My Favorite Barcelona Pictures

This was actually my second time in Barcelona, I went in June 2009 with some girlfriends. Crazy enough, I think I'll always remember that first trip as when I found out Micheal Jackson died. Anyways, I think Barcelona was my favorite place we went to on this trip. I like walking down Las Ramblas and looking at the vendors and artists. 

We did Barcelona on our own as well. It's really easy to get off the boat and take a bus to Las Ramblas. From there we walked down the street, then took the subway to see La Segrada Familia, the Catholic Cathedral originally designed by Gaudi. 

Barcelona wasn't as hot as some of the other places we went, and Las Ramblas was actually pretty decent for the middle of August.

The munchkin took lots of naps in her stroller on the trip. Isn't she such a happy sleeper?? haha

After Barcelona we had a full day on the boat while we made our way to Naples!

My Favorite Cannes Pictures + Marseilles

We didn't book any excursions in Cannes, and decided ahead of time to explore by ourselves. It ended up being a pretty short trip; as soon as I got off the boat and felt the heat I knew I just needed to get Lily back and relax (sleep) so she wouldn't be exhausted by the end of the week. 

Cannes seemed to be just a beach resort town. We walked a long the beach, which was really beautiful and looked like a stereotypical beach scene with all the colorful umbrellas. Oh yea, and some seriously tan French people! Skin cancer must run rampant there.

We ate lunch at a place along the coast, stopped to take some pictures, then headed back to the boat.

The next day we docked at Marseilles, and Jim and I decided not to even get off the boat. We had a feeling it was going to be just like Cannes, so we decided to save our energy for Barcelona and Naples. Greg and Susan went out without us and reported back that we didn't miss much. 

Favorite Pisa and Florence Photos

The first excursion we took from the boat was to Pisa and Florence. This was a "do-it-yourself" tour, which means we basically just paid for the shuttle service to and from the cities, and a tour guide on the bus. Our first stop was Pisa, and there isn't much to do in Pisa except look at the tower and take pictures. You can buy tickets to walk up to the top, but we knew we weren't doing that with a baby in tow. 

Next Stop: Florence! We had about 3 hours in Florence, which gave us enough time to walk around and see the highlights and get some real Italian pizza and pasta. 

We chose our lunch location just based on the fact that they had air conditioning, pizza and a place to sit, and it turned out to be the best pizza of the trip (in my opinion). I realized half way through our meal that this was Lily's first experience with pasta...what a spoiled little girl! First time eating pasta and pizza and it's authentic!

We saw Il Duomo, the Catholic Cathedral, and walked across Ponte Vecchio. There were lots of artists set up on the streets painting and selling their art. Jim and I saw a painting at the very beginning that we both like, then decided after walking 3 hrs that we wanted to get it and found out it was 175 euros. Crazy! Needless to say we didn't buy it, but the artist was selling another painting equally expensive at the time. 

I need to get on the ball with recapping our trip before I forget it all!

First Day of School

Of course at this age it's just day care, but for some reason it makes me feel better to call it school instead. I guess I hope she's learning something knew instead of just being babysat. 

We attempted to take a few pictures this morning. I had to get some kind of picture with her new outfit and new backpack!

She did great! We dropped her off at 8, and she walked right in and started playing with some toys and barely said bye to us. We heard some tears when the door shut and she realized we were leaving, but by the time we got back to the front entrance where we could see her on the video monitor, she had stopped crying and was playing. I picked her up at 12:30, then we came home, had a bottle and went down for a nap (she didn't nap at daycare, which doesn't surprise me). 2 hrs later, and she's still sleeping!

I'm thankful the babies don't have to wear the uniforms and I can get some use out of her cute clothes :)

Jim and I went to Starbucks afterwards, which was really nice. Then I came home, napped for about an hour, then swept and mopped the floors. It's so much easier to clean when I don't have babyzilla following me around everywhere!

She will go three mornings a week: Sunday, Monday and Wednesday. I'm hoping to use the time to get homework, cleaning and errands done so my evenings will be more free. 

My Favorite Rome Pictures

We arrived in Rome at about 7 am on August 13th. Taking an overnight flight was a big mistake. The munchkin was wired and running around everywhere. On the flight to Bahrain she did fine except when she had to be strapped to my lap during take off and landing, and all the flight attendants immediately rushed over and asked if her ears were hurting her. Nope! She's just being a little toot! As soon as she was free to roam she was fine.

She was completely wired while we were in Bahrain for two hours. Thank goodness we had business class tickets because the business lounge had an awesome children's area with toys and she could run around without bothering anyone and we didn't have to chase after her. 

