Run Lori Run!

Five Years

"One of the remarkable things about love is that, despite very irritating people writing poems and songs about how pleasant it is, it really is quite pleasant.”
― Lemony Snicket, Horseradish: Bitter Truths You Can't Avoid

Gratitude

Things I'm thankful for these days:

• Autumn.  I am trying to be outdoors more this season instead of starting my hibernation too early.  I would rather be inside with a cup of hot chocolate and the whole first season of Downton Abbey instead of raking up this:
  

• This Spicy Peanut Kale Rice Bowl recipe. It is addicting.

                  Bert and I, Colleen and Greg

• Friendship. More specifically, the friendships I've developed through blogging. When I decided to start a blog years ago I had no idea how influential and important your friendship would be.  And I had never met any of my blogging buddies in person until I met Colleen and now she is one of my dearest friends. She reminds me of Joseph Campbell because she's an amazing writer (now published!!!) and because she is a voracious learner.   Sara always has spot-on book recommendations for me.  And Tiffany recently reminded me I should be planting garlic NOW.  And thanks to her I heard this beautiful song. (Yes, I know I must be the only person left on the planet who hadn't heard of them...)

             

• My amazing Bean. I think I will always be afraid that my teenage daughter might turn into an alien at some point but right now I am so grateful to have the relationship we do.  It amazes me sometimes how much love you can feel for one little being- a rumpled up combination of confidence and insecurity, interested in everything, deciding her fate, planning her life, charting her course.  Bubble tea, sushi, sketchbooks, music. Kindness. Silliness. Her laughter drifting down the stairs.

What are you thankful for these days?

Pie

Thinking about Thanksgiving yet?  I'm thinking about pie....

Thirteen

 

 

Ah, thirteen. Where did the time go?  They tell you it'll go by fast...

Is there anything more true?

Beanie, you are an incredible little person: kind, smart, tender-hearted, creative, goofy, wickedly funny- such a cartoon character.  I am so proud of you.

Cinque Terre

Hello gorgeous!  Is this a beautiful place or what?  This is the inland view from the apartment we rented in Riomaggiore. And this is the view to the other side, our balcony looked out over the Mediterranean's Gulf of Genoa and it was more than perfect.

We visited in December and look how beautiful the weather was! It was sunny the whole time and there were even some crazy French people out swimming...

Riomaggiore, which dates from the early 13th century, is the southernmost village of the five Cinque Terre, all connected by trail. The water and mountainside have been declared national parks.

The town is literally vertical and people carve their places into the side of the mountain-- citrus trees, gardens, vinyards.

Multiple times a day we took a maze of stairways to get from the town's main drag to our apartment. That is a lot of stairs ...and no elevators!

The Via dell'Amore or The Way of Love, is a path connecting Riomaggiore to it's neighbor, Manarola and is one of the biggest tourist attractions in the area. 

After World War II, the trail was renovated and became known as a meeting point for the boys and girls from the two towns. A journalist, who noticed all the amorous graffiti along the path, coined the trail’s name: Via dell’Amore. 

Some tourists are put off by the graffiti that covers the trail but it's just part of the history and charm of the lovers’ lane.

Closing a padlock with your lover onto a cable or railing at a lovey-dovey spot—often a bridge—is the current craze in Italy, having been re-popularized by a teen novel. And to profit from this, the hardware store in Riomaggiore sells these locks.

The owner of our apartment met us at the train station and offered to take us on a little stroll to show us around. She met us that afternoon and then... proceeded to walk us over to the next town over! And she has grand children. And she was in heels.  

It was a lovely walk and only further fortified my theory that all Italian woman are in better shape than me.  

She planned the walk perfectly because we ended up at Manarola as the sun was setting.

Manarola may be the oldest of the towns in the Cinque Terre, with the cornerstone of the church, San Lorenzo, dating from 1338. Manarola is known primarily for its fishing and wine-making. The local wine, called Sciacchetrà, is especially renowned. 

Back to Riomaggiore...

The town of Vernazza wasn't accepting visitors due to the flood that destroyed the town last October so we took the train to Monterosso instead. 

It was beautiful but shocking to see how the flood devestated the town. 

The water in the region is amazingly clear and blue and unseasonably warm. But not warm enough for me to join the crazy, swimming French people.

We visited Manarola again on our last day and I took what I think might be my favorite photo from our time in Cinque Terre:

The sunsets here were so beautiful. The scenery amazing. And the food was out of this world too. And, because of our exhuastive research on tiramisu, we learned that Riomaggiore has the best!

