doorways we saw while in Italy. We decided to head back to Montepulciano after leaving San Quirico. I had to shoo a cat out of the road before we could go since he was laying in the middle and didn't seem to care that cars kept having to drive around him. I just didn't want him to meet his end when a car didn't see him. After shooing him I had to pet him since I didn't want him to think I was being mean. He was a friendly cat and liked being pet. Maybe that is his ploy...sit in the road until some sucker pets him! Anyway, we made the drive back to Montepulciano enjoying the scenery. The kids had fun with Grammie and Grandpa. They got to spend a lot of time at the playground in Montepulciano. It was a fun day had by all!

Cortona

After settling into Montepulciano we headed off to Cortona. Since it is a hilltop town we could see it for quite a while before we arrived. It was about a 45 minute drive from Montepulciano through gorgeous farm country. The kids would say what was out their window... "Grapes on my side." "Olives on my side!" "Grapes on both sides!" It was fun to hear them say what they were seeing. We came across a beautiful road of cypress trees on our drive as well. I had to stop and take a quick picture. We continued on to Cortona and started to wind our way uphill. We didn't know how far up we could drive and find parking so we went as far as we thought we could and parked the car. We started our walk up hill and came to some stairs fairly quickly that we thought would bring us close to the main road. We were right and there was an added bonus. We got to walk through a nice park and I noted the playground that was there so that we could stop there after walking through town. We spent quite a while in Cortona. The streets are of course narrow and windy but they seemed steeper than the streets in Montepulciano. We ended up getting some bakery pizza and eating on the steps in the main piazza. It was a nice break since it ended up being pretty warm and the Sofia wanted to sit in the shade. After filling up on lunch we decided to head further up the hill to check out a church and a monastery. You couldn't go into the monastery so we couldn't see much but I'm glad we made the walk up because we ended up just winding our way back down through the town on streets where we didn't see anybody else. I love the peace and quiet that can be found in these small towns. After exploring the town we headed back to the park we started at and I showed the kids the playground. They were excited to play on a new playground. It is also a nice way to give them there second wind. There is nothing like a playground to get them excited and since they do such a good job walking around and seeing churches, old building etc. we like to give them there time to play as well. Once I get the pictures on smugmug you will be able to see all the different playgrounds the girls have played on during our vacation.

Montepulciano

We started off our time in Montepulciano. It is such a beautiful town. I just love the narrow windy roads (as seen in pic on left). We definitely got our exercise here. Our rental was below the town square but above the main street with shops so we were up and down the hill a lot. There was one playground at the top of the hill and one playground at the bottom of the hill as well so we went up and down to these playgrounds as well. The girls did a great job walking although I did have to carry Ali quite a bit since it was a lot of work for her little legs. We spent the first full day in Italy exploring Montepulciano. Over the week we spent a lot of time in town. Since we had to be back everyday for Ali's nap we would just spend the afternoon in town every day. It was nice to have the yard at our rental as well since often in the afternoons the girls would run around the grass barefoot and Jason and I would join them sometimes as well. There is nothing like the feel of cool grass on bare feet.

We decided to eat lunch out with the family and we went to a restaurant that was recommended by the owners of our rental. As we walked in to the restaurant the rental owners were there and introduced us to the owner and gave us recommendations for lunch. It really made us feel like part of the community. We all (Me, Jason, Sofia, Ali, Diane and Dan) sat down for lunch. We had a bottle of the house wine and ordered our meals. The food was fantastic. Jason and I both got pici alle briciole which is a pasta with fried bead crumbs. I know, it sounds odd but it was recommended to us by our apartment owners so we decided to try it. It was excellent. Pici is a homemade pasta that is kind of like a gnocci but longer. The pasta was coated in the breadcrumb mixture and olive oil. Diane got the pici with truffles and Dan got the pici with ragu. We gave the kids some of our food. We realized at this point that Sofia has expensive tastes. She loved the pici with truffles! We didn't think she would like that since truffles have a very strong flavor but she loved it. Luckily for us, truffles aren't expensive while in Italy. We ate two lunches at this same restaurant since the food was so good.

