Summer so far

Summer has been going great!  Well actually, I am pretty over it.  I am hating the hot weather and am really wanting some cooler weather and football!  Fall is definitely my favorite season.  But, we have had a pretty good summer so far.  We took a trip to Italy with Alex's sister and his grandparents for his grandmother's 85th birthday.  It was mine and the kids first time to Italy and we were really looking forward to having a great time.  I'm not sure what the kids expected, but they both admitted that it wasn't what they thought it was going to be.  For the most part, they had a good time swimming in the pool and swimming in the sea.  However, I am pretty sure they were not expecting how much time we would be spending eating.  I really enjoy food, so this part wasn't so bad for me, but I felt kind of bad for the kids.  We had many meals with Alex's Italian relatives and they lasted hours.  Most of our trip consisted of meeting up with family members and eating.  Alex's family was so friendly and so welcoming.  I don't think we met anyone that I didn't like.  Also, the food was AMAZING, of course, but the kids didn't agree.  Aeson ate scrambled eggs pretty much every meal for a large part of the trip.  He finally graduated to little hot dogs and french fries and then got up the courage to order pizza with french fries and hot dogs on it by the end of the trip.  (This dish was pretty much at every restaurant for kiddos).  Bryden also had lots of hot dogs and french fries, but discovered that pork chops were on one menu and he was in heaven.  He then ate some form of pork for the remainder of our vacation and was one happy boy!  His favorite meal at home is steak, so I guess this was the closest thing he could find to his favorite meal.  I was actually shocked he didn't eat more pizza...but I don't think he liked it too much.  (Crazy, right!?  The pizza was fabulous!!)  Their favorite food of all was...gelato!  They couldn't get enough.

My favorite day was when we took a drive down the Amalfi Coast and we were able to stop in a few little towns along the way. 

The drive was so pretty.  I loved it.  At one of the stops even Bryden said "I didn't know Italy was going to be so pretty".  Then under his breath he said "it's beautiful...."  Love him.  I like that he appreciates other countries.  I wish we could have spent more time on this drive and been able to explore the other towns longer.  If we go again, I hope that we can do some more things on our own time rather than having to rely on having to be somewhere else and feeling rushed.  I also want to see more of Italy and Europe.  We pretty much stuck to Sorrento (other than the Amalfi drive) so we didn't see Rome (except for the airport) or anything else. 

Overall, we had a great time and the kids and I are looking forward to returning someday.