We immediately checked in to the hotel once we arrived in Rome and all took a 4 hour nap. The time difference was only 2 hrs, but since she didn't fall asleep on the plane until 2 am Dubai time, it was like we all had jetlag anyway.

That afternoon we went to the Trevi Fountain and the Pantheon. 

{Trevi Fountain}

On day 2 we got up, ate breakfast, then went right back for a nap! That afternoon we went to the Spanish steps and got a drawing (caricature?) done of all 3 of us. It took way longer than we thought, so that's pretty much all we did! Lily fell asleep on the walk back to the hotel so we stopped for our first gelato. The whole menu was only in Italian so I just said "chocolate and vanilla?" hoping for the best, and he understood me. It was delish! It was a yellow vanilla that tasted like yellow cake, and the chocolate tasted like brownie batter. YUM!

{Lily sitting for her portrait}

{The finished product. What do you think?}

Later that afternoon while waiting for Jim's parents to arrive, we walked across the street to a little park and let Lily run around. It was her first time on one of these little bucket swings, and she loved it!

{Swinging in the park}

{Lily getting a ride through the park}

On Day 3, we made a quick trip to the Colosseum in the morning before we had to take the train to the port and board for our cruise!

{Us at the Colosseum}

{Inside the Colosseum}

Fast forward to the last day of the trip. We disembarked from the boat in the morning, then took the train back to Rome. We had one last afternoon in Rome before we left the next morning, and we booked a tour of Vatican City. We saw the Sistine Chapel, St. Peter's Basilica, and the Vatican Museum. We had a great tour guide that was American, so she was easy to understand. 

{Hot and sweaty on the train}

{All of us outside of St Peter's Basilica}

{Walking around the courtyard in Vatican City}

{Running around outside of the Basilica}

Overall, I really liked Rome! There's a ton of culture and arts there, and I would love to go back and see more. We took it pretty easy since we had Lily, so we only hit the highlights. You never know, we may end up there again someday. There's lots of places I never thought I'd go to again and I did (Paris!).

31st Birthday

Happy birthday to me!

For some reason saying I'm 31 sounds so much older to me than 30! I guess now I'm *in* my 30's instead of just 30. Oh well, moving on!

We attempted to go out to eat at the Cheesecake Factory, which just opened here in Dubai in August. I thought if we got there before 6 we would be fine. Nope! It was a 3 hr wait! I'm not sure what kind of food people think they have, but I don't think it's worth waiting 3 hrs for. 

Instead we went to PF Changs, which was yummy. The munchkin did fine as long as she was running around. Once we got to our table, she did fine as long as she was eating. But once she was done eating, she was DONE. She does not like sitting in her high chair longer than necessary, and she pretends like she just wants to sit in my lap so I will take her out. Eventually I gave in and took her out, but she sat it my lap for 5 seconds then squirmed out, ready to run around again. Granny came to the rescue and took her back out into the mall to run around. Next time we will get a babysitter!

It was Jim's mom's last night in town, and my dad is back in town from his crazy adventures in Afghanistan, so it was nice to celebrate with so much family!

Jim came home last night from taking his mom to the airport and told me he was going to sleep in Lily's room and get up with her in the morning so I could sleep in. That was probably the best present ever! I slept until 9 am. Jim's mom has also been getting up with Lily every morning since she's been here. I've had an awesome 2 weeks of sleeping in till at least 7 am every morning. I guess it's back to reality tomorrow!

Life, According to My iPhone

Apparently knowing how to hold a purse is in her genes, because I never taught her to do this. She just walked out of her room one day carrying her purse over her arm.

Jim put a headband on her and she cheesed for the camera. Doesn't she look like a totally different baby without her hair in her face?

I took her walking around our little market near our apartment right when she started walking full time and she thought it was the best thing ever.

This is a t-shirt one of her friends gave her for her b-day. Isn't it awesome!

This was in the business lounge on the way to Rome, and she was having a blast running around this little area we blocked off with chairs. We thought she would have run off enough energy to crash on the first plane, but nope! She stayed awake until 2 am.

Finally crashed! I followed pretty soon.

Once we got to our hotel in Rome, Lily decided to help me unpack. We were only in this hotel for two nights, so I was not planning on unpacking everything!

Walking around a park near our hotel

This is back in Dubai. She was running around the food court at the mall wearing her new birthday shoes. (This picture is for Aunt Katie)

Still carrying around that purse!

I'm way behind on blogging! The amount of pictures we have and the many places we went to that I want to recap is overwhelming, so I'll probably just do random posts every now and then of each city. I'll do my best to get caught up!