Jason's parents were very nice and watched the kids for us on two nights so that we could go out to dinner. The first restaurant we went to was ok. It wasn't bad but it wasn't outstanding either. It was a very quiet restaurant which is so different than any other restaurants we have been in while in Italy. The one thing about the restaurant that was very cool was the wine cellar. I tried to take a picture but I couldn't capture it. The wine cellar was basically a cave. You could see into the cave since they had one light down towards the bottom and the ground was sand since it wasn't anything that was finished. It was really a cave. It was pretty cool to look at since we could see it from our table. The other night that we went out to dinner was fantastic. It was a boisterous restaurant with good food. The table next to us had a guy celebrating his birthday. He and his wife and daughter are from Rome but have a place near Montepulciano so they were up for the weekend to celebrate his birthday. He was very funny and shared his champagne with us. One of the things he new about Maine was Jessica Fletcher (Murder She Wrote) so we got some laughs about that. He took a picture with Jason so that he would have a memory of Jessica Fletcher. This is the picture he took an e-mailed to us. As you can tell we were having a great time.

We ended up spending a second day in town towards the end of the week as well. We had planned on having lunch at a small town near by one day but that planned was changed when Sofia fell out of bed and smacked her head on the terracotta floor. She is fine but it was a little nerve racking since she vomited three times after hitting her head. We decided to just stay in town that day and take it easy. After sleeping on my chest for 45 minutes she was fine and ready to go. It was a big relief for me when she woke from her nap feeling better. We spent the rest of the day in town walking around and having lunch.

What to do in Italy...

There is so much beauty in Italy. Jason and I both prefer Italy to France. We both find the countryside of Italy to be breathtakingly beautiful. We tried to figure out what it was about the countryside that we loved. I think that it is not just that it is agricultural but that it isn't defined in clean cut squares. The area is filled with hills which gives you something to see other than just flat farm land but beyond that the farmland on the hills are not squares. The farm land has irregular lines between fields which seems to be defined by the land. It makes every field different. We also both loved the narrow, windy, hilly streets of the hill top walled towns. There is so much history in the walls. Not necessarily book history (although there is plenty of that) but just the history of the people who have lived here. Families who have lived in a town for hundreds of years are still living in the same apartment that has been passed down through the family. Because so much has stayed the same you can imagine what life was like a long time ago. We enjoy the evening stroll where locals and visitors alike come out and stroll the main road at dusk to chat with friends. So, with all of that in mind, what did we do in Italy? We drove around the countryside and visited small towns. We visited Cortona, Pienza, Asciano, San Quirico D' Orcia, Orvieto, Monte San Savino, and Lucignano as well as spending a lot of time in Montepulciano.

Our Italy rental

We arrived at our rental in Montepulciano without any problem. We followed our TOMTOM until we arrived at Montepulciano and then we followed the directions that we had received from the rental. We didn't want the TOMTOM to make us go through the middle of town since it can be difficult to navigate the small, hilly, windy streets. My favorite part of the directions that we received from the owners was, "turn left ignoring the sign that forbids it". I was excited to be staying in Montepulciano. There is something magical to me about driving through the old city wall gate. Everytime we wanted to explore the countryside we had to go in/out of the gate. This is the gate we drove through. As you can see there is no longer an actual gate but it is cool to drive through the wall. No big cars here that is for sure! We followed the directions and came to our rental. I rang the buzzer and the owners opened the gates and came out to greet us. The owners were very friendly and greeted us warmly. I had a high opinion of them before we met b/c Jason and I had booked with them for our planned trip in 2005. As many of you know hat trip was canceled because I became pregnant with Ali. When I called to cancel our reservation the owners were incredibly nice. They didn't charge me anything for canceling and wish me well on our increasing family. When I emailed them to book this trip they immediately responded that they were happy to hear from me again and looked forward to meeting all of us including the new baby! Who would have thought they would remember after 2 years! I know they probably had it in a computer but it was still a really nice personal touch. Anyway, after saying hi we started to get the kids and bags out of the car. Georgio reached for Sofia to help her out of the car. Jason and /i saw him reaching for her and we held our breath. Sofia can be shy with new people but particularly with men so we were afraid she would flip out. We don't know what it is about certain men but some of them she just loves and you would never know that she could be shy. Georgio was one of those men. She loved him! She went right to him and started chatting away with him. She was just as welcoming with Margherita. It was a nice way to start our week in Montepulciano. We walked through the yard to the apartment. It was nice to be able to walk through a yard since we don't have one in Prague. The yard was on three levels. The flat area you see, above that low wall is another long flat expanse of grass and then on the left is their garden and beyond that the yard slopes done again to another flat expanse of grass. The shrubs on top of that low wall is rosemary. It was wonderful to smell.

