Recent purchases

About a month ago, we ordered a wine rack from an Italian store on base. I saw one in a gals house and loved it, so we placed our order.  They delivered it last week.

Pretty, huh?

It even has a place to hang your wine glasses, however, ours are too big, so I hung our sangria glasses

There is also a guy who comes to the BX once every few months who sells these amazingly beautiful paintings. Every time he comes I eyeball them and have loved them.  This time, we bought one.  I picture doesn’t bring out the colors in it, for that, I apologize, you may have to come visit me to see it :o)

We also got a water color while in Rome with my parents this summer. Finally got around to taking it to be framed, I think it turned out really well.

It’s been 24 days since Dan has left, some days better then others, but I am doing pretty good.  Spring time is beautiful in Italy, so that’s definitely helping! Hope everyone is having a wonderful weekend!

Bored much?

I’ve been busy with work this past week, but still was bored around the apartment.  I’ve been seeing just about everyone posting pictures on Facebook of brooms standing on their own. Weird.  I didn’t really try it because I didn’t think it would work, but I gave in….. and was shocked. It actually stands on it’s own! Now…if it would only sweep on it’s own, that would be even better! 

Some people say it has to do with a gravitational force, but looking online other don’t believe that. I’m not sure what causes it to stand up…but it does and I never thought it would.  I,  of course, joined in the Facebook madness and posted a picture on my wall. 

Crazy, right? Especially because it’s slanted and our tile floors are kind of slick. I let go of the broom expecting to catch it when it fell.  I didn’t try and plant it either, just stood it up and let it go, can’t believe how easily it stood.  Whatever the reasoning is for it….it made my day!

Bye, Byes

Another dreaded deployment.  Need I say more?  Dan left a little over a week ago for 4 weeks of training and then is headed straight down range until mid October.  During his first deployment, we were apart just over 6 months, this time will be about 7.5 months.  I think that’s one the hardest parts for me, realizing how long it’s going to be. 

This was a picture when Dan got home from his last deployment

He didn’t tell me that he was coming home, I walked in the door from work one day and there he was..on one knee with a proposal. Totally shocked me. Best surprise ever!  Before he left this time, I asked him, “Can you please tell me when you are coming home this time?”  He of course said yes.  I have to say though, it was nice not worrying about him making it back, finding out that he was delayed…all the things that happen as they are on their way back.  It was nice just walking in one day, not expecting him and him being there.

Here’s to hoping that Dan stays safe while deployed and that the time flies for us both.  I will miss him like crazy.

Lake Como

The second day in Milan, we decided to get on the Metro, to the train station to get to Lake Como. We weren’t too sure what to expect, but figured that we were close so we would check it out. 

The day happened to be really, really windy!  It was kind of crazy, actually.  It’s a pretty small town, although Lake Como is huge and extends pretty far North, I think that Lake Barcis near us is much more beautiful.  We walked around the town, rode the gondola to the top of a mountain to look down over the town and lake, ate lunch and headed back to Milan. 

We wanted to get on a ferry and head to Bellagio, but the ferry left at 11 and didn’t get back until 6pm, with the hour train ride back and all that wind, we decided not to go.  When we got back to Milan we headed back to the main square where the Duomo is to see what else was going on.  It was a nice trip, glad we got to see Milan!

Carnevale Parade in Aviano

Last weekend Dan and I went to Aviano to see what was going on there.  There wasn’t much going on in the square,  so we walked around a bit and saw a crowd of people waiting by the street, so we waited for the parade to come through.

It was a weird parade, in all honesty. Their floats where interesting, most of them had bars on them and the people were pretty drunk.  There were mostly adults in the parade, which I thought was interesting, but the kids that were included would come up to you and throw confetti right in your face.  We were finding confetti for days, in our car and here at home.  It was pretty interesting.

Bar in the back of a float

Some guy, who I’m assuming was drunk, came up and showed us his crack…gross. If I had to see it, so do you…LOL

Interesting parade, but I prefer Carnevale in Venice…much more fun and MUCH better costumes!

3 months?

I guess it’s been 3 months since I have written a blog….oops.  Things have been pretty busy with working and unfortunately, I ‘m on the computer all day at work, so that’s last thing I want to do when I get home is spend a lot of time on the computer.

Dan and I had a great Christmas and New Year, nothing too exciting, but we at least got to spend it together, which was nice.  He’s been taking some more classes for his Masters Degree, so he’s been busy with that for the last few months, I believe he only has 2 more classes left!

Dan is going to be deployed, he leaves for training in less than 30 days for 6 weeks, then goes straight to his deployment, so he won’t be back until Oct sometime. I’m not looking forward to it, but he wants to go and has wanted to go since we have been here, so I am glad that he gets to go.  He deployed once before, we were living in South Dakota at the time, he went Nov-May, missed all the major Holidays, our birthdays, anniversary…just about everything.  I am sad that he will miss the last summer we have in Italy though, as we are supposed to PCS in April 2013.  We have some visitors lined up for when he gets back and have some traveling we want to do as well, so hopefully we will have enough time for it all. 

I will try my best to be better at blogging, just not too much besides working going on at the moment. 

Hope everyone has a great week!

Festa Della Zucca (Pumpkin Festival)

A few weekends ago, Dan and I attended the pumpkin festival that is held here every year.  We didn’t get a chance to go last year, so we decided to check it out this year.  It took us about 2 hours to get there, we went on Sunday morning and arrived around 11am. We were lucky as there was no traffic to get into the town.  We parked and walked about 10 minutes to get to the town. Venzone is an old medieval town with it’s walls still up around the town. It’s a pretty neat town, just not with so many people in it. When we first got there, it wasn’t bad. We made our way to the main square, got some food and watched some things that were going on it the streets.

 

Getting close

Walking into the town from where we parked

About to enter through the town walls

A picture of the town wall

First thing we saw….donuts filled with pumpkin deliciousness

Then, I got a pumpkin and ham pizza and Dan got pork on a pumpkin roll

The center of town

They take pumpkin carving to a whole new level

Little bakery stand

People were performing with flags as the band was playing

This little building held mummified bodies, I believe there were 6 of them in there

My neighbor told me that this church was destroyed in an earthquake in the 1700’s, when they rebuild it, they did so with the original stone and put it back together like a puzzle, everything back in its place

Mummified bodies

We were there about an hour and it started getting really busy, you barely could move. So, we decided to leave.  On the way out we saw the huge line of traffic that was waiting to get close to the town….we timed it perfectly.  It was a long drive just for that, since we didn’t spend too much time there we stopped at a mall in Udine since we were going to pass by it on the way home. Malls aren’t around every corner like they are in the states….so, you stop any chance you are near one.  We didn’t buy anything, just looked around.  All in all, it was a good day for us. Glad we experienced it!