Catching up

Hey, all! It's been a while! Let's see... last time we talked was back in May. To catch you all up, we've had 4 visitors out here since April, we celebrated Kirk's birthday, we've taken a few wine tasting trips, visited Crete, gone white water rafting and we're gearing up for a visit home!

So in April, Kirk's cousin Bridget came out from Turkey. We had a lot of fun taking her around to all the sights out here and cooking all sorts of American food for her. We got to see a couple of new places like Ercolano and the Naples underground city. Then Kirk's friend, Dave, came out from Washington, D.C. and we pretty much did the same thing. Kirk spent much more time taking him around because I was really sick and ended up with pneumonia. I did get to go out to Paestum and Capri with the guys and that was really neat. Our last two visitors were my sister, Kelli, and cousin, Casey. The girls came and spent a week with us before taking a two week tour in Greece. We spent some time at Caserta Palace, Capri, and downtown Naples. It was a nice relaxing week. We think everyone enjoyed their trips a lot and we are so happy that they came out!!!

Greece was great! Kirk had to be down there for the week for work so I flew down with him and hung out with the other wives on the trip. We ate good food and really enjoyed exploring their little port town, Chania. It was a fun and relaxing trip!

We've started collecting wine and we've been learning so much about it. We got an "Italian Wine for Dummies" book as a wedding gift and we've been pouring through it. It's been a lot of fun and we really enjoy going to the little wineries and tasting all the types of wine around here. We've explored Umbria, Tuscany and Campania so far and have big plans for Piedmont. We were in Tuscany last weekend and had such a good time. We visited lots of little hilltop medieval towns and even happened on an amazing antiques market in one of them. Our last stop for the trip was at a wonderful family run winery and the man didn't speak a lick of english. To our amazment, my Italian was good enough to translate most of what he was saying! He ended up gifting us with a bottle of dessert wine called 'Vin Santo' which they do not sell. It's a 5-generation special bottle that they make and only give to friends and family. It is our favorite winery so far and we are going to see if we can help with the harvest in September.

Kirk is on his way to Spain right now for work which leaves me alone with the kitty for the week. The next door neighbor's husband is also with Kirk so us girls are going to hang out this week without them. Then, the day after he gets back, we hop a train up to Rome and fly back to California. We're so excited to see everyone and eat at all our favorite restaurants! We miss people and good food so much! Can't wait to see everyone!!!