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.

Chateau visits

There are so many Chateau to see in the Loire that we had to make a list of our top choices. We narrowed it down to Amboise, Blois, Chambord, Chenonceau and Villandry. They were all beautiful and all had something that set them apart from each other. We had left Friday open so we didn't have anything on the schedule and decided to see Chateau du Clos Luce as well.

Amboise was easy to see since it was about a 5 minute walk from our house rental. The view of the chateau from the river is very impressive. I wondered about it though since it only seemed to have this one side. How could it be considered this great Chateau if it only had the one side? It almost seemed like it was fake. Don't get me wrong, the Chateau is still bigger than anything I
would ever live in. When we walked up to the
chateau (and I do mean up! As you can see from the picture the chateau is far above the houses below it.) and paid our entrance and then got our visitors guide I realized that there was a lot more to the Chateau than what we were currently seeing. Apparently a majority of the Chateau had been destroyed. They have made the grounds beautiful and it is very peaceful walking around the Chateau.







Blois seemed a little blah to me. I'm not sure what it was about the building but it just didn't amaze me. It was pretty but the multiple sides were built at different times and didn't really match each other. It was also raining when we were there which may have added to the drabness for me. It did have really cool drain spouts (pic) though. The interior rooms where pretty and it is amazing how big the fireplaces where in these "houses". Sofia had fun standing in all the fireplaces to see how big there were. The size of the fireplace became something we checked out in every chateau.




Chambord Chateau was amazingly large. I wanted a picture of the whole building and I had to walk quite a way back before I could capture it all in my camera. The grounds were extensive although we only viewed then from the roof of the chateau since the kids were tired. The central part of the chateau was not really decorated so it wasn't beautiful (although still interesting) but in the center there is a really cool staircase. It is a double-spiral open staircase. I will try my best to describe it...there are two staircases that sprial up around each other for three floors but they never meet. There are openings in the inner wall of the staircase so you can see a person on the opposite staircase but you can't actually reach them. It was fun for us and the kids. Jason took Sofia and I took Ali and we went on the opposite stairs and stopped at every window to see each other and wave.

In one wing of the chateau was the Royal apartments. These were decorated and were quite pretty. The girls kept asking about the King and Queen's bed. They enjoyed seeing the massive beds. I had to explain that back when the King and Queen were living here they slept in separate beds. After they got their heads around that they wanted to know if a bed was the King or Queen's. It was very cute.




Chenonceau is another beautiful Chateau. When we first arrived, I thought, "that's it?" It didn't seem nearly as impressive as the pictures in the books and after seeing Chambord it seemed tiny. We went into the Chateau and it was beautifully decorated. I was beginning to get more impressed. We went down to the kitchens which were also beautiful but it made you think about what life was like for the servants. It must have been dark before they had electricity. At least the walls were a light stone so that lightened it up some. The bedrooms in the Chateau were beautiful and there were so many that were decorated. The girls loved seeing all the "king and Queen's" beds. I started to explain that all the beds weren't for Kings and Queens but it didn't matter. In the girls' minds the beds were either a bed for a King or a Queen. Once we had seen the inside we headed out to see the gardens. This is were the wonder of Chenonceau is seen. All pictures in books are shot from the side view. The side view is where you see that the chateau is built out over the river Cher. I knew the chateau did this and saw it from inside as well since we walked in the gallery which is the part of the chateau that extends across the river but it is one thing to know something and another to see it up close.
We finished up our time at Chenonceau with a walk through the gardens and then finally a trip into the maze. The girls really enjoyed doing the maze and finding our way to the gazebo in the center and then back out again.


Villandry had the BEST gardens I have ever seen. The gardens just went on and on. The pictures just don't do it justice. The gardens are so large that you can't capture all of it in one picture. The pic on the left and below are of the kitchen/vegetable gardens. These are the first gardens you see upon entering the chateau grounds. It is a bit overwhelming to see it. I wasn't sure which path to take since it was all beautiful. We pretty much followed where the kids went. There were fountains throughout the gardens and that is what they liked so they ran from fountain to fountain. We will get more pictures up on smugmug so you can see the herb garden, the maze, the garden of love and the water garden. The girls had a blast running through the shrub maze. We took different paths (the girls with at least one adult) and tried to race each other out of the maze. The girls loved it and it was fun for us too!

Chateau Du Clos Luce was interesting to see. It is the house where Leonardo Da Vinci lived in Amboise. I have to admit that I really had no interest in visiting this Chateau but Jason wanted to go. I'm happy that we went. I had no idea that Leonardo Da Vinci had invented so many things! The house itself was nothing special and in the world of McMansions it wasn't that huge but it was interesting to see all his inventions that were displayed in the house as well as outside on the grounds. After walking through the house we headed outside to walk around the grounds. It was fun for all of us to play with some of Leonardo Da Vinci's inventions. This picture is of Jason and the girls playing in Leonardo's tank. We climbed over some of the bridges he invented as well as played with his invention of a pump. It was a beautiful day when we visited this Chateau so it was nice to walk around the grounds.