It is so hard to rank our experiences in Italy but this was, by far, one of the best places we visited.  It was such a nice change from the hectic pace of Rome and Florence. 

I highly recommend it!

Beautiful Siena

Hello, is this not the picture of Italian quaintness or what? Complete with santa repelling down the building...

As a day trip from Florence we took the train to Siena, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. 

Siena, like other Tuscan hill towns, was first settled in the time of the Etruscans (c. 900–400 BC) when it was inhabited by a tribe called the Saina. 

Photo credit
The medieval Siena Cathedral (Duomo) dates from the 13th century. The exterior and interior are constructed of striking white and greenish-black marble in alternating stripes. And yes, all of the cathedrals started to blur together but I never tired of seeing them! Isn't this Duomo gorgeous?

During the 10th and 11th centuries walls were built to totally surround the city, and a second set was finished by the end of the 13th century. Amazingly, many of these walls still exist today.

Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena is the oldest surviving bank in the world. Founded in 1472 it is still operating today with approximately 3,000 branches in Italy.

Statue of Sallustio Bandini outside the Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena. 

Siena was gorgeous, small, uncrowded and quaint.  We loved it.  However, this was about the time that Bert got sick and he was like a walking zombie, barely able to enjoy the sites.

The streets were narrow and, like Florence, people were out and about all day long.

Why is someone's hanging laundry more photo-worthy in Italy?

Siena is famous for its medieval cityscape and has been divided into wards since medieval times. Each ward (contrada) is represented by an animal or mascot and has its own boundary and distinct identity. Ward rivalries are most rampant during the the Palio, an insane horse race held here twice yearly in the Piazza del Campo. (If you're not squimish there are many youtube videos to watch the race but too many horse crashes for my taste!)

These hills were a workout!

 This was by far the best pizza I have ever eaten!

So there is Siena in a nutshell!  Next up Cinque Terre!

More Florence

So this is my last post on Florence.....sigh.....but then we're on to Siena ~ yay!

Isn't the Ponte Vecchio ("Old Bridge") beautiful? 

We learned that there have been shops on the Ponte Vecchio since the 13^th century! Initially there were all types of shops located here-- butchers, fishmongers and tanners--but together they created a bit of a stench so in 1593, it was proclaimed that only goldsmiths and jewelers could have their stores on the bridge.  We visited the bridge on Christmas day so the shops were closed but it was still a bustling, busy day with people everywhere.

View of the Ponte Vecchio from the Uffizi Gallery.

The Uffizi gallery is one of the most important and most famous art galleries in the world. And we were there! Luckily we had tickets for another skip-the-line guided tour because we heard that in the high-season the lines can be up to five hours long. Yikes!

Paired portraits (c. 1472) of Federico da Montefeltro and Battista Sforza Piero della Francesca.

The Uffizi gallery was built in 1581, under the request of Granduca Francisco de’ Medici. The original design was that of Giorgio Vasari, one of the leading painters and architects of the 15th century. The space brought together under one roof the administrative offices ("uffizi" ="offices") for the Florentine magistrates, the Tribunal and the state archive. 

The Adoration of the Magi by Leonardo da Vinci.

Over the years, parts of the palace evolved into a place to display many of the paintings and sculpture collected or commissioned by the Medici family. 

The Doni Tondo, sometimes called The Holy Family, is the earliest of only three surviving panel paintings by Michelangelo Buonarroti, and the only one to be finished.

The Uffizi gallery had been open to visitors by request since the sixteenth century, but in 1765 it was officially opened to the public.

The Birth of Venus by Sandro Botticelli, Beanie's favorite painting.

Replica of Michelangelo's David in the Piazza della Signoria

Michelangelo's David was created between 1501 and 1504 and is currently housed inside the Accademia Gallery. We weren't allowed to take any photos- flash or no flash- and they made that quite clear. But it was odd because there were plenty of security guards on hand whose only job appeared to be yelling at people for taking photos of the David. 

Giambologna's The Rape of the Sabine Women in the Piazza della Signoria

Benvenuto Cellini's statue Perseus With the Head of Medusa in the Piazza della Signoria

This is the 13th century location of Dante Alighieri's birthplace and around the corner is Dante’s Church.  The church itself actually preceeded the poet by many years but he did in fact worship there. It's one of the oldest churches in the city dating from 1032!

