Carving Pumpkins and Emma's room

Today Lizzie was able to invite one of her friends over to carve pumpkins. Since Halloween isn't celebrated here, this wasn't something her friend had ever gotten to do. To make an afternoon of it we started with making caramel apples (another new American treat!) then helped Mathilde and Anna (Mathilde's sister) carve their jack o lanterns. The girls all had a great time getting elbow deep in pumpkin goo. My treat was being able to practice my Italian with Lucia and Catalina, Mathilde's mom and new baby sister. Lucia speaks very good English and is oh so patient with me. Lucia is also an amazing cook (isn't everyone here?) and brought over a delicious torte (shh, don't tell Chris).

I didn't get a picture of it, but originally all three girls had costumes on. Super cute!



I'm getting requests to see pictures of the house, but that requires it to be tidy enough for pictures. Emma's room is almost done, so she got to tidy and get pictures first. We're still waiting for her headboard and footboard, but on Italian time we may not get it until it's time to leave.

Bed complete with stinky cat.



Emma's loft is up above. It's about a 8x6 area that she's turned into a reading/art hangout.
We were able to attach the curtains with removable velcro so that she can have a division of space without damaging the wood.



Nifty removable wall stickers on her door.



All in all it's a really cool room. I'll try to get better pic's at some later point.

Venzone Pumpkin Festival

Venzone is a town north of Udine, but still in the Friuli region of Italy. The drive from our house was a short hour and some, even with a little traffic. If we had never made it to Festival della Zucca, the drive itself would have been worth it. Little towns, gorgeous views of the mountains, fall leaves...
Venzone's walls and moats were built in the early 1300's, but most of the town was destroyed in the 1976 earthquake. I never would have guessed that walking through town today. The whole area was done in a medieval theme down to the merchants, restaurants, and entertainment.

Outside wall and moat of Venzone.



Emma says the sun was in her eyes, I think she looks grumpy. Despite the pictures, she had a great time and even saw a friend from school.



Here's the flyer you get when you donate to enter. There is no set fee, just whatever you choose.


This was the medieval band that roamed the town all day playing. I love bagpipes (and whatever other odd assortment of medieval music equipment they had going on). There were also fire eaters, jugglers, and other entertainment we missed because we were just too tired to stay ALL day.



Us in the square.



Lizzie HAD to take this picture, yes it is meant to be upside down.



Here was the Zucca court, complete with lip synched songs and a whole Italian ceremony. They even threw pumpkin seeds out to the crowd.







Each area of town had a different standard they flew.



Just another view of town.



I couldn't resist getting a few shots on the way home. The "good" shots I missed because I was too busy gawking!



And I haven't even brought up the food yet. What Italian day is complete without food, good, tasty, and plentiful food? Being the zucca fest, everything today was pumpkin. Pizza, doughnuts, sauteed, pies, liquor, whatever you can imagine and plenty you can't. We had a great time sampling everything and I know it's on my list to go back for next year.

Trunk or Treat

Most of our friends and family know Halloween is a James family favorite. In Italy they have Carnival in the spring, and a fest of some sort every weekend, but no Halloween. Instead of having our American children go without trick or treating the base puts together a haunted house and "Trunk" or Treating for the kids. Each squadron or volunteer group puts together a car trunk decorated to the hilt, and they pass out candy. There are some really imaginative people on this base. The Italians are always up for any reason to celebrate, so I'm pretty sure the turnout was almost an even half and half. It was great to see the Italian kids enjoying our American holiday, especially since we have such a great time with all of their festivals.

Emma ran into plenty of friends from school. They all braved the "scary" version of the haunted house. I'm rather glad I skipped that one!



Scary, isn't she?



After not dressing up last year, I got a whole year of grief from the family....



Our friends had a guest in from the states. She braved a flight from NY, a train from Milan, freezing weather, and hundreds of small children (all today!) for an American holiday in Italy. Yeah, Sharon was just cool like that!



Lizzie is reading the Little House on the Prairie series right now... Guess who she is?



We only knew about half these children, but they ALL wanted to be in the picture. Could you have said no? Me neither, they were just too stinkin' cute!



It was a great kick off for Halloween week. On to the zucca festival tomorrow!

Villach Austria

Last Saturday we took a day trip into Austria. There's a town right across the border that's charming, and has a ton of great activities to do with the children.



Here's the front of the St. Nikolas Church with the girls, I, and a new friend (?). This crazy, in a good way, group of Austrians insisted on being in the picture with us.



The historical center is now a pedestrian mall, and it still shows damage from bombing in WW II. It's filled with modern shops, cafe's, and restaurants. The only mistake that we made on this trip was not realizing that Austria has its own "riposa". All the restaurants shut down in the afternoon, we had no choice but to eat pastries and coffee for lunch. Ah, the hardship of Austrian pastries.



