We're going to need a new sled....Dan's trip to Italy

My brother Dan was here this week. For those of you that don't know, Dan's my younger brother who works at Southwest Airlines back in good 'ol OKC. With his nifty airline connections he was able to pop over here and burn some vacation time before the end of the year. Since we are planning on heading back that way in a few days, that means I get about a solid month of seeing my baby brother...Wow, now that I think about it, that's more than I was able to see him when I lived near him. Dan's a great traveler and after about 26 hours of being in airports and airplanes, dealing with international phone cards that hadn't been activated, and just the general uncertainty of flying standby, he made it here, ready to go.

First big stop on the list was Venice. Most of you know that as of yet Venice has not been my favorite city. I certainly haven't thought that anything is wrong with it, it just hasn't ranked up there in my "wow, I could live there" places. Dan and I took the train down by ourselves while the kids were at school and Chris was at work. Devoid of all the milling crowds that fill it in summer this city finally won me over. It was gorgeous, charming, historic, fun, all the things that I'd heard it could be. We traipsed all over the city from the fish market, to Rialto bridge, and through the San Marco square. But "where are the pictures?" you may ask. Really, the first part of this blog should be empty...it would have been filled with all my brothers pictures of Venice if his awful big sis hadn't accidentally erased them all. Can you cringe with me? (Or it may have all just been a ploy to make sure he comes back, you HAVE to have pictures of Venice Dan.) By the way, this is my brothers second trip through Venice. The first one was a few years back and he was too sick to leave his hotel. Maybe he's just not meant to have a lasting memory of that city.

From Venice we hung around our house a bit. Dan got to see Liz at minibasket practice where she got her uniform...



And her practicing her "game" face.



Scary, isn't she? You should see her on the court.



Here's Dan at our new favorite pizzeria in San Quireno.



Emma's teachers finally, actually, really went on strike the Friday he was here. Emma got to accompany us to the Cordenons market for a little shopping.



This is the view from near the girls schools. We're assuming if fills with water in the spring. What water is in there is like Lake Barcis water. Crystal clear with just a tint of glacial green, and colder than it even looks.





We did plenty of eating with Dan here. Here we are at the restaurant I love in Montereale. Interesting side note. Never have I had a bit of problems with unruly people here. Twice (yes, twice) this day we were places where people were "escorted" out. The first was in our local bar (coffee shop) when a poor drunk guy, who thought he spoke really great english, was chased out. No, we didn't do the chasing. He didn't really bother us very much, but the owner thought he was being VERY rude. The second time was in this quiet restaurant and thankfully had nothing to do with us.



On Saturday we all piled in the old Odyssey and went back to Villach, Austria. Sadly, Monkey Mountain closes in the winter, but we did get to see a giant red chair and have authentic German/Austrian food.



Here's our now traditional pic's with the Saint Francis statue outside of Saint Nikolas church.



This is the bridge you cross into the old town.



The entrance to old town and the market.



I think Liz might have thought the train was going to hit her.



More Santa candy.



And what blog post is complete without a donkey.



Even being bundled head to toe we started getting a little chilled. And what do you do at a Christmas market when you get cold? Kinder punch and Gluhwein always warm you right up.



If that doesn't work a Nutella crepe can be a last resort. Yum.





Sunday morning we had what we thought was Lizzie's first minibasket game (so much gets lost in translation!) Instead it was about 6 local teams who got together and did different games.

This is Liz and her friend Michael. Usually they're picking on each other, this was a quiet moment.



And here's Liz making a basket. She's already saying she wants to play for a HS team.



Dan's last day here we went to our new favorite family activity, sledding at Piancavallo. The ski areas were shut down for lack of snow (?), it just meant there was more room for us.
We've been sledding so much that within a few turns all of our sleds were shredded. Santa may have a new item on his list.

This is what you look like when your sled tears, fills with snow, and you can't stop. Remember, things at Piancavallo are much steeper than they appear in blogs.



One of many wipeouts.



They had the snow machine going, but it was snowing naturally while we were there.



Chris and Dan thought it would be fun to race. Can you see the people running to the side? Yeah that snow was fast, it was a close one.









And a snowball fight...





Dan's last night here we took him down to Sacile out to dinner and through their Christmas market.
This morning it was a 3:30 am wake-up call to get him to the airport in Venice, hopefully he's back in the states by the time I'm done writing this. It was great to have him out here, and I can't wait till he makes it back over again.

Thanks to a friend of mine I've become hopelessly addicted to blogs. This quote was on one that I follow and I liked it so much I felt like sharing.

Our job is to love others without stopping to inquire whether or not they are worthy.

That is not our business and, in fact, it is nobody's business.

What we are asked to do is to love, and this love itself will render both ourselves and our neighbors worthy if anything can.

Thomas Merton (1915 - 1968)