Happy Birthday, Zia Anna!

Happy Birthday, Zia Anna! We hope that you will have a wonderful day!

Here's a picture of Zia Anna with the kids after Mass on Christmas Eve (which continues my very drawn out story of our trip to Italy :) )

Happy 3rd Birthday, Matteo!! (part 2)

Now for the traditional birthday stuff :)

Cake...

Candles...
Balloons (from Aunt Ginny - Thanks!!) ...

Presents ....

and off-key singing :)

Happy 3rd Birthday, Matteo!! (part 1)

Happy birthday, Matteo!


His birthday started with one morning present...

Goggles :)
He's been looking forward to his birthday when we promised to let him take swimming lessons like his big sisters! So, today he started swimming lessons.
Here he is in the pool with his big sisters :) Cati is taking lessons in the class with Matteo. The instructor lets Maria have free swim during their lessons.

In this video, you can see Cati having her turn with the swimming instructor, and Maria giving lessons to Matteo :)

The Carousel

For the Christmas season, there was a carousel set up in one of the squares in Como. Here are pictures from the time that Zio Luca took the kids there :)

Zio Paolo visits (more Italian pics)

It may take me all of 2008 to post our pictures from Italy :)
Here are pictures from Zio Paolo's visit to Nonna's house. It was the one time during our trip that all of the family was together. Paolo took the train up from Rome, and Zio Stefano drove from Chiavenna (we saw him 2 other times during our stay). It was a wonderful day!

Meeting Zio Paolo at the train station...



Getting ready to eat :)

With Zio Paolo and Zio Stefano...

Everyone!

Back row (left to right): Luca, Angela (holding Chiara), Dany, Maria in front of him, Paolo (all in black), Michele, and Stefano.
On the couch (left to right): Anna, Giovanni (holding Cati), Nonno, Nonna (holding Matteo), and Marco.

Getting ready for Christmas

Preparing for an Italian Christmas...









Putting up the tree...

Decorating...

Setting up the Nativity...

Chiara's warming-up to the family

Chiara's definitely a mamma's baby, so it took her a while to warm-up to everyone in Italy. But, we did get a couple of quick photos with Nonna and Zia Anna.

First days in Italy

We were all very tired after flying overnight and missing a night of sleep, but we were happy to arrive and see everyone!

The first thing Matteo did was run and give his name-sake, Nonno, a big hug!


The the kids all started playing with the toys...

and coloring...

and playing games :)

The kids were so happy to see all of their zii again!

What we don't have a picture of is Dany scavaging the kitchen to have a snack of his favorite foods: salame and bread!