This is the Title of my Amazingly Creative Blog Post.

Today I found that, suddenly, after my span of writer's block, I have so much to say.  So, here I sit, typing till my fingers are numb, thumbing through our thesaurus for acceptable adjectives, editing and uploading pictures, spinning in my desk chair and racking my brain attempting to fit the word "discombobulated" into my post somehow.  Yes, blogging world, I am back.

Over the past few weeks nothing very exciting has happened. Besides our trip to Italy.  So that is the purpose of this post.  To "sum up" our trip to Italia.

Day #1 was spent driving through the Alps.  It was about a six hour drive that took us around a bazillion (or seven) and a half hours.

Day #2 was spent touring Venice both on foot and in a gondola. It is a beautiful city, but both my mother and I agreed that if all the crowds would just disappear, then it would be even more wonderful.

Day #3 we didn't do anything big.  Just shopped at the market in Citadella (I bought some snazzy sunglasses that look VERY european *cough* :P).

And then there was "Cooking with Giancarlo".  My dad had arranged with Francesca (the owner of our rental) for Giancarlo to come over and teach us how to cook some real Italian food.  I learned how to skin a tomato. :P

Day #4 we went to Verona and visited Juliet's balcony.

Day #5 (our final day in Italy) was spent puttering around some of the smaller cities near Citadella.

Every three years there is a huge festival held in this town in September.  Everyone dresses up in medieval costumes and one of the many activities is the "human chess game" that they play here in the square.

^My Italian sunglasses :P^

Saying goodbye to (in Bear's words) "Italy's house".

Day #6 was our drive home with a little detour to Salzburg, Austria.  We got to visit several of the 'Sound of Music' sights while we were there.

This is a photo taken at the 'trick fountains' of Hellbrunn castle.  The trick fountains can be summed up as a 400 year old water park.  Abi was brave enough to volunteer for this activity and was rewarded with a shower.  See the holes in the benches?  Water shoots out of those holes when a certain switch is flipped by our all too willing tour-guide.

This is the music theater which is operated by water.  In the words of our tour-guide, "No pumps! No power! Only water pressure!!"

And then the last stop before home.  The "I am sixteen, going on seventeen" pavilion from The Sound of Music.  Unfortunately, they had the doors locked.  If that had not been the case I would have been jumping from bench to bench singing at the top of my lungs. ..... Maybe it was a good thing the doors were locked ....

~RM

Photo credits to my dad :)