We experienced out first roasted chestnuts from a street vendor. No wonder they're in songs, those things were great!



Now onto the really fun part of the trip....
On Villach's website we'd seen a listing for "Monkey Mountain", and how can you not go see something named Monkey Mountain?



I grabbed this shot on the way there, it's a castle that's been rehabbed into a bird of prey sanctuary. After grabbing our tickets for "Monkey Mountain" we hiked up to see it.

The start of the hike....



The finish of the hike....



And some views from the top....






It was closed, but we still got some great sights of owls, and these Griffon Condors.



After looking at the picture you might ask yourself, as we did,"...hmmm. are the tops of the cages just open?". But no, that is a wild Griffon Condor perching on top of the cage. We were able to stand right next to the cage. After seeing the wingspan of these birds, the size of their beaks, and how agitated they were getting with each other, we backed away slowly, with Liz behind us. Here's a good old wikipedia entry on them, looks like we were pretty lucky to see a wild one! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Griffon_Vulture
We dug around the castle grounds for a while.





Then we went down to "Monkey Mountain"..To clarify here, Monkey Mountain is a research, conservation, and visiting station for the Japanese Macaque Monkey. These monkeys are most famous for being the Three Wise Shinto Monkeys (see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil). Evidently the climate in Austria is very similar to their natural habitat in Japan, and the monkeys have thrived. They are also some of the few monkeys in the world that are known to swim and dive. The family units are matriarchal, with the meanest female ruling. Her "vice-president" is a male who is always a very intelligent peace keeper and very socially advanced monkey (how backward is that from most animals?). They do not stay in cages, but are free to roam as you'll see.
Just for a laugh, here are some of the rules that they give you before entering:
1. Do not touch or stroke the monkeys!
2. Do not hold direct eye contact with an individual monkey for too long, they interpret this as intent to attack.
3. Lead your children by the hand throughout the tour.
4. When a monkey approaches too closely, please make way and guarantee a safe distance of at least three paces.
After reading this we had the "safety talk" and entered our guided tour. Most of the others had been on the tour, so they did most of it in English for us.
You quickly realize that everyone else ignores most of the rules, the one exception being to touch them. According to our guide, the monkeys don't like it.











There is no way that I can describe how incredibly cool it was to see these animals up close, and they came REALLY close. I don't know how many times we looked town to see a monkey brush by us. Our guide was incredible and educated us for almost an hour about their habits, intelligence, and quirks. To hear them "talking" and see them running and playing in the forest was an experience I'll never forget.
www.affenberg.com They have an english area on their site if you'd like to learn more.

Raffa's

Raffa owns a local wine shop in Sacile as well as a wine stand on base. She's also a FANTASTIC cook, and even put together her own cookbook of authentic Friulian fare. A few evenings ago Kalynne (the SJA's wife) put together a girls night out where we went to Raffa's home for a privately cooked, and absolutely decadent, meal. Since I've sworn off pork, I was treated to a variety of vegetarian dishes as well as the generally served pumpkin risotto, cheeses, bruschetta, salad, and fabulous dessert. I didn't take part in the unlimited prosecco and wine, but heard from reliable sources that they were fantastic as well.

Raffa's home was incredible. Home magazines and catalogs could take a few lessons. Here is the centerpiece-see that huge fruit? Yeah, that's a real pomegranate.

Raffa preparing our feast. I still can't figure how she fixed all that food with the tiny Italian kitchens and refrigerators they have!

Here's the whole crew: Courtney, Carol, Dawn, Raffa, Kalynne, Sue, and Me.
I had a great night. Good food, good conversation, how could I not? Thanks goes to Kalynne for putting it all together, and a thank you to Courtney for the pictures!

Italians are so civilized.

This morning I dropped the kids off at school, they are both bummed since they were hoping they wouldn't have school today. We got a note home a week ago stating that we, as parents, need to be sure "that appropriate school staff is on hand to supervise children" today. After all, the teachers might strike. The fact that it was so well planned really strikes me as funny, the note itself was REALLY funny. Unfortunately I didn't keep a copy of it. It was funnier yet this morning as all the parents were having a little parking lot party to see if school would open this morning. I'm not sure if this sort of planning is a common occurence, they don't really seem to be big on planning in general, or if this was a major bluff on the part of the teachers.
Last weekend we took the kids to a fundraiser held by our landlord. She runs a horse (and dog) rescue farm a few minutes down the road. They had a live band, chili, german beer, and a huge bonfire. Liz got plenty of dancing time, and we all enjoyed hearing Italian versions of American songs. Plus, we helped to support a great cause. www.zedanranch.de