a little late.....

I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas!

Christmas morning is just such a fun thing. It never gets old. Even as an adult you wonder what is in each box that is wrapped up and you think because it has a bow on it...its the "big" present this year. It's just a fun morning! Santa was good to me this year...as he is every year. He brought practical things that needed replacing and new fun gadgets that will make me a better cook and he brought thoughtful things one of which will allow me to talk with my sister in Chicago even more! Oh that Santa-he's a cute one! Now don't think Santa went home empty handed. He got a GPS which will hopefully direct him to the master bathroom to finish up that darn project! Of course he got new awesome tools to accomplish this minor remodeling task! See I'm thoughtful too...

Merry Christmas!

Third Wheel....

Well the season is here. We should have had our baby by now. Who really wants a December baby anyway? So instead of wallowing in sadness of what "could've/should've been" we played at Disneyland. And that is ALWAYS FUN

Though we didn't go alone. We brought along with us my nieces FLAT ANNALIESE inspired by the great childrens story FLAT STANLEY. She made her flat Annaliese with her Kindergarten class back in cold Chicago. Hopefully her flat went the farthest distance and did the coolest stuff out of all her class.

The three of us were able to see Mickey
Ride fun rides,

and walk down Main Street holding hands in front of the Christmas Tree.


SO, I am pretty sure

this totally makes us the coolest aunt and uncle ever....

Venice...

This my friends is St. Marks Chapel. The gold mosaics are indescribable. Every night here in St. Marks square there are 4 orchestras that all play amazing music. On our last night in Venice we stood in this square taking in one last moment of this trip. As we continued to eat our gelato one of the most beautiful songs ever written started to play by one of the orchestras. It is this song that is now playing on my blog that we heard. As the music started, I reflected on our whole experience in Venice.

I wanted to stay a little longer-

just to experience it all one more time...

... I wanted to walk through this arch way one more time to get to our hotel that was orange with green shutters. I wanted to see just how many shirts could hang dry in one day...

...I wanted to to go back to Murano Island to play for an afternoon. How fun to see blown glass, and window shop for things we couldnt afford...

...I wanted to see the reflections one more time...


...I wanted to wear make up in Venice for goodness sake...



...I wanted the chance to see more bright buildings on the water...



...I wanted to see my honey stand by this canal one more time showing off his new jeans...

...I wanted to see one more gondola parked bobbing in the water...

I needed one more sunset in VENICE!

As the song ended so did my wondering mind. I just wanted one more day. One more day of this amazing place. The novelty of Venice didnt disappoint. We loved our stay here. So many great things to see. Hand in hand we left St. Marks square a little sad that the trip was coming to an end but so happy for the opportunity we had to do it.
So we kissed and thanked each other for such a fun adventure...
and promised for more world travels...
lets just hope it isnt for heart mending...




You know your fairytale vacation has come to an end...
when THIS is your luggage:
One bag of clothes and one bag of Souvenirs.
This is our slap of reality...
welcome home!

Florence....

We should have known better when we saw the bike racks in Florence. I mean every where else had matching bikes in an orderly fashion, but here... not so much!! Every person we talked to RAVED about Florence and to that we say.....blah. blah. blah! Sure it was beautiful and we were in Italy but we didn't love this place. The day started out with some smiles. But behind this smile was an uncomfortable feeling. Paranoid about our luggage that we just left behind for the hotel to babysit while we went site seeing for the day.

We walked down the Renaissance streets of Florence really not into it. We wondered if we made the right choice to visit this place. Yes there is history here and things to see but we weren't diggin it. We did see DAVID (well the fake one) But, this is where he originally stood.

It was about this point of the morning I said to Romney

"can we please go back and get our stuff?"

and my sweet so endearing husband said

"babe it'll be fine"

A few feet further from David was the famous Dumo. Yes it's a lot of green goin on. We stood there took a quick snap shot and moved on. Still not lovin Florence.

I asked again
" can we please go back and get our stuff?"

and my sweet, kind, loving, husband says

"we said a prayer this morning it's going to be fine"

At this point I'm annoyed and nagging "can we please go back and get our stuff"

and my charming sweet heart says

"lets climb the Dumo before the sun goes down and we'll go get our stuff"

I couldn't even enjoy the bridges that Florence has to offer.

Soooo, we climbed the 400 something stairs to the top...

...For the best seats in the house...

This was by far the BEST thing we did that day! It was a hard climb but worth the view.

We loved the view and heard all the different bells ringing from the top of Florence.

very cool.

