life is good

(spinach/ricotta/parmigiana made with our new pasta machine a christmas present for us)

there went the christmas, the visit from Dan, the new year and already at the end of january. time is going fast when you have fun.

we picked up Dan from the roma airport - just 300 km away from us - but a different world. the drive went through countless tunnels; one was even 15 km ! long. the traffic towards the airport was ok, but boy, back was a 2 hour stop and go just on the ring around rome. we decided not to drive into the city ( a must for a tourist - we have not yet visited the 2763 old city) and just head back with Dan in our rented car. (30Euros a day) we stopped somewhere on the road to get some fish. arrived home around 24:00. a 17 hour long day.

the weather could have been nicer for Dan's first visit in Europa. but we had some sun, actually we were sitting outside for his first real italian pizza and cappuccino and could show him some very marchigiana impressions.

this area here was once very heavy populated by the romans and you can find even some amphitheaters and walls/ruins. this are perfect backgrounds for the living nativity scene in the middle of roman rural life. they have goats, sheep, soldiers on horses, craftsmen. a busy community and some of the cute soldiers have naked legs under their skirts (around freezing temperatures!).

the second presepio vivente was even bigger, the whole village must have been turned in roman citizen, it starts at 17:00 and ends 3 hours later. the preparation takes 3 months to built all this - we read that on the poster:

he saw also the hunters with their dogs trying to shoot 'something'...hunters drive fiat panda 4x4, a great car to get around on gravel roads, very small, but it is possible to get 6 hunting dogs in the trunk....

another pure italian custom is the Befana. she is an old witch and the one who brings the presents. but on the 6th of january. around christmas you bring/get presents -mostly something to eat in a decorated basket. we had luffas, dried chillies, some straw-flowers and flat bred with herbs, Jon made them with help of our new pasta machine to give away. i got my present at christmas: a 5kg jar of nutella...... will see how long that will last - it has already a big hole in it.

that means don't drink and fly

we brought Dan back to Rome after a wonderful week with him.

pizza arugula hmmmmm

we learned the absolute best time to drive to the capital is at 2:00 in the morning. the long tunnels all for us alone, no slowing down, no get passed in wild maneuvers zooooooom.

we are ready for spring, the first flowers are coming out of the ground, narcissus have big flowerbuds, the snowbell is ringing the spring melody, and the plumtree makes already (too early silly!) flowers. i know it will all be drowned in snow at one time but so far - life is good.