Aaaaaaaah AC

Since the bedrooms are upstairs under a thin wooden roof, they get full on sunshine from sun up to sun down, add that to the street traffic and mosquitoes, which make it impossible to keep the windows open at night and it makes staying upstairs during the summer like sticking your body into a small hot oven.  First investmentment we made is for AC in our room and the girls' room as well.

A Real Pool (sort of).

Since we didn't get to have a party for Sophia, I did want to get her a nice present.  It's dang hot and we have more space, so we got her a blow up pool.

Valentina and Sophia initiate the pool.

After they got bored with that, we made magnets with the art set Pietro gave Sophia.

It's been a while since we've had a mirror large enough for Max to shave.  He looks like an escaped convict!

Ahhhh much better.  He was hardly recognizable.

Mondonico

I love pictures of people whole hardily (i thought the word was heartedly, but apparently word check red lines me!) cracking up.  We are on a much needed break, the Wilhelms invited us up to their place in Brianza.  This is the house that Francesca's great grandfather built.  He made his money in the wool industry.  It's now used by her family for weekends and summer stays because sort of in the boonies, but close enough to get some fresh air every once in a while. Trivia:  It's so lovely out here, that, well  remember Mick Hucknall of Simply Red?  He's got a winery somewhere in these parts.

Pietro, King of the Mountain.

Sophia rides her bike along the garden path.

Hunting for bugs is a favorite past time here.

Mom and Dad enjoy the view (my dad is such not an A's fan, but yet give him a free hat and that guy will be plugging ads around the world).

Max is gets on with his favorite past time, bbq'ing.  PS notice the scaffolding behind him, the Salas (Fra's parents, are having to fix the excterior of the house because a woodpecker has ruined it.  I thought they just pecked in trees, but apparently their beaks are strong enough to break stone).   It's illegal to shoot the pests, but people do anyways because otherwise it is nearly impossible to get rid of them and the early morning noise is a real nuisance.

This is the view looking at the town of Mondonico.

I want a house with a cool tower too!

After living in the burbs of Milan for so long, I've almost forgotten what a real forest looks like.

Cute little road and plus I like the simple perspective.

Old Tape and Dealing with the Upstairs Bathroom

We found the world's oldest tape stuck to the door frame, don't know which family left it there and how many never bothered to take it off.

We don't have the time or the money to do everything right away.  We've decided to fix the downstairs first, because that's the part that everyone uses and do the best we can to make upstairs clean enough to live in and use. As for the bathroom: Max's dad took down the old sink and we went to Ikea to get a new one, the toilet will have to be cleaned as best as possible and now I am attempting the tub project:

Got my supplies all set to reseal/polish/shellack/or whatever the heck you call it, to the tub.  The directions are all in italian (or french or german or czech), so I hope I read everything correctly.

The tub was like this.

I have scrubbed and sanded it and things already look better.

Wow!  I followed the directions the best I could, but it was hard to do after inhaling all the fumes.  I think I lost some brain cells.  It looks almost new! (side note:  I thought I said 7 hours not 7 days and I touched the surface last night-it looked dry to me and I left my fingerprints and Sophia saw me, so she did the same thing. Damn. Damn Damn!  side side note: after coming back from the summer it does not look that great anymore, for some reason the enamel yellowed, i mess up trying to take the tape off from around the drain, the finger print part never dried well and looks all grey -ah well at least it's hygenic now).

Snail Foreclosures

My supermega awesome parents (yes I'm giving props!) have weeded both inside our gate and out, leaving these big giant nasty snails without damp places to slither around.  They are coming out everywhere and Sophia is morbidly fascinated. She likes to check them out, but she won't actually touch them.

This is how the strip of garden looks now.  Remember when it was like this:

Inside our gates.

   

Outside our garden.

Dirty Dirt

My dad has been working hard trying to level and clean out the dirt-now that all the weeds are gone we've  discovered that they just used the are as a trash pit.  There are dozens of fruit seeds (none of which grew, that's how bad the dirt is), rocks, chunks of cement, class, broken toys, wrappers and other crap buried in the first layer.  This is the dirtiest dirt I've ever seen!

Not to miss out on the action, Sophia does her part to help.

Guess we over worked the old dude.

Maggie's and Max goes Hoeing Around

My parents are always in search of the areas best ice cream.  We went to Cologno and so they went to Maggie's to taste test against Ranocchio (the gelateria behind our new house).

All the weeds have been picked and so Max begins to break the dirt and prep it for grass.

Back to Work

The Nonni are gone and it's back to work for the Grans (hey their choice to keep busy not mine).

2010 Meeting of the Grans

We took out the old blue sink upstairs and put in a new one, but we havent put the mirror up  yet.  Poor Grandma is using the only mirror in the house to fix her hair.  Things have been crazy busy, Max, my dad and I ran to Bennet (Gemco like store) to buy an umbrella because we don't have a table inside the house large enough for everyone (we've been using our 2 seater for breakfast) but it's dang hot outside now. 

Nonna hugs Vivienne.

Buon apetito.

Moody Soffria giving the evil eye.

The Nonni and the Grans with the grandkids 2010.  Would be a nice picture, too bad for my dad's fancy outfit and the slime on the wall!

 Vivienne pines for her long lost love.

Sophia in her ghetto swimming pool.

Pane e Mate

Grandma got Sophia a face painting set. Yes, I said face painting, but she got it everywhere EXCEPT her face.

Best view around. 

 It took us forever, but we finally found the ol' farm house where The End Of The Year soiree is taking place.

Mom and Dad chat to Carmen (Luigi's mom), whilst Viv does her usual nap. (ps Carmen is was an English teacher back in Peru.  She's getting a crash refresher course talking to my parents.)

These type of old cascina (farm house) were practically a city unto itself.  There was a church, a little bottega for daily goods, cute trattoria, houses and of course a farm with animals.

 The kids went inside for a type of interactive theater, called Pane and Mate (pane means bread, I don't know what mate means).  Since they 'traveled' small room to small room, parents were asked to volunteer to stay outside.  Max and I both did (however I would have loved to see).  After they were through, I asked if my Mom and I could walk around and see.  That's how I got to take the pictures.

 The theme was water and each actor was dressed as a different characted someone was a pirate, one was a samurai and a Polynesian lady.  This was the entry and there were things to touch and clink and clank in order to make sound.

 This room was had the smell of freshly washed clothes and a lady came out to tell a story of travel and water.

 This room used the kids' sense of sight and sound, the lights were dimmed and the kids heard water and then then I assume they were turned back on and using vibrations on a metal dish, the actor made the water jump and splash.

 This was the hall way and these strips of plastic were to make the kids feel as though they were walking through water.

 Stairwell, I dont remember the story, but I liked the fish.

A door, 'nuff said.

 After the show, the actors came out and helped the kids make puppets out of recycled things.

 Caught in the act. Marco bustin chops as usual :o)

The puppet making was such a simple and inexpensive thing and the kids loved it!

Mom and Dad hide in the shade.