As a child in 1274 Dante first saw Beatrice Portinari, the woman who would become the love of his life. But they were never destined to be together, both marrying other people. Still, Beatrice remained the subject of many of his poems and was cast as the heroine of his Divine Comedy in which Dante called her the ‘True glory of God.’ Beatrice and her nurse are both buried in this church and often next to her tomb you will see flowers and notes with messages to Beatrice written by lovers who, like Beatrice and Dante, are unable to be together.

The Basilica di Santa Croce (Basilica of the Holy Cross) is the burial place of some of the most famous Italians and features sixteen chapels, many of them decorated with frescoes by Giotto and his students.

The original structure was built in the 1200s and the building's design reflects the simple, austere approach of the Franciscans. The Gothic marble facade was added in the mid-1800s by a Jewish architect named Niccolo Matas who incorporated a prominent Star of David into the composition.

It is the largest Franciscan church in the world and legend says that Santa Croce was founded by St Francis himself. 

Machiavelli died in 1527. The epitaph honoring him, in latin, reads: "So great a name (has) no adequate praise."

Michelangelo died in Rome at the age of 88 and his body was brought to the Basilica of Santa Croce, fulfilling his last request to be buried in his beloved Tuscany.

Such was not the case for Dante Alighieri.  He was exiled from Florence after taking a stand against the Catholic church's interference in Florentine daily life. He was sentenced to pay a fine and to serve a two-years exile but he didn’t pay the fine and was therefore sentenced to death.  He lived various places including Ravenna where he died in 1321 at the age of 56. Eventually Florence came to regret Dante's exile but requests to return his remains to Florence were refused. Nevertheless, in 1829 the tomb above was constructed but remains empty.

Galileo Galilei is considered the Father of Modern Science.  He, like Dante, ticked off the Catholic church and therefore was tried by the Inquisition, found "vehemently suspect of heresy", forced to recant, and spent the rest of his life under house arrest. He died in 1642, at the age of 77. 

Leaving the Basilica di Santa Croce.

Skinny Italian Santa. 

You're just walking down the street in Florence, minding your own business...and then BOOM! The Duomo is right there in front of you!  I never tired of seeing bits of the cathedral peeking out from behind the buildings in Florence.

The Basilica di Santa Maria del Fiore (Basilica of Saint Mary of the Flower) is the cathedral church of Florence. The Duomo, as it is usually called, was begun in 1296 and construction lasted 170 years, the collective efforts of several generations. It was engineered in the Gothic style of Arnolfo di Cambio who was also architect of the church of Santa Croce and the Palazzo Vecchio. The dome was engineered by Filippo Brunelleschi.

photo credit

The cathedral complex, including the Baptistery and Giotto's Campanile, is considered a UNESCO World Heritage Site. 

The view from our apartment!

The huge dome is the iconic image of Florence and Filippo Brunelleschi's raising of this dome, the largest in the world in its time, was no easy architectural feat. He invented hoisting machines and lewissons for lifting the 37,000 tons of material, including over 4 million bricks.

At the base of the dome, just above the drum, Baccio d'Agnolo began adding a balcony in 1507. One of the eight sides was finished by 1515, when someone asked the great Michelangelo what he thought of it. The master reportedly scoffed, "It looks like a cricket cage." Work was immediately halted, and to this day the other seven sides remain rough brick. 

Santa Reparata was the old cathedral of Florence until 1412, when it was replaced with the current building of Santa Maria del Fiore. And luckily you are able to go beneath the Duomo to see these amazing relics.

There is even evidence that there were buildings present before Santa Reparata,  dating back to around 780.

So, in a nutshell, Florence amazed us. It exhausted us. It inspired us.

The city was decorated so beautifully, it was a magical place to be for Christmas.

Our condo was perfect. The food was excellent, the brioche were amazing, and the gelato here was so awesome we had it daily.  

And I wasn't sure if taking a 12 year-old on such an expensive vacation was a good idea, I mean would she really care if were were in a 13th century church?  Would she rack up a $200,000 phone bill from texting without an international calling plan?  But, alas, she raved about the art. She drew everyday. She loved the food. And after awhile she admitted she didn't even miss texting her friends!

Mission accomplished.

Forty

                              Beanie, me, my brother Justin, Brandi (Bean's sister) and my husband Bert

Today is my birthday.  My fortieth. 

Four. Tee.

Truth be told it has taken me several months to adjust to the word "forty". Why is that? Why is it that my big birthdays- my 30th and 40th- were a bit harder to swallow but birthday 39 was just a walk in the park? Why is it on these birthdays we step back and look our lives and take stock: what should I have accomplished by the age of 40? 