Once we got to the bottom I said "can we please go back and get our stuff?"

and my sweet husband finally said "YES!!!"

he's a stubborn one that romney.

We walk in the hotel to get our belongings. Right when we walked in my heart fell and there was a pit in my stomach... all we saw was our neck pillow, the big brown tube that held our paintings, and a plastic bag of souvenirs sitting on the couch. Everything else was gone!!! Romney ran out the door to the train station and started searching trash cans for anything that was ours. I sat in the hotel lobby starring at the wall while one little tear fell down my cheek. All of our stuff had been stolen. I felt sick about it! Everything was gone!! ALL NEW Clothes, underwear, socks, makeup, medication, my hair CHI, etc... When Romney returned we tried to work anything out with the hotel people and they were useless. We went to the store that night to buy some toiletries. And for heaven sakes we were in Italy...fashion capitol. Where on earth were we going to get new clothes that we could afford???

H&M was the answer the following morning.

We caught the fastest train out of there.

We left our sadness in Florence telling ourselves "its just stuff"
"all replaceable stuff"

and headed to Venice, excited!

Romney appolgized all night and promised me that I could buy whatever I wanted when we got home....

and I did.

Yes, we had all money, credit cards, passports and camera goods on us.

ROME

How amazing is Rome? Um, pretty amazing. I promise. So many things and so little time. But I think we were able to squeeze in all the FUN!

The Roman Forum was FANTASTIC! Were talkin 2,000 years old here. Original pillars still stand today and we walked on the same stones that Julius Cesar walked on. We stood where he lived and is buried now.

Julius himself would walk from the forum directly across this street to....

The COLOSSEUM.

In which we were amazed. The Colosseum is unbelievable.
We couldn't get enough of this place (hence the pictures), we loved learning the history of it.
I mean, we have stadiums today because of this place!! So cool.

...and we did learned that where you go in the day you MUST go back at night....

...so we did...
and loved it just as much.

There are churches EVERYWHERE in Rome. If we saw a church somewhere we walked in. And were so glad we did because we would of missed out on things like this:

Though this blue ceiling is breath taking, our favorite church was St. Peters Basilica in

Vatican City.
(St. Peters Dome)

After a nice day in Vatican City we ended it at The Pantheon.

As the sun was setting and the Pantheon was closing we walked out the doors and captured what is now our favorite plaza. This plaza is what I think of when I think about "ROME". All you could see was colorful buildings with colorful shutters, and charming cafes filling up for dinner, you could hear the water fountain splashing, and the little Italian band playing fun music. This is where I fell in love with the city.

This is the place that I imagined Rome to be; romantic.

BUT, no matter where we went in Rome I knew I was safe with my Paramedic.

...say goodbye to our clothes because this is the last stop we were able to wear them...
stay tuned...

Off to Florence.

Brussels....

THE UNEXPECTED HIGHLIGHT: BRUSSELS, BELGIUM!!!!

We got in kinda late so we went to a cafe for some dinner....

The following day was my FAVORITE DAY!!!!

We didn't know where we wanted to go or what we wanted to see

so, we walked down this charming street!

and found vendors selling all kinds of stuff

and ate the three things Brussels is famous for:

1.) FRENCH FRIES

2.) WAFFLES

...which are nothing like our waffles...

(you eat them with your hands like pizza, they were AMAZING)

3.) Chocolate

mouth watering I tell ya.

All three things were DELICIOUS!!!!!!!
we seriously grazed through the day on these staples.


With bellies full of all healthy foods we stumbled upon the main plaza that...
surrounded us completely by these Gothic style buildings.

The plaza was busy with music and people

celebrating the annual festival.

We aren't quite sure what the festival was for but it was fun to hear the different music and see the different parades that marched by.


One word to describe our day:
PERFECT

We absolutely LOVED LOVED LOVED our day. We kept expressing our love for Brussels throughout. We would love to go back but how can you beat that experience? It seriously was untoppable. So we will just have to reflect on the memory.
Now were off to ROME!

Paris

Each morning was started off with a pastry from the oldest bakery in Paris.

Then we would walk and walk and stop to admire all the amazing architecture!

Arc de' Triomphe being my favorite...

...and the Louvre being Romneys favorite!

Not only was the architecture amazing but also the simple things- like the street lights.

Small day trips were taken. Oh Versailles! Take me back!!

Bells were heard from Norte Dame everyday...

...and night

The Eiffel Tower was beautiful...

and we couldnt get enough of it!


All good things must come to an end....
well not to a complete end...
just Paris...

we are off to Brussels, Belgium on a speed train.
see you in a couple of days.