The apartment was beautiful. The floors were all terracotta. The apartment was decorated as though it was someone's home which was nice. The kids were excited to check out the apartment. Sofia and Ali had separate bedrooms and Ali had a small baby cot to sleep in. It was nice for her to have that b/c it was small enough that she could easily climb out but had sides so she would fall out of bed. The apartment had three bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, a living room and kitchen. The kitchen was downstairs and everything else was upstairs. I'm not sure what floors these would be called since the kitchen walked out to the backyard and the main living space was above the door on the front of the house. We also had access to a washer and a dryer! It was excited to be able to dry my clothes in a dryer. I love clothes that are fresh out of the dryer. Here are some pics of the the inside.

Moving on to Italy

We packed our bags and cleaned up the house rental so we were ready to get up and hit the road by 4:30am. We had a three hour 15 min drive to get to the airport. We had gone over the maps and printed out direction for Dan and Diane (Jason's parents) so that they would be able to get to the airport without any problems. We hoped it would be easier for them going back to the airport than it was when they arrived. The road signs in France are difficult to follow if you aren't familiar with them so we wanted to make it as easy as possible. We had our trusty TOMTOM to guide us but Dan and Diane had to rely on good old fashion maps and directions. This can be difficult when you are driving in the dark. Anyway, we had separate cars and went our own routes to get to the airport. We arrived at the airport and Dan and Diane weren't there yet. We started to worry as it was getting closer and closer to boarding time but alas, they made it just in time!

We flew Ryan Air to Rome. It was our first flight on Ryan Air and it went fine. We ended up with seats mostly together. They do not do seat assignments so it is first come first serve. The plane was configured with 3 and 3 seats so Ali, Diane and I sat together and Sofia, Jason and Dan sat together. We were separated by two rows so not too bad. Ali ended up falling asleep on me and I dozed off for a little bit which was nice. It was a quick 2 hour flight and then we were in Rome. We rented our car and hopped on the van to go to the rental car location. We got our car and they installed the car seats. We fixed the installation since they were really lose. Then we had to have them come back over and adjust the straps since they would not loosen. After we got that out of the way and got the kids in their seats we started to head out we noticed the gas tank was almost empty so we had to stop and talk to the Hertz guy again. He marked our rental agreement and we were off to find a gas station. We almost had a heart attack at the gas station. IT was a full service station and we had a diesel car and we looked and we see the guy has a gasoline pump!! I opened the door and started to panic and he told me no problem. Apparently they pump diesel out of the pump that says "gas"! Oh well, at least it wasn't a problem.

Our original plan was to stop in Orvieto along the way to our rental in Montepulciano but we were starving and we wanted to stop at one of the Autogrills along the highway. We had good memories of prosciutto/mozzarella sandwiches from the Autogrill on our last trip to Italy. We missed the exit for the first Autogrill so we stopped at the next available option which was not an Autogrill but it served its purpose and gave us food. After eating lunch we realized we wouldn't have time to see Orvieto on the drive to the apartment so we just skipped it and continued on to Montepulciano.

