Roma

We spent this past holiday weekend in Rome and had a blast with the kids! We took the train there and back (about a 90 minute ride) since we wouldn't need the car and didn't want to worry about parking and tolls. We rented an apartment and it worked out really well. It was in a great location and we were able to walk to almost all the major sights. We saw a ton, but there is still so much to see in this great city! Fortunately we are so close that we will be back many times over the next 2 years. Here is a link to our photos- we have too many to post here!

click here: Rome photos

Napoli

Dan and I spent 3 days last week in a class to help familiarize us with the Italian culture and the local area. It was very interesting! Did you know that the number 17 and women with a humpback are considered very unlucky in Italy (while a man with a hump is very lucky!)? We also learned a bunch of other things, such as etiquette, shopping, hand gestures, and holidays and festivals. On the last day we went into downtown Naples to begin to get acquainted with the public transportation system in the region and see some of the sights in the city. It was a nice introduction to the local area!

typical pedestrian street

Margellina, one of the port areas where you can take a hydrofoil (fast ferry) to Capri, Ischia, or Procida.

Galleria Umberto, one of Italy's oldest shopping "malls"

Castel Nuovo

Castel Nuovo

an area of ruins that was discovered when they started digging to build a subway station!

A large Piazza

Pozzuoli, ancient port town

Well, we FINALLY have internet access in our apartment and are moved in and getting settled. So we can hopefully keep the blog more updated!
A couple of weeks ago we spent the afternoon in Pozzuoli. It's a coastal town just outside of Napoli proper, and has some really neat ruins right near the ocean. We had a nice afternoon there with the kids and as always, had some yummy gelato to keep cool!

Our massive American minivan, compared with typical European subcompacts

view from Pozzuoli, I think those are the islands of Ischia and Procida.

"Temple of Serapis" in Pozzuoli. An ancient marketplace.

Coast view of the city

A and E playing in the piazza that is at the marina

latest news and the princess' castle....

Yahoo! We finally got offered one of the newer places on base and we will be moving in this week! We can't wait to get all of our stuff (mainly toys!) back with us, and be back in our own beds after over 2 months since the movers came. We will post pics when we get settled in! We are so ready to be out of this tiny hotel room with the kids- to say it has been a bit stressful is an understatement!
Today we went to a local medieval town called Casertavecchia. It was very picturesque and looked a lot like an old castle. Allison, who is currently obsessed with the Disney princesses, thought it was Snow White's castle and was looking for her all over the town as we walked around. She wasn't too happy when we couldn't find Snow White and threw a fit! We tried to tell her Snow White was alseep, or on vacation, but she wouldn't back down. Fortunately, a cup of raspberry-chocolate gelato is all it took to bring her down from the ledge. The town is on top of a mountain and is very scenic.

View of Casertavecchia as we drove up the mountain

Our first week in Italy...

We're getting settled in and have gotten out a bit to explore now that we have our car. It's very hot here so we are holding off until it cools down a bit to do a lot of the local sights with the kids. We are already enjoying the famous Neopolitan pizza that is available everywhere! And of course the gelato!

Ethan is upset about something...

Ethan and Allison playing in the courtyard outside the Navy Lodge.

Courtyard in back of the Navy Lodge

train ride at a local mall

Dan in front of the walkway behind our temporary housing

Ethan loves gelato too!

Dan and the kids in Carney Park, a huge recreational area inside a volcano crater

Driving on the highway in Naples, that's Mt. Vesuvius!

Benvenuti in Italia! Welcome to Italy!

We arrived last night and have been slowly getting acclimated to the time difference and our new temporary housing. So far, so good! The flight over was a fairly hellish experience...... from a midnight flight with a 5am stopover in Lajes, Portugal (we had to get off for 2 hours- all crammed into a tiny terminal that did not have enough seats for all of us), to a 3 year old who decided to sleep about 1 hour total, leaky diapers that necessitated 3 clothing changes in the first 4 hours of travel, to a flight crew who demanded that the airplane interior lights be on full-tilt when they were serving food no matter what time it was. It wasn't fun, but we survived!
Internet is spotty right now but we will try to update as we can with more info! Ciao!

Buon Viaggio!

One last picture from our wonderful summer in south Florida.....

Well, the day is finally upon us- we leave for Italy in less than 24 hours! We are excited, nervous, overwhelmed, anxious...just about every emotion a person can have. We know we are in for a wonderful adventure for the next 2 years. We will miss the comforts of home, for sure, but hopefully it won't be too hard to adjust to life as Neopolitans. I'm not sure when I will get to update this blog next, as we don't know what our internet situation will be there while we wait to get into housing.

Keep checking back for our next update and think of us as we embark on a 24-hour transcontinental plane ride with 2 toddlers!

Happy Birthday America!

This past weekend I got to visit Dan while the kids stayed behind in Florida. We had a great time in Newport and Boston for the 4th of July! Newport was beautiful and the mansions are amazing....and Boston has so much wonderful history. The weather was perfect and it was a wonderful getaway!

The Breakers in Newport

4th of July parade in Bristol, RI (nation's oldest 4th of July parade)

Faneuil Hall In Boston

Dan with the founder's statue at Harvard (in deep thought....)

Fun in the sun!

We've been having so much fun in the sun here in Florida the past few weeks! In the interest of getting this blog up to date, here are some pictures of all the things we've been up to!

relaxing poolside...

Sitting in sissy's booster seat

Visiting with Aunt Shana!

Chuck E. Cheese

Petting zoo at a local farm

Pony Ride!

Hanging out together in the front yard