Tuscany, Day 4: Florence

Florence is a very cool city! It is considered the birthplace of the Renaissance. There is awesome shopping, architecture, history, food, and scenery. The duomo (church in the center of town) was the prettiest I've seen yet. There were so many beautiful colors of green and coral. It was lovely. We had fun walking across the Arno river on the bridge and seeing all the mopeds (we even saw two Italian men get into a fight over a car accident...scary!). The David, by Michelangelo is amazing {although we had to explain the nakedness to our kids}. I am truly awestruck at the detail that he carved out of a solid slab of marble...wow! We censored the pictures for you! We sat down for some amazing Italian cuisine...yum. Matt couldn't stop raving about the white sauce. J loved the spaghetti! We saw several versions of Pinocchio {who was apparently Italian}, and the boys drooled over the Ferrari museum. We had more Gelato, my fav is the Mango and J and G each got hats. Matt score some Italian silk ties for 3 EURO each and I walked away with some beautiful boots, sigh. October was a great time to visit this amazing area in Italy. We enjoyed low 70's and high 60's...just perfect for walking around in all day. We took the train from our villa into Florence, but the kids walked for over 8 hours that day. We walked till we dropped. Our last picture is us and the Ponds' making our Italian hand motions. We had TONS of fun. The Ponds' were awesome to travel with and took more pictures than me! {so they didn't mind me hanging back for pics all the time}.

Tuscany, Day 3: San Gimignano & Volterra

These are two beautiful medieval cities as well. The Tuscan charm was unreal and the drives up to these cities on different hills was breathtaking. We enjoyed weaving in and out of the skinny roads and the tall buildings. Of course we enjoyed some gelato too. We loved the food and the Italian people, they are all so friendly.