What to do in France...

We went to the Loire Valley mainly to see the Chateau scattered around the area but we also wanted to enjoy French culture and French food. When we arrived on Saturday we just hung out and walked into town to check things out. After getting up early we were all pretty tired so we just wanted to take it easy. On Sunday in Amboise is the open air market. This was a site to see. The market was huge and just seemed to keep going. There were vendors selling flowers, straw bags, seafood, salami/sausage, cheese, fruit/vegetables, clothings, cookware, meat/chicken, bread, desserts, wine, ready made food like rotisserie chicken and paella. We spent the entire morning walking through the market. We bought so much stuff that we ended up walking back to the guy selling the straw bags and bought one so we would have something to carry all our goodies. It was hard to not buy everything. I had to keep reminded myself that I didn't have to buy 3 loaves of bread at once b/c I could just go out in the morning and get a nice fresh loaf.

We went back to our house for lunch and Ali's nap. That was pretty much our schedule every day...out in the morning and then back for Ali's nap and lunch. Lunch consisted mainly of bread, salami/sausage and goat cheese every day. It was so good and we just can't get those items in Prague so we ate a years worth in one vacation.

The trip beginnings...

The week before our vacation Jason had to fly to the US at the last minute. This definitely added another complexity to the trip preparation. Jason arrived back in Prague on Friday afternoon and we left for France on Saturday morning. We had decided to pack light for this trip mainly because we were tired of trucking a ton of stuff with us but also because we wanted to have as much as we could in carry-on in case our luggage was lost again. We also had a leg of our trip on Ryan Air which has a lower weight limit so having two large bags wouldn't work. So, before our trip I went out and bought two rolly carry on bags. We packed everything (or what we thought was everything) that we needed and went to bed early on Friday night because we were both tired from our hectic week and we had to leave for the airport at 4:30am.

We woke up early and got the kids up and dressed, walked Watson and then headed downstairs to catch our cab to the airport. We got the airport and checked in without any problems. We boarded our flight and the girls were excited. They really enjoy take off and landing in airplanes. Our flight was uneventful and we landed in France and went to retrieve our rental car. This took a little longer than ideal since we had to figure out how to install the car seats that we were renting. I had thought that the rental company would help or have some knowledge of the seats they were renting but I was wrong so we had to figure it our on our own. We finally figured it out and headed to Amboise.

As we drove to Amboise we were happy to have the TOM TOM to guide our path. It is so much easier to follow the GPS rather than looking at maps (although I did have printed directions as well just in case something happened to the TOM TOM). After a couple trips around the block in Amboise we found our rental. We were sure what to expect upon arrival b/c we booked the rental through a french company and therefore most correspondence was in French. The last document I received was nice because it was written in English until the end. It said, "Further information to collect the keys: Au meuble". So I looked up "au meuble" and came up with furniture or furnished. So we figured ok, the keys must be at the house. As we were driving through the town on the way to the house we saw a sign that said "Meuble" which made us laugh since it was clearly not a place that we would be picking up keys. The house was on a pretty busy road so Jason stopped and I hopped out to look around to see if there was a way to enter. There was not. There was a phone number though so when Jason came back around the block I had him pull in the driveway of the hotel near our rental and I called the number. Luckily the woman spoke a little English and could make sense of my horrible garbled French as I said the street name. She told me 5 minutes, or at least that is all I understood, I said thanks and waited. Sure enough, she showed up within 5 minutes and let me in the house and showed me where everything was. She left and I went to the parking lot and got Jason and the girls. We had rented a mid size car for this trip and that was a downer at this point. It took multi-point turns and mirrors in to get the car into the driveway of the house. After a couple days we got more use to this and it got easier but a smaller car would have been nice.

The house we rented was cute. I don't think there was a straight wall in the entire house. It was clearly an old house. I think probably the funniest thing was the bathroom that was half way up the stairs. I had never seen a bathroom that is essentially between two floors. It did have a nice shower though. The house had three bedrooms, a living room, dining room and kitchen. It was small but after living in an apartment it was fine for us.

We're back from vacation

We got back from our vacation last night so you can look forward to hearing about all we did in France and Italy. After being away for two weeks we need time to settle back in at home. We came home to a very cold apartment since it has been cold in Prague and we didn't have the heat on so it took all night for the apartment to heat up to a comfortable temperature. Today we need to unpack and go to the grocery store. The kids ended up eating rice cakes for dinner last night since that is all we had in the cupboards! We have nothing for breakfast so the kids need to wait until the shops open this morning so that I can go out and buy food. I was so good about using everything we had before vacation but I hadn't really considered what we would eat when we got home. I will have to remember that for our next vacation and make sure I leave enough food in the house for two meals. Oh well, the kids don't seem to mind. They are happy to be home and run around the apartment. I think Sofia played with every toy that she had last night. We had a great vacation but it is always nice to come home. I will try to start posting about our vacation tonight.