Finishing up February

WHERE IS SPARKY???

Photo #1 playing in Jacob and Sally's Tunnel- yes he has grown a lot
Photo #2 Sparky seems to have a knack for finding what is on his mind!!!

Last weekend we had Heather (my sister n law) and her 3 daughter done to visit for the day,
and James and Sally took them to Rome for a tour and had a great time. One
of the kids favorite things is their one on one time with their dad. He usually tries
to take one of them on the field trips or whenever he goes somewhere.

This is a great place call Villa d'Este which is a place a cardinal built with
thousands of water fountains that all flow from the natural pressure of water
and no mechanisms. We had a beautiful day and enjoyed all the fountains and the
rest of the field trip with the students from James program.



There are 22 students here and most of them are in both James Baroque and Grand Tour
classes and we are getting to know them which has been fun. James teaches and works
at the office until about 4:00pm and then he runs home and I go up to the school
to take an Italian Class with some of the students. I really enjoy learning Italian and getting
out a little every day. The beauty of it is James is learning how to cook dinner
since he has the kids at home at that time of the day. When I am done they usually
meet me up at the school and we go for a walk and get a treat of some sort, cookies, gellato, chocolate or whatever sounds good that night and then we go home and get the kids to bed and
James works on his Dissertation for a few hours while I pick up and do laundry.

This was a field trip that James took Jacob on in Sienna, which is one of our favorite cities here.
It is about one hour North/East of us and it has a beautiful large center Piazza that
we always enjoy just hanging out in and letting the kids do whatever.
Obviously Jacob is loving the Height in this picture as they are looking down from the clock tower to get an overview of the city.

Weekend in Bologna

Weekend with my
Sister n law and her three daughters in Bologna



WHERE IS SPARKY?

1. Sparky at St. Maggiore Duomo in Bologna
2. Sparky at a museum infront of famous painting?? I will ask James
3.Sparky infront of Neptune fountain In Bologna (He seems alittle excited
about what he is seeing behind him!!!)


POP QUIZ - where is the first place you find in a new city while traveling
abroad with little kids?

DING DING DING - if you guesed McDonalds you are correct
(more for the bathroom than the food especially with a 3 and 5 year old)

FOR PAPA SWENSEN we thought you would appreciate Jacob licking
his ketchup out to the last drop.

SOME MORE PHOTOS FROM OUR TRIP


DONT ASK I DONT KNOW!!!

LETS GO RUNNING!!

Well we have been here another week and our enjoyng our time.
In the center of Orvieto there is a Bell Tower that splits the town into four quarters
and this is the view from the top of the Bell Tower.

I thought I would take you running with me for a day so you can see why I will
probably never run again in the U.S I just dont think I can match
what I get to see here when I go running.

First I exit the main city walls through an old Mid-evil Gate and then continue my way around the mountain that Orvieto is situated on. The Path I run on is about in the middle of the mountain so I get the views of the cliffs above and the hillside below.

Now you might be wondering why I have a picture of an escalator here,
you have three options g to get to the top of Orvieto,

Escalator
Tram
or a long road up hill.

I chose the Escalator this day (it is about 8 escalator segments that cuts throug the middle of the mountain and ends up in the cneter of town) But on a good day I would probably run up one of the paths back to the top.

As I run around the corner from the escalator you begin to get the
view of the Famous Duomo in Orvieto

The home stretch down our road and down the stairs to our balcony!!!
I will take you running on the other side of the mountain next time!!!

Just a few fun photos from our week, Sally in our apartment getting ready to go out. Me and Jacob at the market were we buy most of our food. Jacob waiting for a train in Terni where
we went to church this past Sunday (we left at 9am and got home at 7pm) I dont
think I will ever complain about where my church is again.

QUOTES FROM THE WEEK

Jacob " mom BUGA"
mom " JACOB what does BUGS mean"
Jacob " it must be Italian mom"

NUMBER OF TIMES I AM STOPPED TO BE ASKED IF THEY "ALL OUR MY KIDS"
at least 4-5 times a day
(I ONLY HAVE THREE)

WE WILL CATCH YOU UP ON WHERE IS SPARKY NEXT TIME!!!

WEEK II in Italy

"WHERE IS SPARKY PART II"

Picture 1- Sparky enjoying his view of the DUOMO in ORVETIO
Picture 2-Sparky loving carnival and confetti from his new home -the stroller
Picture 3-Sparky just hanging out on our porch overlooking the hills across from ORVIETTO.


Carnival was this last week and we spent some quality time in the streets throwing confetti with the Italian kids. We aslo went to Florence last Sunday on the train and we walked down to where we went to church last time and it had been moved so we were out of luck but we made the best of a rainy day and spent some time exploring and took the 2 hour train ride back home. James took Jacob with him on their field trip on Wednesday down to TARQUINIA, which is on the coast bellow Rome. With Jacob gone and only 2 kids it enable me to make a trip to the grocery store which entails a 10 min walk to the tram and then a tram ride down the hill and a 10 minute walk down to town to the grocery store which is the biggest one within about 100km radius and is the size of about a McDonalds. Then I pile everything in my stroller and to it all again. I love it though, Sally thinks it is fun because she gets to go on the Tram so it is all worth it.

MOVING TO ORVIETO ITALY

Well after a very busy January we finally made it to Italy where we will be living for the next four months. We are in a small town Orvieto which is a hill top town in Italy, it is the same place we lived in two years ago and are excited to have another adveture.

Traveling with three little kids can be an adventure on its own. When we got to Rome James
put Sally in a back pack on his back I had Andrew in a Bjourn and Jacob walked. We then
had 7 large bags and 3 car seats and a double stroller to get through customs up a elevator and accross 4 moving walk ways until we got to the car rental center. We had rented a wagon
and soon realized there was no way that we were going to fit everything so we got 5 bags in and then opened the rest of them and dumped them in every crack we could find and put the last one in the front seat next to James. Needless to say we couldnt see a thing but it fit!
I would love to show you a picture of us struggling through the airport or the car but as you
can imagine a camera and picture was the last thing on our minds.
After a good night sleep (we would like to believe that) we took advantage of having a rental car and went down to Florence to hit the IKEA a large grocery store. We then made it into Florence for a evening stroll and our first Gelato. As you can see Sparky loves Italy.

The next day was our last with a car so we went to quickly go and visit our favorite city Chivita. This is a little town they call the dying city because over 75% of it has literally just fallen away down the hillside and this is all that is left. It is only accessible by the little path that winds up infront for walking only.

As part of our travel journal James wants to play where is SPARKY, stay tuned!!!!

Now that we are settled in Orvietto it is back to our simple live of walks, parks, exploring, pasta, and gelato. It is so fun to strip away all the distractions and focus on just your family and enjoying the simple things.