Bulla Regia and Dougga and Kelly!

Yesterday we went on a tour of Dougga and Bulla Regia. Dougga is a very well-preserved Roman town with a lot of great history and stories to be told through out. Bulla Regia is an underground town that is only partially exavated, but very cool. The mosiacs found on the floors here were awesome. Anyhow, we all had a great time. The way up Ash mixed juice, cheetos and chocolate pastry (another of my mother of the year moments:))....it came out about an hour later in a fabulous milkshake on her and I in the backseat. And poor Max got a bit hot and decided to hang his big, fat tongue over the headrest and onto Ash and I where his amazing breath and thick drool made the trip most enjoyable. Lets just say...my patience was tested and the limit was reached and passed a few times:) But honestly we did have a good time. It's great to have Kels (my brother)here and we even got brave and tried Boar for lunch. I had a hard time getting past the looks of it, but he seemed to enjoy it. Oh and we loved his DJ skills...the girls were getting quite the indocrination to all music. They're favorite of the trip was Beastie Boys song "Girls"!

It is what it looks like...toilets!

These are snails!

The flowers were gorgeous!

The Trip!

Ok, so all of the pics are posted in the following blogs dated April 26 from our trip last week. We had a fantastic time and it was really nice to get away. I would have to say for the first time too that it was nice to come home as well. I actually feel like this place is home (kinda) and it was nice to know we had a place to relax even when we got back. The girls did well. Ash met new friends at Hoss's conference and Bri just wanted to go home and see her friends..but I still think she had fun. The pic above is of the girls on the final leg when we were driving to get on the ship. They were being absolute monsters and just couldn't get along so their dad turned off the DVD player and told them to go to sleep...it wasn't two minutes later they were out cold!

Also, I've included some pics of our Max. He seemed to have tons of fun while we were away. He stayed at the co-worker's house and was king of his domain. The door to outside was left open so he could come and go as he pleased and he even figured out their ice maker (ice is his favorite treat) so he was able to get that any time he wanted:) Oh, and boy did we hear about how much the girls missed him the ENTIRE trip. Everyone they met heard about their "brother"... And yes he does hang his weiner out on occasion and that is dirt on his nose (he loves to dig and we love him!)

Milan

We didn't take too many pics here. It had the feel of a big city and was entirely different than any other place we visited. The architecture was a mix of old and new. You'd see a massive old building with marble and carvings right next to a tall building with the black reflective windows for a front. The church was amazing, but we didn't have our camera and we were on standby for Da Vinci's "The Last Supper" painting but never made it in. We had lunch with the person who does Hoss's job in Milan and his wife and kid. We knew them from Japan and they took us to a great resturant. We rode the subway everywhere since there wasn't parking, Ash loved the subway; And Brielle is still asking to ride the trains!

Just walking

The behind shot.

We ate SO much McDonalds...we don't have it here.

Brielle and Sophia. The one's who do the same job in Milan.

I don't know what he was doing.

Ash took this one.

Playing in the rain.

Brielle loved the pigeons.

Playing the the square while we tried to see The Last Supper.

Genova

We pulled into and out of Genova. It had the feel of Santa Cruz, for anyone who's ever been there. We managed to find a small carnival thing by the aquarium and it was great for letting out energy before the long ferry ride. On an interesting note. There was an organized demonstration going on there for the democratic party (not sure of why) so we had to be careful and were only able to visit half the park.

We took this pick of a "pirate ship" because we thought it rather ironic that they were flying the Tunisian flag!

We always manage to find carousels.

Another pic of the pirate ship

Sweetheart.

She was waving at daddy.

A crazy ball, slide, bounce house we found. They loved it.

I tried to get them to say cheese, but I gave up. They were too busy.

Make's me remember the carousel in Rhode Island and good memories of my dad.

Our attempt at holding the camera ourselves.

The Leaning Tower of Pisa

Here is Pisa. It was a sweet, cute little town with amazing history and buildings and people. We came for the tower, but left feeling like it was the least that the town had to offer. I wish we could have spent weeks here enjoying the life around us. As we were driving away I was scanning through the pics we had just taken and Hoss kept saying "you're missing it". Every corner had another beautiful sight that really embodied everything Italy had to offer to us specifically.

Me and Ash

My handsome man!

Family shot

Silly girl look at the camera.

I just thought this was funny because she has the same shape as the dome behind her.