“WHAT I DO TODAY IS IMPORTANT BECAUSE I AM EXCHANGING A DAY OF MY LIFE FOR IT.” –HUGH MULLIGAN

I googled "bucket list" and man, people have some odd ideas of things they *must* do before the kick the bucket. I have no desire to scuba dive, go to Burning Man or own a Capuchin monkey... but here is my list:

1. Italy
2. Learn to play chess 
3. Learn French
4. Be a good parent. Successfully raise a teenager. (work in progress)
5. Sea kayak in Alaska
6. Go white water rafting
7. Bungee jump
8. Ride a jet ski (well I rode on the back of one, does that count?)
9. Machu Picchu – Cuzco, Peru
10. Killer whale watching in the San Juan Islands
11. Drive across America, coast to coast
12. Try crazy bug food in Asia
13. Celebrate Chinese New Year in China
14. Ride in a helicopter
15. Santa Fe New Mexico
16. Feel an earthquake
17. Yellowstone National Park
18. Get another tattoo 
19. Grand Tetons National Park
20. Yosemite National Park
21. Glacier National Park
22. See a professional tennis match
23. See a professional baseball game
24. See a professional football game
25. See a professional basketball game
26. Switzerland
27. Visit The Elephant Nature Park in Chiang Mai, Thailand
28. Hike on a glacier
29. San Francisco, California
30. Key West Florida
31. Pyramids and Sphinx – Cairo, Egypt
32. Australia
33. Nepal/Tibet
34. Grand Canyon 
35. Las Vegas, Nevada
36. London, England
37. Redwoods
38. Guggenheim Museum – New York
39. Walt Disney World – Orlando, Florida
40. Maui, Hawaii
41. Spain
42. Amazon Jungle – Peru/Bolivia/Colombia/Brazil/Ecuador
43. India
44. Chichen Itza – Mexico
45. Athens, Greece
46. Niagara Falls – New York
47. Day of the Dead, San Miguel de Allende, Mexico
48. New Orleans, Louisiana
49. Oktoberfest – Munich, Germany
50. Take a photography class

And since I have so many culinary aspirations I decided to come up with a culinary bucket list as well:

1. Homemade bagels
2. Pok Pok's Pad Thai
3. Decent cinnamon rolls
4. Banh Mi sandwiches
5. French Crepes
6. Nigella's Sticky Gingerbread
7. Tikka Masala
8. Triple Layer Salted Caramel Cake
9. Fresh pasta
10. Tater Tot Breakfast Casserole (yes indeedy)
11. Pizza a la Colleen
12. Real sourdough bread
13. Tortillas
14. Paella
15. Cioppino 
16. Homemade Yogurt
17. Thai shrimp salad rolls
18. Graham crackers
19. The cheesecake of all cheesecakes
20. Egg rolls

Today has been a lovely day. Went out to breakfast, saw the latest Sherlock Holmes movie, had ice cream for lunch, got Cold Play tickets (yahoo!) and this cookbook, bought some books, went out to dinner and now am crashing: new books + sugar coma = bliss.

Tomorrow I start a new decade.

Bring it.

Merry Bokeh Christmas!

Merry Bokeh Christmas! 

 Lovely Christmas cottage by Magpie Ethel.

Frosty sage in the backyard...

Christmas lights downtown...

Olive dreams in Bokeh...  (If you are a geek like me you have already perused the "Christmas Bokeh" section of Flickr... I highly recommend it.)

I love seeing people's homes all decked out for the holidays, don't you? I like the idea of putting so many lights on my house that it's visible from space.  I am all for having a little santa village in my bathroom. What I can't get into however is the lugging of the twelve huge storage bins up from the basement. So, alas, we have a tree and are calling it good.

So do you guys go all out and decorate your houses inside and out?  Does your electric bill triple during the month of December?  Do you have baubles and snowmen and tinsel in every room in your house? 

DIY Holiday

Ever since I saw this post on Ella's blog, I knew this was something Beanie would love. Using this pen she created an awesome keepsake mug! Care to give it a try? Look at this for some cool ideas....

Other crafty things we have going on include:

Felt ornaments...

Felted sweater fingerless gloves...

Felt bookmarks...

One more felt ornament for a dear friend.

And to top it off, a felt Tardis ornament (albeit a bit wonky) for Beanie because she is a completely insane Dr. Who fan!  Can you tell what the fabric of choice is around here? It's a theme.....

We're on a roll!