My birthday dinner

Jason and I decided we were splurge for my birthday dinner. It was the only night that we went out for dinner while we were in France. We went to Le Choiseul for dinner. I had tried to make reservations at a couple other restaurants that had been recommended but they were closed on Wednesday night which is when I wanted since that was my birthday. I had gotten one recommendation for Le Choiseul and had seen a good review online so I decided to give it a try. I had gone for a walk in the afternoon and decided to just stop by to make the reservation. The building and grounds were very nice which is a good sign. I made the reservation without a problem.

Jason and I arrive at 8:15 for our 8:30 reservation and there was only one other couple in the restaurant. We thought, "oh no" but we hoped it was just because we were early. By 9pm the restaurant was full which was nice. With just the one other couple in the room it was painfully quiet so it was nice when the restaurant started to fill up. We did get a laugh though when we were listening to the other couple. It wasn't that we were purposefully listening to them but it was so quiet and they were so loud you couldn't miss it when she said that the cabbage that came with her meal just did not work with the dish.

Anyway, this is the first time that Jason and I had been to a gourmet restaurant. Being our first time we had the challenge of knowing all the etiquette which made us laugh but we also had the challenge of understanding the servers. They did speak English but it was accented and hard to understand and of course we wanted to seem like we knew what we were doing. I think the staff knew we had no clue but didn't care. We ordered our appetizer, meal, and dessert all at the same time. We also ordered a nice bottle of vouvray wine. Here is the meal process...

1. We order drink
2. We order our food and wine
3. They brought the wine, tasted it and then put it in a decanter and put it on ice.
4. They bring our pre-appetizer food. This is not anything we order just something they bring. It was all seafood based although I have no idea what it was. The plate was separated into three sections with something different in each section. Across the top of the plate was a spoon with something on it. The server clearly was telling us when to eat the stuff that was on the spoon but after he walked away Jason and I looked at each other and had no idea what he said. Do we eat it first or last?? I just waited for the server to leave the room and I ate it as quickly as possible! Just something else we laughed about. I tried all three things on my plate. I almost didn't try the middle one since it had fish eggs on it but I thought if I tell Sofia she has to try something before she says she doesn't like it then I have to do the same. I worked up my courage and took a bite. It was fine until the fish egg exploded in my mouth! That was it! I tried it and it was gross!!
5. They poured the wine
6. They brought our appetizer. Jason had gotten duck foie gras. He said it was tasty but I wasn't trying it. One exploding fish egg was enough for me. I had a chanterelle mushroom appetizer that was excellent.
7. They brought our post appetizer/pre meal appetizer. Again, this wasn't anything we ordered. It was some kind of foamy thing with licorice. I gave it a try but the foamy part just tasted like dirt so I left the rest of it there. Jason did well and ate all of his.
8. They brought our meal. I had pike perch and Jason had brook trout. Both are local specialties. They were delicious.
9. They brought our post-meal/ pre-dessert appetizer. This was also not anything we order. It was good though. They brought two small pieces of pie along with a small jar of cookies and marshmallows.
10. They asked us if we would care for coffee and Jason said yes. They then asked if we wanted to sit at the table or sit in the lounge. We decided to go sit in the lounge. So we left the dining room and went to the lounge. Apparently this is where the French go to smoke after they are done with their meal. Oh well, lesson learned. They other thing that was strange about the lounge is that the chairs were really small. You know they have to be small if I thought they were small! Oh well, it was still fun to sit in the lounge.

All in all it was a good meal with great service. It was by far the most expensive meal we have ever had but it was worth it to have the experience of dining in a French gourmet restaurant. Now that we have done it once we probably won't do it again since we prefer a more loud, gregarious restaurant like we find in Italy but it was still fun. We laughed a lot during our meal and have a great memory. The wine was fantastic and we tried to find it so we could bring some home with us but we didn't have any luck. We went direct to the vineyard to see if we could buy it but they had completely sold out. I guess I wasn't the only one that likes the wine.