Max’s 8th Birthday

 

Munich, Germany – 40th birthday trip! (and 15th Anniversary!)

 

Piemonte, Italy

We spent fall break in Piemonte, Italy, near the hilltop city of Moncalvo. We rented a very nice apartment in an old 17th century farmhouse where we relaxed, read books and ate wonderful meals prepared by Måns.

We visited the nearby towns of Moncalvo, Grazzano Bagdoglio, Asti, Alba and Turin. Alba was having it’s annual truffle fair.  Måns almost couldn’t stand the smell but the kids and I loved it.  They weigh the truffle and slice shavings onto your pasta and you have to pay by the weight. I’m glad I stoped her quickly.  I was already up to 10 Euros!  In the rest of town, there were many tables on the streets selling both white and black truffles.

Turin was nice.  We visited a park and a castle as well as a fake medieval town that was built in the 1800s so actually it was still a bit historical. We went to the Mole Antonelliana, the tallest building and symbol of Turin. Inside, they have a wonderful Film museum.  We also took the glass elevator to the very top for a stunning view over Turin.

Texas 2014

We are back from our yearly Texas trip!  This year Måns tried a fried Snickers bar, the boys discovered the joys of riding a lawn mower, we finally visited the Beer Can House in Houston, spent a lot of time with crabs and turkeys, had a stormy 4th of July and ate so many hamburgers that we couldn’t stand to look at them the last week.

Weight gained: 5 pounds
Injuries sustained: 5 (1 by Max, 4 by Leo)
Ice cream consumed: 30 scoops

Sicily 2014

For Måns’ 40th birthday, I took him and the kids on a surprise trip to Sicily.  They had no idea where we were going until we got to the airport!

We rented a beautiful house with a 5 minute walk to our own private beach.  We also could walk to the little village of Scopello and have lunch or drive 10 minutes to Castellmarre del Golfo, a bigger town.

We visited Palermo.  Our first thought upon entering Palermo was, “We should probably get out of here before it gets dark.”

On another day, we took a ferry from Trapani to Favignana, one of the Egadi islands.  We tried to rent scooters to drive to the beach, but after seeing me almost crash mine in the first 2 seconds I got on it, the owner simply said, “no” and rented us a car instead.

And then after spending the day in the hot sun and on the beach, we took the ferry back and went up on a mountain to the town of Erice.  Erice is a mediaeval town which is so high up that it usually has its own personal cloud.  The temperature at the bottom of the mountain was 25c (77f) and the temperature at the top of the mountain was 15c (59f).  We looked completely ridiculous in our shorts, but it was amazing to be inside a cloud.

We of course passed the volcano Mount Etna, which I thought the boys would love, when in fact they were terrified we would all get covered in lava. So we skipped that tour.

The day before we left, we went to the beautiful city of Cefalu and spent a night in Gardini Naxos.  It was a wonderful trip.  When we all boarded the plane home, dressed in our summer clothes and sweating from the 27 (80) degree weather, the pilot announced that we would arrive in Stockholm to 10c (50f) and rain.  The entire plane groaned.